The heavy bullet tore through the reinforced glass, leaving a web of spiderweb fractures around a neat, deadly hole.

The sub-basement of The Velvet Crown was a forgotten place—a fortress of damp brick and rusted iron pipes beneath the city’s sewer lines.

I insisted on going down with Adrien. He had tried to refuse, offering to let me rest in his private quarters, but I grabbed his sleeve with surprising strength.

"I spent two years being afraid of him," I told Adrien, staring into his storm-grey eyes. "I ran barefoot across four blocks of ice and asphalt tonight to escape him. If you are going to break him, I want to watch him realize he lost."

A dark, approving smile touched Adrien’s lips. "As you wish, my Queen."

When the iron door opened, Marcus was chained to a heavy wooden chair in the center of a dimly lit room. His tailored suit was torn, his nose broken from his capture, blood dripping onto his silk tie.

When he saw me walking in beside Adrien, flanked by six armed guards, his eyes went wide with a mixture of rage and terror.

"Lena!" Marcus barked, spitting blood onto the stone floor. "You think this mobster gives a damn about you?! He’s using you! You're a Moretti! The moment he uses your name to seize Falcone's territories, he’ll put a bullet in your head just like his father did to your mother!"

Adeline didn't speak. She took a slow step forward, stopping just out of his reach.

"My father didn't kill her mother," Adrien said calmly, pulling a pair of black leather gloves onto his hands. "My father tried to save her. It was Don Falcone who ordered the hit on the Moretti mansion twenty years ago because your father, Marcus, leaked the security codes to the estate."

Marcus froze, his jaw hanging open. "What... what are you talking about?"

"Your father wasn't just a gambler, Marcus," Adrien sneered, stepping into the ring of light above the chair. "He was a traitor to the Moretti family. He sold out Lena’s mother for five hundred thousand dollars and a seat on the bank board. And for twenty years, your pathetic family has lived off the blood of an innocent woman."

Marcus looked frantically between Adrien and me. "Lena, please! I loved you! You know I loved you! I was just trying to protect us! Falcone threatened to kill me if I didn't bring you in!"

I looked at the man I had once believed was my protector. The sight of his sniveling, desperate face made me feel nothing but profound disgust.

I walked over to the small table near the wall where the guards had laid out the contents of Marcus’s pockets: his watch, his phone, his wallet... and the silver riding crop he had kept in his desk to threaten me with.

I picked up the crop.

Marcus paled. "Lena... no... please..."

I walked up to him, looked him dead in the eyes, and raised my hand.

CRACK!

The leather strap came down hard across his cheek, leaving a deep red welt. He howled in pain, twisting against his chains.

"That," I said, my voice steady and cold, "was for my ribs."

CRACK!

"That was for my feet."

CRACK!

"And that was for my mother."

I tossed the crop onto his lap, turned my back on him, and looked at Adrien. "He isn't worth another second of my time."

Adrien looked at me with an expression of fierce, absolute adoration. He turned to Marco. "Strip him of his law license. Seize his accounts. Send his father to a federal penitentiary in upstate New York. And as for Marcus... dump him in the docks in Jersey with a warning on his forehead. If he ever steps foot in Manhattan again, feed him to the fishes."