Chapter 1

Dante planned to trade Elena’s mute sister into a marriage pact to protect his mistress from her own lie. For six years, Elena had built his empire with her father’s routes, her money, and her loyalty. On the wedding day, she arrived with all seven route tokens, exposed the forged deal, and handed him the divorce papers he had signed without reading.

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Mara sat by the bedroom window, a brass bell token clutched in her palm.

It was one of seven route tokens our father had left behind, the old Vellano shipping company's crest engraved along its edge. A gentle shake produced a clear, bright ring. We had agreed when we were little: one ring meant we were safe, two meant we were scared, and three meant we needed help.

She saw me and rang it once, then three more times in quick succession.

I crouched in front of her and took her freezing hand in mine. "I know. You don't want to marry him, and I will never let them send you away."

Mara's eyes were red. She signed rapidly, asking whether Dante had chosen her because she couldn't speak, because he thought that made her easier to sacrifice.

My throat tightened, but I couldn't let her see me waver. "It's not your fault. He's forgotten that a person's voice doesn't only come from their throat."

The door swung open. Camille hadn't knocked. Two maids trailed behind her. She wore a deep red cashmere coat, a pearl hairpin fastened in her dark hair.

I recognized them at once. They had belonged to my mother.

"Who gave you that coat and hairpin?" I stood up.

Camille ran her fingers along the collar and smiled. "Dante. He said they were going to waste sitting in the wardrobe. I'm meeting guests from the north district tonight, and I should look presentable so I don't embarrass the Family."

Mara's bell rang twice. After our mother died, she had kept the coat folded at the bottom of a trunk, taking it out only on the anniversary of her death and holding it for a while.

I walked up to Camille and reached for her buttons. "Take it off."

She stepped back, deliberately raising her voice. "Elena, it's just an old coat and a hairpin. If you're going to make a fuss over something this petty, no wonder Dante won't even talk to you."

Dante appeared at the end of the hallway, right on cue. He saw us struggling, strode over, and seized my wrist. "Enough."

"These belonged to my mother." I looked at him. "You know that."

"I only lent them to Camille for one night." His grip didn't loosen. "It's just a hairpin. Why make a scene and embarrass everyone?"

Six years ago, he hadn't yet become Dante Ravello, the man everyone in the port city feared. The Ravello Family had been besieged on three sides, with barely a week's payroll left in its accounts. I was the one who led my father's convoys through the blockade, delivering medicine, food, and cash to its warehouses.

Back then, someone on the street had called Mara a mute. Dante had broken two of the man's fingers himself. He'd shielded a frightened Mara behind him and told me, "Your sister is my sister. As long as I'm here, no one will touch her."

Then my father died on a supply run. Dante took over the port and became head of the Family. He still remembered the bullet the Vellanos had taken for him, yet he'd forgotten every road the Vellanos had laid at his feet.

I pulled free and, before Camille could react, yanked the pearl hairpin from her hair. She yelped in pain. Dante immediately pulled her behind him.

"Elena!"

"I didn't touch her face. That's me being generous." I handed the hairpin to Mara and told the maids to take the coat off Camille. "Now take the woman you're so determined to save and get out."

Dante stared at me, his expression dark. "One day you'll regret being this cruel."

"I'm not the one who should be sorry."

I closed the door and locked it myself. Mara clutched our mother's coat and cried silently for a long time. I sat beside her, listening to the bell ringing softly in her palm, over and over.

Each ring reminded me that the seven-day countdown had begun.