Page 56 of In Shadows We Dance

Operation Rossi Crown.The name draws my attention because of the date. Sixteen years ago, the FBI’s most successful takedown of the Rossi crime family. The surveillance photographs in the file confirm what that single hospital photograph suggested. Annetta Rossi and Maria Morenoarethe same woman. But there’s something else buried in the heavily redacted pages about an undercover agent, code name ‘Charleston.’ His real identity has been erased, but one detail remains. His physical description matches James Moreno exactly.

My hands move faster now, breaking through security protocols, chasing down every lead. Personnel files show Agent Charleston went dark the same night Annetta Rossi and her daughter, Isabella, vanished. Three months later, property records show James Moreno appearing in Silverlake Rapids, with a wife named Maria. There’s a paper trail attached to them that’s so perfect it has to be government work. It’s the kind of detailed fabrication only federal agencies can create.

The medical records tell their own story. Prenatal care at private clinics in New York under Annetta Rossi, then nothing for months during the operation, then new records appearing under different names as they built their cover. All of it designed to hide a mother and child while creating a new history that no one would question.

How long had this operation been in planning?

Another file reveals a grainy surveillance photograph of a small dark-haired girl wearing a pale pink tutu and ballet shoes with bright pink ribbons wrapped around her legs. She’s wrapped in Victor Rossi’s arms, taken shortly before the night of the FBI operation. A handwritten note on the back reads ‘Isabella, age 2.’ His heir. His princess. The child that disappeared the night his empire fell.

Those same eyes now haunt my dreams. The same grace captures my attention every time she dances.

My ballerina isn’t just someone who hates being seen. She’s being hidden from a truth buried so deep she doesn’t even know it exists.

Isabella Rossi. The lost princess of a fallen empire.

“Holy fuck.”

A surveillance feed pings, a traffic camera I hacked into a couple of days ago, positioned almost perfectly to give me a clear view of her window, drawing my attention. Ileana stands at her window, staring into the darkness. There’s something haunting in the way she looks out, as though she’s searching for somethingshe can't quite name. But she’s looking in the wrong direction for monsters. I’m not standing outside her window tonight—I’m deep inside her past.

I pull up FBI cases—the ones marked classified, buried so deep most agents don’t even know they exist.Operation Rossi Crownspanned nearly five years of undercover work. Agent Charleston’s infiltration was complete, the timeline showing him earning Victor Rossi’s trust long before Annetta became pregnant. The layers of redaction, the missing evidence, the carefully structured aftermath. It reveals not just the takedown of a crime family, but years of complex relationships and, possibly, deeper entanglements.

The medical records make more sense now. Annetta Rossi’s pregnancy occurred while Agent Charleston was still deep undercover, the FBI helping fabricate alternate identities even then, preparing for multiple outcomes.

My eyes go back to the surveillance feed. She’s pressing her forehead against the glass, her vulnerability making something dark and possessive wake up inside me. She has no idea her entire existence is built on federal cover-ups and deceptions. No idea that I now own the truth about who she really is.

The finality of it settles deep in my bones. Every deception, every aspect of her existence, every time she was told to avoid attention. It was never about witness protection. It was about erasing Isabella Rossi completely. About turning a mafia princess into a ghost who never existed at all.

Ileana Moreno isn’t James Moreno’s daughter. She’s Victor Rossi’s heir.

CHAPTER 29

Fractured Composure

ILEANA

The headacheI used as my excuse to leave school early becomes a reality not long after I enter my bedroom. I pull the curtains closed, crawl into bed, and bury my face in the pillow. It doesn’t help. My thoughts are too loud, too relentless, replaying Wren’s words, his touch, the way he pinned me in the auditorium.

Rolling onto my back, I stare at the ceiling, frustration building. The memory of my dad’s earlier scrutiny lingers, prickling at my skin. He knows something is wrong, but he doesn’t know what. He can’t. Not even he could imagine that a spilled drink could lead to this—a whirlwind of fear, fascination, and suffocating intensity.

Restlessness drives me to my feet. My gaze lands on the bookshelf, stuffed with worn paperbacks, their spines cracked from years of secondhand use. I grab one without thinking and flip it open, but the words blur into nonsense. My mind refuses to focus.

The mirror catches my eye, and I turn toward it, startled by my own reflection. I look disheveled, my hair tangled, my eyes wide. The girl staring back at me isn’t the one I’ve worked so hard to become. She’s not invisible any longer.

Because of him.Wren.

His name sends a shiver down my spine, and I hate the way my body reacts. My pulse picks up speed, heat creeping over my skin, flushing my cheeks. He looks at me like he sees everything. Every flaw. Every secret. Like he could strip everything away from me with nothing more than a glance.

And I hate that it works. I hate that I let him get to me. That I let him make me feel so powerless.

But that’s not all I feel, is it?

My pacing takes me to the window, and I pull back the curtain just enough to see the street outside. Everything looks quiet, but nothing feels right.

Is he out there? Watching?

Do I want him to be there?

The thought leaves me breathless. I shouldn’t want him anywhere near me. Not after last night, after this morning. The idea of wanting him to step out of the shadows twists my stomach into knots. I shouldn’t want that at all. I should want him to leave me alone, to stay away from me. But the idea of him being gone, of him losing interest and leaving me to fade back into the background …thatscares me in a way I can’t explain.

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