The drive to wherever they were taking me after I was sold was the slowest and darkest stretch of minutes I had ever lived through. The hum of the engine was low and steady, but to me, it sounded like a death march. Every bump in the road jarred through my body, reminding me I wasn’t free, reminding me that I belonged to someone now.

The last few days flashed behind my eyes, every memory, each sharper than the last. The betrayal. My father. The auction. The hammer striking down like a curse. I blinked rapidly, but the sting in my eyes only worsened. My hand drifted down unconsciously, pressing lightly against my belly.

My baby. My tiny, unborn baby that hadn’t even taken form yet.

I thought of Elara and Damian, the only people I had believed I had in this world.

The first tear slipped down my chin before I even realized I was crying. Then another. And then it broke from me all at once, I wasn’t just crying, I was wailing. Loud, broken sounds tore through my chest, echoing in the enclosed space of the car.

I cried for my father. I cried for my baby. I cried for myself. And I cried for whoever waited for me at the end of this drive.

Valerio Moretti.

He wasn’t even in the car with me. He rode in another, separate and untouchable, while I was pushed like cargo in this one. My new owner.

Was he going to resell me? Was I just a temporary purchase, a body to be bartered and traded like weapons and jewels? Would I wake tomorrow in another country, another bed, another cage?

I had heard whispers about him. Dangerous whispers. Conversations dropped to murmurs when his name surfaced, lips trembled as though even speaking of him was risky.

Valerio Moretti.

A man whose empire stretched across cities like a dark tide. A man whose fortune was carved out of blood-stained money, illegal trades, and power so vast even politicians bowed to him.

They said he never forgave. Never forgot. That one wrong glance could cost a man his tongue, one careless word his life. Rivals didn’t linger in his shadow…they vanished. Consumed in fire and smoke, their empires swallowed whole overnight.

But it wasn’t just fear attached to his name. It was something heavier. Respect. A respect born not of admiration, but of survival. Fear so deep it bent into obedience. He wasn’t just dangerous. He was untouchable.

And yet fate or Seraphina’s cruelty had placed me directly in his path.

My stomach turned cold.

I remembered the way he had looked at me during the auction. Not a glance, not even a stare, it was something sharper, something that cut straight through me. And when the hammer came down, when the world sealed my fate, I knew in that instant I had been sold to the devil.

The car came to an abrupt stop.

The door yanked open without warning, and a rough hand shoved me out . I stumbled, my legs stiff from sitting too long, the ache of the poison still lingering in my veins.

And then I saw it.

It wasn’t a house. It wasn’t even a mansion. It was a fortress.

Black Iron gates rose higher, with spikes that looked like thorns. Beyond them were black stone walls. Glass windows stared back as guards stood at every corner, rifles resting casually in their arms, their faces were unreadable. Their eyes slid over me as though they were measuring my worth, calculating my price.

“Move!” the driver barked in my ear, shoving me forward.

My legs felt weak, as though I had forgotten how to walk. The ground tilted beneath me, each step a reminder of the poison residue still lingering in my body. I winced but forced myself forward, my worn out shoes tapping faintly against the rock.

Inside, it was no softer.

The marble floors were so polished they mirrored my pale reflection back at me. I hated it..hated how small I looked, how out of place. Chandeliers dripped from the ceiling but the light they cast was dim, as if designed not to warm. Oil paintings of dead men with stern, pitiless eyes lined the walls, watching me as I passed.

Cold…Everything here was cold. The air. The floor. The walls. The silence.

It wasn’t a home.

It was a kingdom.

And Valerio Moretti was its merciless king.

My chest tightened until I thought I would suffocate. My palms were sweaty my dress, my breath caught. I wondered…would he be cruel? Would he touch me? Would he destroy me the way everyone whispered he destroyed others?

And then I heard it.

Footsteps.

Slow, Heavy and Deliberate. The sound of leather against the floor, They were unhurried footsteps, the kind that belonged to a man who had never been made to rush a day in his life. Each step landed with authority, as if the entire house held its breath, bracing for his arrival.

I froze where I stood. My skin prickled, my stomach knotted, and for a moment the silence was unbearable.

And then he appeared. He stepped into view

Tall. Broad. His presence filled the hallway before his voice ever could. His suit was black, cut to perfection, tailored so sharp it might as well have been a weapon. His shirt was open at the collar, a small rebellion against the suffocating elegance of the house. His dark hair was slicked back, precise, not a strand out of place. But it was his face that trapped me…the severe line of his jaw, the faint scar that cut across his cheekbone, the mouth that looked carved from stone.

And his eyes.

God. His eyes.

They were not just dark, they were bottomless. Piercing. They didn’t look at me, they looked through me, stripping away every pretense, every shield. In that gaze I felt exposed, undone, like every secret I had ever carried was being weighed and measured in an instant.

He didn’t need to speak. The silence he carried was its own command.

My knees nearly buckled. My lips trembled, words caught in my throat. He was fear himself, he commanded the atmosphere’s aura.

Valerio Moretti.

Now I understood.

Why men bowed.

Why women trembled.

Why his name was never spoken above a whisper.

Because he wasn’t just a man. He was power made flesh.

I was his.