Chapter 10 - The Night Lorenzo Let Me Walk Away
My thirty-fifth birthday was twelve days away.
Crown wasn’t merely a criminal network.
It controlled assets worth hundreds of millions.
My father had secretly structured the legitimate shell so ownership would transfer to me.
Margaret had spent seventeen years trying to prevent that.
Suddenly everything made sense.
Ethan.
The relationship.
The engagement.
If I had married Ethan, he could have manipulated access to my assets.
When I left him, Margaret lost her easiest route.
Then Rosa brought me to Lorenzo.
Two old families collided again.
I wanted to scream.
Instead, I laughed.
Lorenzo looked worried.
“Why are you laughing?”
“Because apparently my terrible taste in men almost caused a corporate war.”
“I’m standing here.”
“I said terrible taste.”
His eyebrow lifted.
For one second, even there, I felt normal.
Then reality returned.
Margaret wanted me before my birthday.
Lorenzo proposed something drastic.
Leave.
Not marry him.
Not stay under Duca protection.
Disappear somewhere Crown couldn’t find me until federal authorities secured the evidence.
“You want me gone?”
“I want you alive.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
His face tightened.
“I want you here.”
The honesty hurt.
“But wanting you here doesn’t give me the right to keep you here.”
He placed my brass bedroom key on the table.
My key.
My choice.
“If you leave tonight, nobody follows unless you ask.”
I stared at him.
Six women had left Lorenzo because they were threatened.
Now he was giving the seventh every opportunity to walk away.
I packed.
Not because I wanted to leave.
Because I needed to know whether I could.
At the front doors, Lorenzo stood twenty feet away.
He didn’t stop me.
Didn’t manipulate me.
Didn’t remind me of danger.
He simply said, “Goodbye, Amelia.”
I walked outside.
Reached the car.
Then stopped.
All my life, men had made choices for me and called it love.
My father hid the truth.
Ethan controlled me.
Even Rosa manipulated me for protection.
Lorenzo was the first man powerful enough to imprison me who had instead opened the door.
I turned around.
He was still there.
“You idiot.”
His brow furrowed.
I walked back.
“You’re supposed to fight for me.”
“You told me you hate men deciding what women want.”
“I do.”
“So I’m respecting your decision.”
“Very inconveniently.”
His mouth twitched.
I stepped close.
“I’m staying.”
His eyes searched mine.
“Because you choose to?”
“Yes.”
“Not because you’re afraid?”
“Lorenzo, I nearly strangled you on arrival. Fear was never our strongest theme.”
He laughed.
Then I kissed him.
Later, while everyone prepared to transfer the evidence to federal investigators, I returned to my room.
The new lock worked.
The window sensors worked.
Everything worked.
Then I noticed something on my pillow.
A photograph.
Taken minutes earlier.
It showed Lorenzo and me kissing at the front doors.
On the back:
HE LET YOU CHOOSE.
NOW CHOOSE WHICH ONE OF YOU DIES.
My bedroom door clicked.
May you like
The lock began turning from the outside.
And someone whispered my name...
