Page 6 of Ruthless Vow
I step back from the doorway before Papa turns.
Down the hall, Mama has gone quiet behind the master bedroom door.
Neither of them has come to check on me. Neither of them has thought to wonder what the other daughter might do.
I could stay. Let Papa grovel his way through negotiations that will fail. Watch him offer money we don’t have, promises he can’t keep. Dante will listen with that stone face, calculating the insult, and then he’ll make an example of us.
Because Elena didn’t just break a contract. She humiliated him. Made him look like a man whose bride would rather vanish than share his bed.
That kind of wound demands repayment.
Or I could go. Offer him something Papa can’t. Something that might matter to a man who just lost his political alliance and gained a public humiliation.
Me.
It’s not a good choice. But it’s the only one I have.
The burgundy dress hangs in my closet. Elena’s bridesmaid dress. The one I was supposed to wear while I watched my sister marry a man whose voice I’ve memorized from the nights I ran numbers at the Santoro compound. Whose nightmares I’ve heard through the walls. Whose hands tremble when he pours whiskey at 3:00 a.m. and thinks no one is watching.
He doesn’t know anyone sees that.
I see. I always see. That’s the thing about being invisible. You learn everything about everyone, and no one learns a single thing about you.
I pull the dress from its hanger. The fabric is heavier than I expect. Lined, structured, the kind of quality that costs more than my monthly car payment. The color of wine stains on a white tablecloth.
Elena complained it washed her out. She wanted blush pink, anything delicate. But Giada Santoro chose the color. And what Giada wants, she gets.
I strip off my sleep shirt and stand before the mirror.
Soft hips, full breasts, a body I spent years trying to minimize because taking up space wasn’t part of the equation for girls like me. I used to slouch. Cross my arms. Wear loose things that hid the shape of me, as if being smaller would make me easier to keep.
Today I need a man to look at me. And I need him to see something worth keeping.
I step into the dress and pull it up over my hips. The zipper catches for a moment, teeth biting into the fabric, before sliding home with a sound like a lock turning. The lining is cool against my skin. Smooth. Close.
The reflection in the mirror stops me.
Deep red hugging every curve I’ve tried to hide. Clinging at the waist, flaring over my hips. Dark hair falling past my shoulders, still mussed from sleep. Brown eyes that have spent three years memorizing a man who’s never once looked in my direction.
I run my fingers through my hair, smoothing it. My reflection does the same.
This woman in her sister’s dress, with her shoulders squared instead of hunched. She looks like someone who walks into rooms and stays. Someone who makes choices instead ofaccepting whatever’s left over after everyone else has chosen first.
I don’t know if I am that woman.
But I’m going to walk into that compound like I am, and figure out the rest later.
I find my shoes. Simple black heels. My fingers tremble as I clasp my mother’s old pearl earrings. Small, worth next to nothing, but they were hers before she became a Neri. Before she had daughters. She cried when Elena was promised to the Santoros. Wept for the daughter who would be trapped in the mafia world forever.
She never cried for me.
She would if she knew where you were going. She would if she thought to ask.
I walk to my bedroom door. On the other side, Papa’s voice still rumbles from the living room. Damage control. Desperate negotiations with men who hold our family’s fate in scarred hands.
I could tell him. Walk out there and watch his face cycle through shock, disbelief, refusal. He would say I’m not the right daughter. Not the one who was prepared for this.
So I don’t ask permission. I don’t explain. I just leave.
