Page 15 of Crown of Blood

“Make sure she sleeps.” A pause, like there's a hidden message I don't understand in those words. “She’ll need her strength.”

My stomach twists.

“Tomorrow,” he says, voice calm, almost casual.

“She becomes a Ravelli.”

Chapter Four

Luca

Thedoubledoorscreakopen like a warning.

Inside, the Ravelli mansion’s inner sanctum waits—an oil-painted mausoleum dressed up in power. Heavy wood panels line the walls, soaked in cigar smoke and blood-soaked memories. Generations of Ravellis stare down from their portraits, all stern brows and cold eyes, like they're daring me to prove I belong here.

I walk the length of the room, each step echoing off marble.

Vito Ravelli, my father, sits behind his desk like a dying god on a throne. The oxygen tank at his side wheezes in time with his breath, tubes snaking under his nose like serpents trying to keep him tethered to this world.

But don’t be fooled by the atrophy—there’s steel in his spine still.

The fire that burns white hot remains, the kind of evil that’s burned entire empires down.

The oxygen machine beside him hisses again, a mechanical heartbeat counting down his remaining breaths. One glance at him and all I can see is his once-powerful frame has collapsed inward, his cheekbones now almost sharp enough to cut glass… but his eyes remain unchanged.

They remain cold. Calculating.Disappointed.

"You're late."

I move to stand before him, not sitting until invited. Never sitting until invited.

The portraits of dead Ravelli's stare down from the dark walnut panels—generations of men who lived and died by the same code that's branded into my bones.

"The Malenko situation is handled." I keep my voice flat, emotionless. The way he taught me. "Permanently."

Vito's skeletal fingers tap once against the leather armrest. "The leak?"

"Sealed." I don't mention the girl. Not yet.

My father studies my face, hunting for weakness. For hesitation. For the slightest crack in the armor he forged around me since childhood. I give him nothing.

"And the merchandise?"

"Rerouted through Marseilles. Dante is overseeing delivery personally."

He nods, a barely perceptible movement. His oxygen tank clicks, pushing another breath into his failing lungs.

“You were sloppy again, Luciano,” he mutters, adjusting the rings on his skeletal fingers. “That floor was meant to be empty. Someone broke protocol.”

A long silence hangs between us like a guillotine.

Then, before I can say anything, my father's dark eyes sharpen. “The girl.”

Fuck.

Of course he knows. He always fucking knows.

Even with one foot in the grave and a machine breathing for him, Vito Ravelli misses nothing.

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