POV: Isabella
The word echoed in the silence of the bathroom long after his footsteps had faded. Obsession. It wasn't a declaration of love. It was a diagnosis. A sentence. It explained the fury in his eyes, the broken wall, and the terrifying way he watched her. He wasn't just a jailer. He was a collector who'd found his one irreplaceable piece, and the thought of a crack in the glass was driving him mad.
It changed nothing. It changed everything.
For two days, the mansion was a tomb. He was gone, a storm contained elsewhere. The hole in the wall by the bedroom door was patched and painted over with shocking efficiency, a metaphor that chilled her: his violence could be erased, made to look like it never was. But the memory of his voice, raw and stripped bare, could not.
Her cage felt more palpable than ever. The library's books now felt like printed distractions. The garden's high walls laughed at her. The guards were more visible, their presence a constant reminder: You are watched. You are owned.
On the third morning, a sliver of chance appeared.
It was during the guard change at the side service entrance—a door she'd only ever seen used by staff. Leo was speaking to his replacement, a new man she didn't recognize. Their backs were turned for a moment, engrossed in the clipboard handover. And the heavy door, usually bolted from the outside, stood slightly ajar, held open by a crate of fresh linens.
Her heart stopped, then hammered against her ribs like a trapped thing finally seeing light.
This was it. The universe is offering a key.
She didn't think. She moved.
Slipping from the hallway shadow, she was through the door in two silent, breathless steps. The cool morning air of the delivery alley hit her face, and it smelled like freedom—of diesel, damp concrete, and uncurated life. She didn't run. She walked, fast and purposefully, head down, blending with the early foot traffic on Madison Avenue. With each step away from the limestone fortress, a wild, giddy sensation bubbled in her chest. She was doing it. She was out.
The city embraced her in a chaotic, glorious cacophony. The blare of horns, the chatter of strangers, the smell of coffee and pretzels—it was overwhelming and beautiful. She was a ghost among the living, and she wept silent tears of sheer relief as she walked, then ran, then hailed a taxi with the last of the cash she'd had in her pocket the night she was taken.
"Brooklyn. 328 Bergen Street."
The brownstone, with its chipped paint and Mrs. Chen's geraniums on the fire escape, was a sight that cracked her open. She paid the driver and sprinted up the steps, knocking frantically on the familiar green door.
"Xiao Hua?" Mrs. Chen's wise eyes widened in shock, then softened with immediate concern. She pulled Isabella inside without a word, locking the door behind her.
The apartment was exactly the same. The smell of ginger and old books. The sunlight through lace curtains. It was a preserved slice of her past life, and the contrast to the cold opulence of the mansion was paralyzing. She collapsed into a chair at the kitchen table, trembling.
"He let you go?" Mrs. Chen asked, placing a cup of tea in front of her. Her tone said she already knew the answer.
"I ran. There was an open door."
Mrs. Chen sat opposite her, her face grave. "And you came here first."
"Where else would I go?" Isabella's voice broke. "I have no money. No plan. I just… I had to get out."
"The wolf knows his prey's habits," Mrs. Chen said softly, stirring her own tea. "He will look for you where your heart lives. This is the first place."
A cold dread seeped through the fading adrenaline. "I can't stay. I'll put you in danger."
"The danger is already here," Mrs. Chen said, glancing out the window with a calm that was somehow terrifying. "They are probably already watching."
Isabella's brief, glorious taste of freedom turned to ash in her mouth. She had been naive. A fool. She'd traded a gilded cage for a predictable trap.
For hours, she sat in the safe, familiar space, clutching her tea, jumping at every car that passed. Mrs. Chen moved about her apartment, watering plants, humming softly, a picture of normalcy that felt like a dream. She offered no grand escape plan. She simply offered sanctuary in the eye of the coming storm.
It arrived just after dusk.
A black SUV, identical to the one that had taken her to the mansion, pulled up silently across the street. Then another. Not with sirens or drama, but with an air of inevitable conclusion.
Isabella's blood ran cold. She watched from the window as Marco stepped out of the lead vehicle, his expression unreadable. He didn't approach the door. He simply leaned against the hood, crossed his arms, and waited.
He was waiting for him.
Five minutes later, a black Rolls-Royce Phantom glided to a stop behind the SUVs. The door opened.
Dante emerged.
He was dressed in a black overcoat over a suit, his hair perfect, his face a mask of icy calm. But even from this distance, Isabella could see the storm in his eyes. He didn't look at Marco. He didn't look at the building. His gaze went straight to her window, as if he could feel her standing there. It pinned her through the glass.
He crossed the street with a predatory stride, not hurried, but utterly deliberate.
A soft knock sounded on Mrs. Chen's door.
Isabella froze. Mrs. Chen, however, stood calmly and answered it.
Dante Salvatore filled the modest doorway. He didn't step in. He removed his hat—a gesture of cold courtesy. His eyes swept past Mrs. Chen, landing on Isabella, where she stood shaking in the kitchen.
"Isabella," he said, his voice dangerously quiet. "It's time to come home."
"This is my home," she whispered, the defiance a last, weak spark.
"No," he corrected, his tone leaving no room for argument. "Your home is with me. You left something behind." He finally looked at Mrs. Chen, giving a slight, respectful nod. "Thank you for keeping her safe."
The words were polite, but the meaning was clear: I know who you are. I know where she is. Your part in this is over.
Terror for Mrs. Chen swamped her. She couldn't let this gentle woman pay for her mistake. "Don't you touch her."
"I have no quarrel with your friend," he said, his eyes snapping back to her. "My quarrel is with you. For being foolish enough to run. For thinking you could." He extended a hand into the apartment. Not pleading. Commanding. "Now."
Every instinct screamed to refuse, to fight, to scream for the neighbors. But she saw Marco outside, saw the other shadows in the SUVs. She saw the absolute certainty in Dante's face. He would take her, and anyone who stood in his way would be broken. Including Mrs. Chen.
The freedom was an illusion. It had been from the moment she stepped into the alley.
With legs made of lead, she walked to the door. She stopped before him, close enough to see the flecks of gold in his dark eyes, to see the faint, purpling bruise on the knuckles of the hand he held out to her. The wall-punching hand.
"I'm sorry," she whispered to Mrs. Chen, tears streaming down her face.
"Go, child," Mrs. Chen said softly, her eyes holding a world of sorrow. "Grow your roots where you are planted. Even there."
Dante's hand closed around her upper arm. His grip was firm, unbreakable, but not painful. It was a brand. He guided her down the steps and across the street toward the idling Rolls. He didn't speak. The silence was worse than shouting.
He opened the car door for her. As she slid in, he leaned down, his face close to hers, his voice a low, seething promise that vibrated in the confined space.
"You want to run? Fine." His breath was warm against her ear. "But know this—I will always find you. You're mine, Isabella. The sooner you accept that, the easier this gets."
He shut the door, sealing her in the silent, opulent interior. Through the window, she saw him give one last look at Mrs. Chen's apartment, a look of cold assessment, before he walked around to the other side.
The car pulled away from the curb. The brownstone, the geraniums, and the last piece of her old life shrank and disappeared behind them.
She hadn't escaped. She'd only succeeded in proving the walls of her cage were not made of stone and iron, but of his will. And his will stretched across the entire city.
The ride back to the mansion was silent. The gates swung open. The fortress welcomed her back.
She had flown. And she had been caught.
Now, she had to live with what came next.