2025-04-23 14:15:12You can only play god for so long before your creations turn on you.
Loyalty isn’t free. It’s paid for in favors. Fear. Blood. And once the scales tip? Even kings fall. Two days after Isabella’s confession, I called a meeting with my remaining allies. No suits. No rituals. Just steel and silence. Viktor sat closest to me, arms crossed, always watching. Gio leaned forward, tapping a cigarette against the table, eyes flicking to Isabella every few seconds. Even he wasn’t sure whose side she was on. I didn’t blame him. Neither was I. “Matteo has holes in his circle,” I began. “And we’re going to fill them with corpses.” Gio grinned. “I like this plan.” “Good. Because it starts tonight.” I pushed a folder across the table. Inside: names, photos, addresses. Matteo’s lieutenants. Not the public ones—the shadows behind the throne. Three names. Franco Talese. Ivo Marchese. Elena Neri. Each one vital. Each one untouchable. Until now. “We take them out,” I said, “Matteo starts bleeding.” “And if they’re protected?” Viktor asked. I smiled. “Then we kill the protection first.” Franco was first. Old school. Cautious. Lived in a fortress of cameras and concrete. But even the cautious bleed. We hit his convoy on the autostrada at midnight. Two SUVs. Six men. All dead in minutes. I pulled Franco from the wreckage myself, blood dripping from a gash across his scalp. He begged. I didn’t listen. “I want Matteo’s current supplier,” I said. “I don’t—” I jammed a blade between his ribs. He screamed. Then gave me a name. Tobias Crane. A foreign broker. Low-profile. Efficient. And apparently, untraceable. Until now. “Thank you,” I said. Then I slit his throat and left him in the road like roadkill. One down. Two to go. Ivo was next. A numbers guy. Cold. Smart. Ran Matteo’s laundering empire from a compound outside Palermo. Getting in was impossible. So we got someone inside. Isabella. It was her idea. “I used to work with Ivo,” she said. “He respects me. If I say I want back in, he’ll listen.” “And if he suspects a trap?” “Then he dies faster.” I didn’t like it. Too risky. But she was the only one who could pull it off. So I let her go. And waited. And waited. It took hours. I paced the war room, staring at maps and messages, watching the clock tick like a bomb. Then finally—her voice. Over comms. “He’s down,” she said. “But there’s a problem.” “What kind of problem?” “He wasn’t alone.” I swore. “Matteo?” “No. Elena. She got away.” My heart dropped. Elena Neri was the sharpest blade in Matteo’s arsenal. She used poison where others used bullets. And her loyalty ran deeper than blood. “Get out of there,” I snapped. “Already on my way.” Isabella made it back with bruises and a limp. But alive. We stitched her up in the study. Her jaw was tight. Silent. Something simmering just beneath the surface. “You okay?” I asked. She nodded. But her hand wouldn’t stop shaking. “I didn’t expect her to be there,” she muttered. “She knew. She knew.” “What do you mean?” “She looked at me like she’d been waiting for this moment.” “She was.” Isabella looked up, eyes dark. “She’s going to strike.” I nodded. “Let her. We’ll be ready.” But even as I said it, I knew something was off. Elena wasn’t just going to attack. She was going to erase us. We reinforced the mansion. Tripled security. Checked every exit, every code, every face. I didn’t sleep. Neither did Viktor. But the strike didn’t come that night. Or the next. Which only made it worse. Because silence? That’s the sound before the storm. On the third night, the trap was sprung. Not on the mansion. On Gio. He didn’t show for the morning briefing. Didn’t answer calls. Viktor found him slumped behind the wheel of his car, eyes wide, throat slit clean. No blood in the car. Because it wasn’t his. It was mine. The same model. Same license plate pattern. A message. “She thought it was you,” Isabella said quietly. No. Not thought. Wanted it to be. “She’s sending a warning,” I said. “Next time, it’s not a message. It’s a massacre.” I turned to Viktor. “We hit first. Tonight.” He nodded. No hesitation. Because when war calls, hesitation kills. Elena’s base was a penthouse downtown. All glass and gold and bulletproof arrogance. We breached at 3:12 AM. Smoke. Steel. Flashbangs. She was gone. Just her guards—dead within two minutes—and a single note on the desk: “He was mine before he was yours. – E.” I stared at it for a long time. Then crushed it in my fist. “She’s playing you,” Isabella said. “She’s trying.” “She’s close. You need to stay sharp.” I turned to her. “And you? You still with me?” She didn’t blink. “Always.” But I saw it then. Something in her eyes. Not betrayal. Memory. And that’s when I realized… She knew Elena. Not just by reputation. But