Page 418 of Rosetti Family New York
The choice crystallizes with brutal clarity. Not between the man who raised me and the man who claims to love me. Between stopping a monster and becoming complicit in genocide.
I think about Matteo's patient amber eyes, the way he said he'd wait for me as long as it takes. About Dom's quiet authority, Leo's wild humor, Besiana's unexpected kindness. About all the people who work for them, who depend on them, who will die if I stay silent.
Then I think about Chase, about the way he's shaped every aspect of my life for fourteen years. About the gratitude I've carried like a weight, the loyalty that's defined me since I was nine years old.
But that loyalty was built on lies. Everything I thought I knew about him, about myself, about my place in his world—all of it constructed on the grave of my parents.
He's not my savior. He's their killer.
And now he's planning to kill again.
I stand on unsteady legs, my decision made. Whatever consequences come from this choice, whatever it makes me, I can live with it. What I can't live with is doing nothing while he murders an entire family.
The hallway stretches before me, leading toward the library where voices still murmur behind closed doors. Each step feels like crossing a bridge that will burn behind me, cutting off any path back to the woman I used to be.
But maybe that woman was always an illusion anyway. Maybe the real Isabella Callahan is the one walking toward that door, ready to choose the lives of people she cares about over the lies that have defined her.
Ready to become someone who acts instead of someone who simply endures.
The library door looms ahead, and I raise my hand to knock. On the other side lies the end of everything I thought I knew about myself.
And the beginning of everything I choose to become.
23
Matteo
The intel Isabella brought us yesterday changes everything.
She's been sleeping in her own room for three nights now, insisting she needs space to process everything about her parents. I wake up reaching for her every morning, my body aching for the weight of her curves pressed against me. The scent of her perfume still clings to my sheets, driving me insane with want every time I close my eyes.
I can't stop thinking about the look on her face when she told us about Chase liquidating twelve million in art. The way her voice cracked when she described Libby Donaldson's call. How she'd connected the dots herself: her uncle raising money fast, preparing for something massive.
Something that would destroy us.
My brothers are already gathered in the war room when I arrive. Maps spread across the mahogany table, laptops open, the smell of coffee and violence thick in the air. Rafe looks up from satellite photos, his expression grim.
"Isabella was right," he says without preamble. "We found the warehouse."
The photos are spread across the table like evidence at a crime scene. Industrial compound in Queens. Remote. Perfect for staging a massacre and making it look like we orchestrated it. I flip my coin between my fingers, metal warm and familiar against my palm.
"Explosives?" I ask, though I already know the answer.
"Rigged to blow," Rafe confirms. "Fire suppression disabled. Arms deals staged to look like our suppliers. We even found bodies in cold storage, waiting to be planted as casualties."
Leo slides a tablet across the table. "Security footage from three blocks away. Chase's men have been moving equipment for weeks."
"He's not just trying to disappear," Rafe says quietly. "He's staging a massacre and wrapping our names around it."
Leo slides a tablet across the table. Security footage shows Chase's men moving equipment, setting the scene. My jaw clenches watching them work with military precision. This isn't revenge. It's theater.
"He's not just trying to disappear," Rafe says quietly. "He's trying to make us disappear."
The coin flips faster. Chase Callahan isn't content with starting a war. He wants to destroy us completely, frame us for something so horrific that even our allies will turn. Then he walks away clean while we burn.
"We don't wait," I say, catching the coin in my palm. "We end this. Tonight."
Dom straightens. "Matteo."
