LOGIN“Mom… Mom” Isabella called as she walked out of her room, she woke up minutes ago and didn't find her mother in bed. She walked to the kitchen,it was empty and Isabella prayed it wasn't her fear creeping in. Valerie had , her eyes drifted to her door. Valeria was gone. She ran to the room, her eyes scanning the whole room for what was missing.
Everything looked untouched, Isabella took a minute to think what she could possibly take. She had no money hiding anywhere in the house, nothing significant so she went back to the sitting room. Isabella Sat down and was massaging her temple while trying to process how she would go about the new day when she caught a figure at her door, the next minute the door was pushed open and Delaney stepped in looking concerned and confused. “Isabella,are you okay? Why is your door opened?” Delaney asked. “Delaney” Isa started and Delan went to her pulling her into a hug. “It is okay, whatever it is… but don't leave your door openlike this again and …” she pulled Isa out of the hug and looked at her face “ why were you ignoring my calls?” She asked. “Your calls, I wasn't…” Isabella paused as it dawned on her, “my phone,” she said suddenly “ my phone” Isa withdrawed from the hug and hurried into her room , Delaney followed her watching her rummaged through her bed, her drawers. “ Did something happened? Isa, talk to me…” “My mom” Isabella paused while trying to catch her breath “My mom happened” she said and Delaney gasped going to meet her where she stood by the drawer. “ You let her in again?” “ She came last night looking battered… I couldn't…” tears took words from her and Delaney went to her pulling her into another deep hug “ how am I going to reach out to Jason? He's going to be worried, he's going to lose focus…” “ Isabella Hart, catch your breath” Delaney said holding her face “ I came because I found you a job” “What?” Isa paused amid tears. “ Yeah, the man I told you about reached out to me some days back for your curriculum vitals, I sent it to him and he called me this morning to tell me you got a job” Isabella gasped “ …I don't know what job it is but it's a big company and you're getting well paid. You are scheduled to resume today and permitted to be there on or before 10pm because of the impromptu appointment. I've been calling all morning, you need to dress up, I'll drop you off at the company” “Oh heavens” Isabella said, she pushed her cinnamon coloured hair back as Delaney spoke. “ Now, get up.” Delaney said “ Go shower and get dressed, I will be waiting for you” she said. “ Delaney, thank you so so much” “ Now time is going” Delaney said and Isa chucked while hurrying to the bathroom. #### Kevin Zacchaeous sat in a cafe having his breakfast. He was tired of being in the penthouse and giving order, he wanted air. He wanted to see people and how beautiful their lives could be and how quickly he could snap it out of them. As he sat by the corner in the restaurant, his eyes caught a lady hurrying into the cafe. She was another beautiful lady with quite nice features, deep brown hair and eyes darting as she ordered her meal at the counter. He smiled wondering how a grown up could look so much like a doll instead and fascinated by her, Kevin watched her grab her two bags of takeaways and his eyes trailed the Benz s-class that she turned to enter. There was another lady at the passenger seat with her cinnamon hair packed in a ponytail and just as the car started moving, she gave a quick glance at the cafe. It was a fleeting moment but Kevin's heart stopped, he sat staring at the leaving car while wondering what was wrong with him. He had seen that face, that side look but he couldn't place where. “ Ladies of Los Angeles” he chuckled and went back to his meal. Since he had arrived in Los Angeles, every lady that caught his attention only tended to remind him of the first he met at some restaurant. It clicked. The lady with the ponytail had her hair color or maybe. He has only met her once and it's crazy of him to think his brain had registered every of her features. And that was why he had assigned Stanley to find her with the cost of his life on line. #### “ I think there's a cafe around that block,” Delaney said and Isa turned to her. “ Don't go through that stress, Delaney. I am very much good…” “ I am famished, Isa and I wouldn't have you go to an interview on empty stomach” Delaney said pulling up at a restaurant “ ma, I wouldn't take much of your time”she said jokily, got down and disappeared into the cafe . Isa sat in, she began to wonder if her brother had ring her line, if he was worried and she thought of contacting him through Delaney when she got back. Soon enough, Delaney pulled the driver door and got in, handing her a bag of her order. “ There's some handsome man in there but he stared so much I was uncomfortable, I couldn't even look back” Delaney said as soon as she got into seat and locked the door. Isa turned to see who but Delaney already ignited the engine and was driving while fastening her seatbelt. “Maybe he's a fan” Isabella said. “ Creeping me out with his eyes… Isabella eat up, I got you smoked salmon bagel and cheese cream” Delaney sai, eyes on the road. “ I will” Isabella said then paused “ I want to talk to Jason, I don't want him to be worried about me and…” “Relax” Delaney rubbed Isa’s leg with her other hand on the wheel “ Jason would be having lecture by now. I will come around to check up on you once I'm done with my meeting” Delaney added and Isabella relaxed, bringing out the bagel to feed on it and she was still eating when Delaney pulled into Kade Enterprise.Victor admitted it to himself first. The thought was bitter. “It’s possible, isn’t it? The message… it could be from the same person. The one who set up Rome.”Isabella moved to the window. Her back was to him. City lights reflected in the glass. She was thinking. He could almost hear it. She was going over everything she learned since coming back. She was more like Felix than she knew. A planner. A fighter.“How many knew your exact moves that night?” Her voice was low. Careful.Victor paused. He counted in his head. The inner circle. The ones who handled the most secret info. “Four. Me included. My security chief, Vincenzo. My consigliere, Marcello. And Seth.”“Four.” She turned. Her eyes narrowed. “Three others.”“Three others,” he confirmed.“And how many of those three are still… active?” She hesitated on the last word.“Two,” Victor said. The old suspicion weighed on him. “Vincenzo is gone. Died a few years back. Natural causes.”“Leaving Marcello and Seth,” she said, her ga
