Chapter 6: The Taste of Ash

The photograph crumpled in my fist, the edges biting into my palm like a reproach. My mother’s frozen scream, the black smoke curling around her face—I couldn’t look at it anymore. I shoved it into the inner pocket of my jacket, the one Dante had given me, and felt the phantom weight of his threat settle against my ribs.

*Finish what your father started.*

I paced the study like a caged animal. The grandfather clock ticked a slow, mocking rhythm. Outside, the city hummed with life that didn’t know my name. But I knew Dante’s. I knew the curve of his jaw, the way his thumb had brushed my cheek as if I were something fragile. As if he hadn’t just threatened to bury me.

A sharp knock snapped my head up.

“Come in,” I said, forcing steel into my voice.

The door swung open. It wasn’t a servant. It was Dante, his silhouette filling the frame like a storm rolling in. He wore a black shirt, sleeves rolled to his elbows, revealing forearms corded with muscle and ink. The viper tattoo coiled around his wrist, its tongue flicking toward his knuckles.

“You’re still here,” he said, closing the door behind him. The lock clicked. “I half expected you to run.”

“Where would I go?” I laughed, bitter. “You own every exit. You own the city. You probably own the air I breathe.”

He crossed the room with slow, deliberate steps. “Then you’re smarter than I gave you credit for.”

“Don’t patronize me.” I turned to face him, my back against the desk. “You brought me here to use me. To dangle me in front of your enemies like bait. I’m not stupid, Dante.”

“No,” he said, stopping a breath away. The heat of him radiated through the space between us. “You’re not stupid. That’s the problem.”

His hand came up, fingers grazing the collar of my blouse. I flinched, but I didn’t pull away. I couldn’t. It was like standing at the edge of a cliff and knowing the fall would kill you, but leaning anyway.

“You hate me,” he murmured, his voice a low rasp. “I can see it in your eyes. The way they darken when I touch you. The way your pulse jumps under your skin.”

“I do hate you,” I said, and my voice cracked on the last word.

“Good.” His hand slid to my throat, not squeezing—just *there*, a warning and a promise. “Hate is honest. Hate doesn’t lie to you at night and whisper sweet nothings while it stabs you in the back.”

“Like you did to my father?”

His eyes flashed. The fingers at my throat tightened a fraction. “Your father was a traitor to everyone who ever trusted him. Including you.”

“Don’t.” I shoved at his chest, but he didn’t move. It was like pushing a mountain. “Don’t you dare speak ill of the dead. He was *my* father.”

“He was a coward who sold his soul to the Marchetti family and then tried to sell mine.” Dante’s voice dropped to a whisper, venomous and soft. “He would have killed you too, Eva. If it meant saving his own skin.”

“Liar.”

“I have proof.” He pulled out his phone, unlocked it, and held it up. A video played—grainy, night-vision green. My father’s voice, tinny and desperate: *“The girl doesn’t know anything. Take her, do what you want, just leave me out of it.”* My own face, younger, terrified, being dragged across a warehouse floor.

I stopped breathing.

“That was three years ago,” Dante said, pocketing the phone. “Before I took over. Before I made sure the Marchetti dogs were put down for good.”

The room tilted. I grabbed the desk edge to steady myself. My mother’s face—smiling, alive—flashed behind my eyes. My father had sent her to her death. And he’d been ready to do the same to me.

“Why?” The word came out as a whisper. “Why are you showing me this?”

“Because you deserve the truth.” He stepped closer, his chest brushing mine. “Even if it burns.”

“You’re not a hero, Dante.” I looked up at him, and the hate was still there, but now it had a twin flame—something raw and aching. “You’re just a different kind of monster.”

“I know.” His hand cupped my jaw, tilting my face up. His thumb traced the line of my lower lip. “But I’m the monster who’s going to keep you alive.”

I should have pulled away. I should have spat in his face, clawed at his eyes, run for the door. Instead, I closed my eyes and felt the ghost of his breath on my mouth.

“Then prove it,” I said.

He kissed me.

It wasn’t gentle. It was a collision—teeth and tongue and the metallic taste of blood. I bit his lip, and he growled, hauling me against him like he wanted to devour me whole. My hands fisted in his shirt. His hand tangled in my hair, yanking my head back, and I gasped into his mouth.

“You want this?” he rasped against my throat. “You want a monster in your bed?”

“I want to hate you,” I breathed. “I want to hate you and I can’t.”

He laughed, low and dark. “Then hate me harder.”

His hand slid down my spine, gripping my hip. I arched into him, and the violence of it—the beautiful, terrible violence—consumed the last shred of my sanity.

“One condition,” I said, my voice trembling. “You tell me the truth. About my mother. About everything.”

Dante paused. The air between us thickened. “And if the truth destroys you?”

“Then at least I’ll go down knowing.”

He stared at me for a long moment. Then he pulled back, straightening his shirt. The cold returned, flooding the space he’d vacated.

“Tomorrow,” he said, heading for the door. “I’ll show you the file. Everything. But when you see it, Eva—” He looked back, and his eyes were ancient and empty. “You’ll wish you’d never asked.”

The door closed. I sank to the floor, my heart hammering against my ribs, my lips still burning from his kiss.

And in the silence, a new sound emerged—soft, rhythmic, like the beating of wings against a window.

The Marchetti family crest was a hawk.

I looked up. A black feather drifted through the open window, settling on the floor at my feet.