I Deleted You Traitor Even My Blade Forgot Your Name novel Chapter 8

Chapter 8

‘ake.

very goddamn thing was fake.

ienna’s waterworks, that helpless little girl routine–fake.

he PTSD that made him bend over backward for her, that he used to excuse every shitty thing he did–fake.

ven Vesper being dead–just another lie they’d spun up.

hese hands had ended lives. Made calls on who lived and died. He thought he was smart. Thought he saw every angle.

nd some scheming bitch had played him like a mark.

Vorse–he’d been the one who broke Vesper. The woman who’d bled with him for a decade. Who knew him better than anyone

le’d turned on her. Tortured her. Pushed her out.

age and regret detonated inside his chest.

illing intent poured off him like heat off asphalt.

ANG.

le kicked the door clean off its hinges. Stepped through looking like the Reaper himself.

oom went dead silent.

ienna’s victory smile turned to stone. Then crumbled into raw fear. Face went white as a sheet.

ana fumbled the jewelry box Sienna had just handed her. Thing hit the floor. Diamonds and pearls rolled everywhere.

he didn’t even glance at Dante. Just bolted–crawling over herself to get out the door.

eft Sienna alone. Slumped on the couch.

he tried steadying herself. Forced her mouth into something that might’ve been a smile on a corpse. Started to get up. “Dante, sweetheart just lista-

Shut the fuck up.”

free steps and he had her. Hand locked around her throat, Drove her into the wall so hard the drywall cracked

mpact knocked the wind out of her. Everything went black at the edges. Lungs screaming

Jante got in her face. Eyes shot through with red. Something wild and ruined burning behind them.

The PTSD was horseshit, wasn’t it?

Vesper being dead? You made that up?

Everything from day one–every tear, every setup you fucking orchestrated all of it?

Fach word came out like a blade.

Sienna went slack in his grip. That look in his eyes–pure murder–turned her insides to liquid.

Teeth rattling. Couldn’t get a single word out.

Chapter 8

Her pulse knocked against Dante’s thumb. One more ounce of pressure and the vein would flatten.

She had never been this close to dying.

In the red map of his eyes she saw herself–small, warped, expendable.

Something inside her snapped.

Words came out in a wet, jagged rush.

She told him how she’d joined Red Spider Lily and clocked his clout the first week.

How she’d rehearsed the orphan story until it sounded like memory.

How she’d studied Vesper the way a forger studies a signature–copy the tilt, steal the flourish, take the credit, take the crew, take the warmth that used to be Jesper’s.

She had to disappear… or you’d never see me.”

fer knees hit concrete.

he grabbed his cuff, snot and tears slicking her chin.

Hit me. Kill me. Just don’t walk away.”

Dante stared down as if she were roadkill.

Not worth the dry–cleaning,” he muttered.

le thumbed his encrypted comm.

Enforcement. I got a rat.”

hey arrived in black, chain–links rattling like spare change.

Dante didn’t wait.

Sienna Graves. Framed family. Evidence locked. Max–sec, Drowning Cells. No daylight without my signature.”

he Cells were underground wells–neck–deep rainwater, electrified cuffs, food slung once a day like feed to carp.

‘ou don’t serve time; you rot until the water claims you.

hey dragged her out screaming.

urses bounced off the corridor walls, fading to gurgles, then to nothing.

Afterwards Dante burned every contact–dark–web brokers, dockyard snitches, even the night shift janitor who vacuumed the server room.

He knelt in front of the Boss, forehead to hardwood.

The old man lit a cigarette, exhaled the answer through his nose.

Gave her enough cash to vanish. Where she vanished to? Not my story anymore.”

Three years.

Dante took the blood contracts no one else wanted

Council of Elders? Wiped. Lana? Drowned in her own bathtub of rose petals.

Chapter 8

Cash rolled in, medals rolled in.

He got colder, quieter–a gun with the safety filed off.

Even his own crew spoke to him sideways.

Then Sicily.

A rival family had dug in: Dante dug them out.

Night air smelled of cordite and citrus when he walked away from the safe house, gloves still wet.

Wind chimes tinkled from a side street.

Je glanced over.

single bookshop glowed butter yellow against the dark.

woman in a cotton dress twisted the key in the shutter.

he straightened, profile caught in the light.

he street tilted.

hree years of gravity reversed.

esper?!