Isabella felt her phone buzz as she walked away from Victor’s office. His anger still felt close, like heat on her skin. Another unknown message. Her stomach turned. She thought it might be from Cora. Another threat. Another taunt. But when she read it, cold fear ran through her. Worse than anything Cora had sent._Don’t trust the man keeping you safe._ _The same hands that held your father while he died… are the hands now holding you close._Isabella’s breath caught. This wasn’t Cora. This was different. Her blood went cold, then hot. Every part of her wanted to delete it. To pretend she never saw it. But the words were already stuck in her head. She was done being kept in the dark. Done being used.Without thinking, she turned around. The door to his study was still open. Victor sat at his desk again, staring at papers. A half-empty glass sat under the lamp. He looked up, surprised, when she pushed the door open wider.“Isabella?” His voice was calm, but his jaw looked
The words were stuck in Victor’s throat, thick and heavy like old oil. He hated this. He hated the way his stomach twisted, a familiar cold knot forming low in his gut. Protecting Isabella felt like a constant battle against forces he couldn’t always see, and now, calming her was no longer part of that equation. Keeping her calm was the opposite of what he had to do. This was going to break that fragile peace they’d somehow cultivated. But she needed to know. She deserved to know.Victor pulled out his phone, the screen felt hot in his hand, and turned it around without a word. The image filled the small space between them, stark and intrusive. Isabella, standing by the sandwich cart, her dark hair catching the light, a small, unconscious smile on her lips. A moment of normal, weaponized.Her eyes, usually so expressive, widened just a fraction. It was fleeting, a ripple across a perfectly still pond. Then, the stillness settled in, cold and sharp, like winter ice. Victor recognized i
The words were stuck in Victor’s throat, thick and heavy like old oil. He hated this. He hated the way his stomach twisted, a familiar cold knot forming low in his gut. Protecting Isabella felt like a constant battle against forces he couldn’t always see, and now, calming her was no longer part of that equation. Keeping her calm was the opposite of what he had to do. This was going to break that fragile peace they’d somehow cultivated. But she needed to know. She deserved to know.Victor pulled out his phone, the screen felt hot in his hand, and turned it around without a word. The image filled the small space between them, stark and intrusive. Isabella, standing by the sandwich cart, her dark hair catching the light, a small, unconscious smile on her lips. A moment of normal, weaponized.Her eyes, usually so expressive, widened just a fraction. It was fleeting, a ripple across a perfectly still pond. Then, the stillness settled in, cold and sharp, like winter ice. Victor recognized i
The dead line hummed in Victor’s ear, a stark reminder of Cora’s words. Thirty seconds. He held the phone to his ear, listening to nothing, absorbing the silence that now filled the space where her frantic voice had been. Kevin was coming. Kevin knew about the necklace. He had killed someone for it. Victor lowered the receiver slowly, the plastic cool against his palm.“Seth!” he bellowed, his voice rougher than he intended.A moment later, crisp knocks sounded on his door, and then Seth entered, closing it softly behind him. He looked at Victor, a question in his eyes. Seth was good at picking up on shifts in Victor’s mood, always had been. Today, the shift was a seismic event.“Cora called,” Victor began, the words tumbling out, almost tripping over each other. He told him everything. Her terror, the hurried warning, the name: Kevin Moretti. He described the necklace, the specific way she’d spoken about it, connecting it unequivocally to Felix. And then, the chilling detail—the woma
Victor’s fingers tightened around the phone, the plastic digging into his palm. It had been thirteen years. Thirteen long years since she’d vanished, a ghost in the wind, leaving nothing but questions and a gaping hole in his life. He’d torn the city apart looking for her, chasing shadows, clinging to scraps of hope that always turned to dust. Now, a voice, a whisper from the past, was making his blood run cold.“Cora?” he breathed, the name a foreign sound on his tongue after so long.“Yes, Victor. It’s me.” Her voice, softer now, but with an underlying steel he remembered well, sent a shiver down his spine.His mind reeled, trying to process the impossible. “Where have you been? Why… how?”“I had to disappear,” she said, her tone flat, devoid of emotion. “It was the only way to survive.”“Survive what?” The words tumbled out, laced with a decade of frustration.“The information I possessed,” she explained, a sigh escaping her lips. “It made me a target. Staying alive wasn’t easy,
“What happens now,” Isabella said, her voice quiet but steady as she sat across from Victor and tried to keep her hands from shaking in her lap.Victor did not answer right away and she did not rush him because she was busy turning his last words over and over in her head, slow and careful, the sam
“Why does Kevin matter to you this much when you barely say his name without your jaw locking like that,” Isabella said, her voice already tired.Victor did not answer immediately.“I asked you a question,” Isabella said again, softer this time, “and I am done pretending I do not notice when your e
“I am going to need you to start from the beginning,” Isabella said as she followed Victor into the study, her voice controlled but tight, like she was holding herself together by force rather than choice.Victor closed the door behind them without rushing, then walked past her toward the window li
“I cannot keep doing this in my head alone,” Isabella said under her breath as she shut her bedroom door behind her and leaned against it for a second like the wood itself might steady her thoughts.She walked a few steps in and stopped because sitting felt like admitting she was falling apart, and







