Finally, he called a halt. I collapsed onto the mats, gasping for air, my whole body trembling with exhaustion.
Dante handed me a bottle of water. "You did well."
"I feel like I got hit by a truck."
"You'll feel worse tomorrow. But you're stronger than you look." He sat beside me on the mats, close enough that our arms almost touched. "Your mother must have been a fighter too. You have her steel."
"Rosa said that last night." I took a long drink of water. "You knew my mother?"
"No. But I knew of her. Catherine Chen was legendary in business circles. A woman who built an empire from nothing in a male-dominated industry. That takes more than intelligence. It takes ruthlessness.
Determination. The ability to fight when everyone expects you to break."
"She taught me to be strong. But I don't think this is what she meant."
"Strength takes many forms." Dante's voice turned contemplative. "My mother wanted me to be a doctor. Respectable. Clean hands. A life far from the violence my father lived in."
"What happened?" I turned to look at him, seeing the first glimpse of real vulnerability since last night.
"My father was murdered when I was eighteen. Shot in the street like a dog by the Volkov family." His jaw tightened. "The Russians. They'd been at war with us for years over territory. My father thought he could negotiate peace. He was wrong."
"I'm sorry."
"Don't be. He was a criminal. He knew the risks." Dante stared at the ceiling, lost in memory. "But he was also my father. And they didn't just kill him. They mutilated him. Left his body in pieces for my mother and sister to find."
My stomach turned. "Oh God."
"That's when I learned that showing mercy in this world is suicide. That being the nice guy gets you killed. So I became worse than my father ever was. I became the monster the Volkovs should have feared." His voice was ice. "Within a year, I'd killed every man involved in his death. Slowly. Painfully. I made them scream for mercy I didn't give."
I should have been terrified. Should have wanted to run from this man who spoke so casually about torture and murder. But instead, I felt something else. Understanding, maybe. Or at least the beginning of it.
"You said you had a sister?"
Pain flashed across his face. Real, raw pain that made him look almost human.
"Sofia. She was sixteen when my father died. Sweet. Innocent. Everything good in our family." His hands clenched into fists. "I tried to protect her from this world. Sent her away to boarding school in Switzerland. Gave her a life far from the violence. But the Volkovs found her anyway."
"What did they do?" I whispered, dreading the answer.
"They kidnapped her. Sent me videos of her screaming, begging me to save her. They wanted me to give up territory, power, everything I'd built." His voice cracked, just slightly. "I tried to negotiate. Tried to give them what they wanted. But it wasn't enough. They wanted me to suffer like they'd suffered. So they killed her anyway. Made me watch."
Tears filled my eyes. "Dante…"
"I was twenty-three. She was eighteen. And I failed her." He finally looked at me, and the devastation in his eyes stole my breath. "Every man who touched her, who hurt her, who pulled the trigger I hunted them down. It took three years, but I killed them all. The Volkov family was decimated. But Sofia was still gone."
"That's why you kill without hesitation. Why you showed me what you did to Marco."
"Yes." He reached out and touched my face, his fingers gentle despite the violence of his words. "Because loyalty is all that matters in this world, Isabella. Betray me, and I become what the Volkovs feared. But stay loyal, stay safe, and I'll protect you with everything I have. Just like I should have protected Sofia."
"Is that what I am to you? A second chance at protecting someone?"
"Maybe." His thumb brushed my cheekbone. "Or maybe you're something else entirely. I haven't figured it out yet."
"I'm not your dead sister. I'm not your redemption."
"No, you're not." He leaned closer, so close his breath touched my lips. "You're my property. My responsibility. My"
A sharp knock on the door made us both jerk apart.
One of Dante's guards entered, his face grim. "Sir, we have a situation. The Volkovs sent a message."
Dante was on his feet instantly, all business. "What kind of message?"
"They know about her." The guard's eyes flicked to me. "They know you bought her at the auction. They're demanding a meeting."
"Absolutely not."
"Sir, they say if you don't meet, they'll" The guard hesitated, clearly uncomfortable with me hearing this.
"Say it," Dante commanded.
"They'll come for her. They say she's fair game since you brought her into the war."
The temperature in the room seemed to drop ten degrees. Dante's expression turned to pure ice, the vulnerable man who'd spoken about his sister disappearing behind the killer I'd seen last night.
"Double security on the estate. No one in or out without my direct approval. And find out who leaked information about Isabella." His voice was deadly calm. "When you do, bring them to me alive. I want to ask them questions before I kill them."
"Yes, sir."
After the guard left, Dante turned to me. "Pack anything important from your room. You're moving."
"Moving where?"
"My bedroom. The master suite. It has a panic room and direct security access." He was already walking toward the door. "If the Volkovs are targeting you, I'm not taking chances. You stay by my side until this is handled."
"You want me to sleep in your room?"
"I want you to stay alive. Sleeping arrangements are secondary." He paused at the door. "And Isabella? What we discussed about Sofia, about my past that stays between us. Understood?"
"I won't tell anyone."
"Good." Something shifted in his expression. Not quite a smile, but close. "You did well today. The fighting. The listening. You're stronger than you think."
After he left, I sat alone in the gym, processing everything. The training. The story about Sofia. The near-kiss that had been interrupted. The threat from the Volkovs.
My life had been turned upside down in three days. I'd been sold, imprisoned, forced to witness murder, and now I was being targeted by Russian mobsters who'd killed Dante's sister.
And somehow impossibly I was starting to see Dante Moretti not as just my captor, but as something far more complicated.
A monster, yes. But a monster who'd been created by trauma and loss. A killer who'd once been a brother trying to protect his sister. A man who'd spent five years hunting down everyone responsible for her death.
Was he right? Was I his second chance at protection? Or was I something else?
I didn't have answers. Not yet.
But as I headed upstairs to pack my things, I realized something terrifying:
I was starting to trust him.
Not completely. Not foolishly. But enough to believe that as long as I was under Dante Moretti's protection, I was safer than I would be anywhere else.
Even if that protection came from the devil himself.
Rosa met me in the hallway. "You're moving to the master suite?"
"How did you"
"I know everything that happens in this house, dear." She smiled gently. "It's a good sign."
"How is moving into his bedroom a good sign?"
"Because Mr. Moretti has never let anyone into his personal space. Not in the five years I've worked here. That room is his sanctuary. And he's giving you access to it." She squeezed my arm. "That means you matter to him, Isabella. More than he's probably willing to admit."
"Or it means I'm valuable property he wants to protect."
"Believe what you want." Rosa started walking. "But I've seen the way he looks at you. That's not how a man looks at property. That's how a man looks at someone he's starting to care about."
I wanted to argue. To say she was wrong. That this was just Stockholm syndrome or survival instinct making me see humanity in a monster.
But I couldn't. Because deep down, I knew Rosa was right.
Something was happening between Dante and me. Something dangerous and complicated and probably doomed.
But real nonetheless.
And that scared me more than any Russian mobster ever could.