personally. Intimately. And she hadn’t told me. Not once. That night, I asked her directly. “How long did you work with Elena?” She froze. Not even trying to lie. “Two years,” she said finally. “Back when I was deep in Matteo’s circles.” “Were you friends?” Her jaw tightened. “No.” That meant yes. “Why didn’t you say anything?” “Because it was complicated.” “Uncomplicate it.” She turned, fire in her eyes. “She was my partner. My shadow. We did things together that would make your nightmares look tame.” I stared. “You trusted her?” “I trusted no one. But we survived together. Until she turned on me.” “Why?” “She said I got soft. That I was weak for caring about Rafael. For leaving the life.” “And now?” “Now,” Isabella said, stepping into my space, “I want her dead more than you do.” I believed her. But I also knew one thing. This wasn’t about strategy anymore. It was personal. And personal? Gets messy. Fast. Later that night, we got a call. No voice. Just audio. A looped recording. My voice. Begging. Screaming. From years ago. The night I got my first scar. I hadn’t heard it since. Didn’t even know it was recorded. But there it was—echoing through the speaker like a ghost. Elena’s voice followed. “Everyone breaks, Luca. Even you. Especially you.” Then silence. I stared at the speaker until it went dead. Then I punched the wall hard enough to crack bone. Isabella didn’t stop me. She just watched. And when I turned to her, blood dripping from my hand, she stepped forward and kissed me. Not gentle. Not sweet. But like war. And that night, we didn’t sleep. Because sometimes, the only way to forget the pain… Is to drown in someone else’s.
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024: Ghosts of the Throne
I wasn’t sure how long I stood there, staring into the black metal mask that gleamed like death itself. The air was heavy in this underground chamber—an unsettling, clinical coldness that felt more like a morgue than a meeting room. And maybe that’s what it was. A place where lives were dissected, then buried, out of sight and out of mind. “You’ve been orchestrating this since the beginning,” I said, my voice low, cutting through the silence like a blade. “But why? What do you gain from all this?” The masked figure tilted their head. “That’s the wrong question, Luca. The right question is—what did you lose?” Behind me, Marco shifted, his hand resting casually on his hip—near his gun. He was tense. So was I. But pulling a trigger in a room full of secrets would be suicide. We were outnumbered. Outplanned. And possibly already out of time. “I lost everything,” I replied. “My family. My name. My control. You stripped it all from me.” A pause. Then the mask cracked—figuratively, not
023: The Reckoning
I stood there, frozen, my mind struggling to process everything. The words Isabella had spoken were like daggers, cutting through what little trust I had left. She had played me—no, we had all been played. And I didn’t even know who the real enemy was anymore. The man in the sleek black mask watched me closely, waiting for a reaction. Marco was silent behind me, his presence like a shadow, barely noticeable. I couldn’t even bring myself to turn around and face him, not when the answers I so desperately needed were right in front of me, just out of reach. Isabella stepped forward, her heels clicking on the concrete floor as she approached. The cold, calculating look in her eyes told me everything I needed to know: she had no regrets. She didn’t care about the betrayal. It was all part of the plan. Her plan. The thought twisted my stomach. “Luca,” she said softly, almost as if speaking to a child, “You’re so predictable. I told you, from the very beginning, that I didn’t belong to yo
022: The Unseen Players
The warehouse was eerily quiet as Marco and I stepped deeper into the shadows, the sound of our footsteps muffled by the thick layer of dust that coated the floor. The only light came from the faint glow of a streetlamp just outside, its pale beams filtering through the cracked windows. I couldn’t shake the feeling that we were being watched, even though no one was in sight. It was as if the very walls of the building were alive, whispering secrets, secrets that I was too late to uncover. My hand tightened around the gun, the cold steel a reminder of the gravity of the situation. “You ready for this?” Marco’s voice broke through my thoughts, low and strained. His eyes darted around, every corner of the warehouse scrutinized. I nodded, but I wasn’t sure if I was ready. How could I be? Everything I thought I understood about this game was wrong. Isabella’s betrayal, Viktor’s lies, even Marco’s sudden reappearance—it all pointed to one thing: I was just a pawn in someone else’s hands.
