Chapter 1

Isabella's POV

"Time's up, sir. That's enough."

I've said it so many times I've gone numb to it. In this brothel, I'm nothing but a body with a price tag.

Then an old man froze in the doorway, his eyes reddening. "My God... Miss Isabella, what happened to you?"

Isabella. Somewhere in my shattered memory, that name still carries a weight I can't explain.

"I'm Antonio," he wept. "Alessandro sent me to find you."

A name both familiar and foreign. Salvation—or just the door to a darker room?

——

"Time's up, sir. That's enough."

The man on top of me didn't let go. His fingers dug harder into my wrist.

I turned my face away, eyes shut, and endured it.

In this underground brothel, the customer was god. I didn't have the right to say no.

The wooden door slammed open.

The man flinched like he'd been caught, yanked his hand back, grabbed his pants, and stormed out cursing.

I pulled myself up off the blood-stained mattress, grabbed a tissue, and wiped roughly at the inside of my thigh.

Did it hurt? Not anymore.

Three years ago I still cried. Now I couldn't even be bothered to shed a tear.

Thinking it was the next customer, I didn't bother looking up. I just sank back to my knees, the motion as automatic as a reflex.

"The rate's a hundred euros. Fifty more if you don't wear a condom."

No answer.

I finally lifted my eyes.

An old man stood in the doorway, white-haired, dressed in a well-tailored wool coat, frozen in place.

"My God..." His voice cracked. "Miss Isabella, what happened to you?"

Isabella? The name rang a bell somewhere.

I frowned at him. "Who... who are you?"

He dropped to his knees right there, in the filth, not caring at all.

"I'm Antonio." His voice broke. "Alessandro sent me across all of Europe's black markets to find you."

Alessandro.

That name hit something in my chest.

Vita sauntered in, hips swaying — she ran this place. Pride dripped from every word.

"This one's prime stock," she said with a smirk. "Used to be mafia royalty. Now, pay enough, and she'll do anything you want."

The old man surged up and pulled a gun from his coat.

The grip cracked across her face. She screamed and dropped.

I flinched, instinctively curling up, arms over my head.

Was I next?

But instead, he wrapped me in his coat.

He carried me to a car.

"After the Rossi family fell, I had to run," he said, hands trembling on the wheel. "Now we're going back to the Corsica estate."

Rossi family. Corsica estate.

"Three years ago, you were accused of poisoning Vittoria's wine," he went on. "The Don exiled you. He sent men to bring you back twice, and you drove them off both times."

I opened my mouth. Nothing came out.

Antonio's eyes reddened, his voice cracking higher. "What happened to you these past three years? Why wouldn't you just come back to that estate?"

My chest seized, like something had a fist around my heart.

All that surfaced in my head was the crackle of an electric current, the stench of a red-hot iron pressed to skin.

Everything else was blank.

Headlights slammed into the windshield without warning, blinding me.

Then gunfire, rapid, like fireworks tearing the night open. Screams.

The car door was ripped open from outside.

Everything went black.

When I woke, the air reeked of antiseptic.

I was lying in an unfamiliar bed, an IV needle taped to the back of my hand.

A woman's crying drifted in from outside the door.

"Alex, she suddenly went crazy and tried to jump out of the car... Antonio died protecting her..."

Died? My whole body went rigid.

"If I'd known she was this far gone, I never would have brought him back to get her."

It hit me then. They were talking about me.

The door opened. A man walked in, tall, and the entire room seemed to still under the weight of him.

I clutched the blanket, shrinking back on instinct.

"Isabella," he said, and the word came laced with mockery. "Haven't you had enough of playing amnesiac?"

Panic surged. I clawed the IV out of my hand, blood welling up, not that I cared.

I dropped to my knees on the floor, hands raised. "It wasn't me... I never touched the wheel, I swear!"

I didn't remember who Antonio was.

But I remembered that when he looked at me, there had been no cruelty in his eyes.

Vittoria appeared in the doorway, leaning against the frame, her face arranged into something tragic.

"Isabella," she said, voice thin and broken. "Antonio's dead because of you, and you still won't admit it?"

The man crossed the room, two fingers pinning my chin up, forcing me to meet his eyes.

"Three years ago you poisoned Vittoria and denied it to my face." Each word came like a blade. "Today you got Antonio killed, and you're still lying through your teeth."

He released my chin, disgust thick in his gaze. "I never should have let my guard down and pulled you out of that brothel."

He turned to leave.

I lunged, grabbing his shoes, my forehead hitting the floor over and over.

"Please," my voice shook apart, "don't send me back. I'll behave. I'll sleep with whoever you want, I know how to do anything—"

In that place, the price for upsetting a customer was being thrown to the dogs.

I couldn't let him walk away.

My hands fumbled at the collar of my hospital gown, tearing it open, baring the cigarette burns and knife scars across my chest.

Terror flooded through me so completely that I felt warmth spreading down my legs, soaking my pants.

I couldn't stop it.

Something flickered in his eyes — shock, gone in an instant, swallowed by something far heavier.

He kicked me off him, hard.

"Isabella." He looked down at me, voice dripping with revulsion. "Right now you look like a bitch in heat. It's disgusting."

I hit the floor and rolled, the back of my skull slamming into the metal leg of the bed.