After a bloody transaction in a desolate warehouse miles outside the city, the heavy silence that followed felt thicker than the stench of gunpowder. Marchetti Ashford and his men filed out through the rusted doors, their footsteps echoing against the cracked concrete. The convoy of black Rolls-Royces waited outside, engines purring beneath the night rain like restless beasts. The air around Marchetti carried tension sharp enough to cut glass, though his expression remained unreadable.

Enzo, his best friend and right-hand man, broke the silence as they slid into the backseat. "I think he was hiding something, March. But... did we really have to kill him? He might've been our only lead on what really happened to your father."

Marchetti sat still, head tilted back, eyes closed. He unbuttoned the top of his blood-specked shirt—a habitual gesture whenever exhaustion found him. His voice came out low, measured, too calm to be comforting. "Enzo, he knew nothing valid. There's someone bigger behind this. Killing him was necessary—it'll force the real one out of hiding."

He reached for the tablet on the seat beside him, scanning through news feeds until a headline froze him in place: VINCENT LOREZ FOUND DEAD — WIFE UNDER INVESTIGATION FOR MURDER. For a long moment, Marchetti didn't breathe. All he could see was her name—a name from his past buried deep inside his blackened heart.

Later that night, high above Florence's skyline, Marchetti sought solace in his penthouse pool, the water lapping against his muscular frame as he swam laps to drown his thoughts. A shadow by the far end of the pool caught his attention. Before he could react, the figure stumbled and fell into the water.

Instinct took over as he dove in, dragging the unconscious woman to the marble floor. After administering CPR and mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, she coughed violently, spluttering water onto his expensive suit. "Woman, are you aware I could have you sued for intruding on my property?" he snapped, irritation evident in his voice.

As he grabbed a towel and looked down, recognition hit him like a physical blow. The hair, the eyes, that face—it was her. The woman who had once been his entire world, the ghost he could never exorcise. The same woman now accused of murdering her husband.

"So, you're the new killer in town," he murmured, a smirk curving at the corner of his lips. "That's disappointing. You could've just called me—I would've handled that scumbag for you. No need to dirty your hands."

Her eyes lifted then, and recognition flickered between them—silent, heavy, electric. After years of distance, betrayal, and buried memories... fate had just thrown her back into the wolf's den.