021: The Broken Mask
I thought I was done. After everything that had happened—Viktor’s betrayal, the blood on my hands, the lies, the manipulation—I figured the game was over. But nothing was ever as simple as it seemed. Not with Isabella. Not with this world. I barely made it out of that room before the weight of what I had done hit me. The walls of the mansion seemed to close in around me as I walked, each step echoing louder than the last. I didn’t know where I was going, but the need to escape, to find some semblance of control, drove me forward. I couldn't go back. Not after everything. Isabella was still out there, somewhere. And I was going to find her. But there was more to it than that. I needed answers. I needed to understand why, after everything, she still thought she could play me like a pawn. I thought I had known her. But she had hidden so much from me. My thoughts were a whirlwind of confusion, of betrayal, but one thing remained certain: I wasn’t the same man I had been when this all s
020: Point of No Return
I couldn’t breathe. My chest felt tight, as if the weight of the world had been placed on my shoulders and it was crushing me, squeezing the air from my lungs. Viktor was gone. Just like that. One moment he was breathing, the next, his life had been ripped away, and I was left with nothing but the aftermath of my own mistakes. His blood stained the floor, his eyes wide and empty. I should’ve been the one to die. I should’ve been the one to fall, not him. I was the one who had dragged him into this mess. I was the one who had made every choice that had led to this moment. I reached out, my fingers brushing against his cold skin, and it felt like the last piece of humanity inside me shattered. He was my closest ally. My brother in arms. And I had failed him. And for what? To play a game with a woman who never cared about anything other than her own power? I was nothing but a tool, a puppet in her hands. I stood up, my body trembling with the force of my rage. The gun was still in my
019: Betrayal’s Edge
I didn’t know how much longer I could keep my grip on reality. The world felt like it was spinning out of control, every decision I made leading me further into darkness. But I couldn’t stop. I wouldn’t stop. Not after everything I had sacrificed, not after all the lies, the blood spilled, the promises broken. This was the only way forward, the only way to survive. Viktor was barely hanging on, his body weak, his breaths ragged. But I wouldn’t let him die. I couldn’t. He had been by my side through all of this, and I owed him more than just my loyalty. I owed him my survival. “Stay with me, Viktor,” I said, my voice tight, forcing calm into my words. The pain in my shoulder was becoming unbearable, but I ignored it. Focus. I had to focus. Viktor’s eyelids fluttered, his grip on my arm weak but steady. “You’re... not going to win this, Luca. She’s too far ahead. Too many steps ahead of you.” I clenched my teeth, the rage rising again. “Don’t talk like that. I’ve fought harder than
018: The Final Game
The weight of the gun in my hand felt heavier than ever. Every breath I took was shaky, every thought fragmented by the moment of reckoning that had arrived. The sound of the wind rustling through the courtyard was the only thing that broke the tense silence hanging in the air. But it wasn’t enough to calm the storm inside me. Isabella stood before me, her eyes locked onto mine, the challenge in them clearer than ever. She wasn’t afraid. She wasn’t backing down. And it made me sick to my stomach to realize how far she was willing to go to destroy everything I had built. The woman I had trusted, the woman I had let in, was no longer someone I recognized. I didn’t move, not at first. I couldn’t. My entire body was locked in a battle between revenge and reason. What had I become? Was this who I was, who I had always been? The man who would do anything to survive, even if it meant tearing down everything I had ever loved? Isabella tilted her head slightly, studying me, the faintest smi
017: The Reckoning
The silence was suffocating. The kind that presses down on your chest, forcing the air out of your lungs, leaving you gasping for breath. It was the calm before the storm, but it wasn’t the kind of calm I was used to. This silence was heavy with the weight of betrayal, a warning of what was coming. I sat at the war room table, the map in front of me blurred by the sharpness of my thoughts. Elena’s men were closing in, and Isabella’s treachery still hung in the air, like a toxic cloud, tainting everything I had worked for. I had underestimated her. I had let my guard down, trusted someone who wasn’t worthy of it. And now, I was going to pay the price. But I wasn’t about to let it end like this. Not without a fight. Viktor stood beside me, his expression grim. “We’re down to the wire, Luca. If we don’t act now, we’ll lose the upper hand.” I nodded, my fingers tapping on the table as I considered our next move. “I know. We’ve got one shot at this.” The plan had to be perfect.
016: The Price of Trust
The world didn’t feel real anymore. One moment, everything had been falling into place: the strategy, the power, the promise that nothing could tear my empire apart. Then came the gunshot, and with it, everything I thought I understood about loyalty shattered. Isabella. My right hand. The woman who had been more than just an ally—more than just a tool in my game. She had been the thread that held everything together when I couldn’t. She was my lifeline. And now, she had pulled the trigger. I couldn’t believe it. The weight of it crushed me, pressing down on me like a suffocating force. Isabella’s eyes locked onto mine, the gun still hanging loosely from her hand. Her lips barely moved, but when she spoke, her voice was venom. “You’ve been so blind, Luca. So damn blind.” My heart slammed against my chest, every beat a reminder of the betrayal that was unfolding in front of me. I’d known something was off, I’d felt it in the air, but I refused to see it. I thought I could control
