Page 5 of Conall's Reign

I rolled my eyes. “I’m just looking, that’s all. There’s no harm in looking. He’s out of my league; he’s really… intense. I know he’s too old, and he’s Angelo’s friend.”

Angelo would completely flip out if I made a move on Conall O’Kelly. Not that I’d be that gutsy. Conall was everything I wasn’t—sophisticated, dangerous, and experienced. He wouldn’t be interested in someone like me. I had hardly ever said more than three words to him at a time. Still, whenever we were in the same room, my eyes inevitably drifted toward him.

“That’s one way to put it,” Theo said, nudging me. “But let’s focus. Are we doing this, or are you going to chicken out?

“This is a bad idea,” I whispered, but Theo barely acknowledged me, her confidence unwavering. “Fine. We’re doing it.”

Sneaking upstairs was a breeze. There was just one private bathroom, and it was located upstairs, so my brother’s men easily allowed the littleprincipessato waltz past them with her best friend after I flashed them a smile. I even gave them a playful wink.

“You shouldn’t do that, Frankie,” Theo warned as we climbed the stairs. “If one of them flirts back, Angelo might kill him.”

“I know.” She was right. It wasn’t smart. Theo still cast me a look that suggested she didn’t believe I was aware. Somehow, Theo always seemed far too knowledgeable about such things, even though she was only a year older than me.

We reached the door that screamed, “Do Not Enter.” Theo turned to me, her eyes sparkling with mischief. “Okay, birthday girl. Go ahead. I’ll be the lookout.”

“What? Me? This was your idea. I thought you were going to get the keys.” Nerves unfurled in my stomach. My brother would never hurt me, but he would be angry if we got caught.

“Of course. It’s your birthday, your brother, your heist,” she said as if it were completely logical. She flicked her hair back and batted her eyelashes. “A little rebellion is good for your soul.”

I groaned, but my hands were already reaching for the doorknob. It was locked with a passcode. After entering my birthdate, I paused for a heartbeat until it disengaged, almost chuckling to myself at his lack of imagination. I had apparently been his favorite sibling. Probably not after this.

The office was just as I expected: dark leather furniture, a massive mahogany desk, and walls lined with books and files. It carried a faint scent of Angelo’s cologne—a mix of cedarwood and something sharp and citrusy. My heart raced as I stepped inside, with Theo right behind me.

“Hurry up,” she urged, gesturing toward the desk.

I opened one drawer after another, my hands shaking. Papers, a gun—I quickly shut that drawer—and finally, a set of keys bearing the unmistakable Ferrari logo.

A file in one drawer caught my eye as I reached for the keys. It lay on top: Santelli Documents. What was this? I opened it and rifled through its contents. Birth certificates? And a piece of paper that looked aged and important. My breath caught when I saw names I recognized scrawled in an elegant but unmistakable script. Beneath the signatures were fingerprints pressed in crimson ink—or at least, what I initially thought was ink. A closer look made my stomach churn.

It wasn’t ink. It was blood.

Theo leaned over my shoulder. “What the hell is that?” she whispered, her voice filled with a mix of awe and fear.

“A blood oath,” I said, the words feeling foreign and heavy on my tongue. My mind raced, piecing together what I had gathered from whispered conversations and half-heard warnings. This wasn’t just a contract; it was a pact, binding people—some of whom I recognized— to Angelo’s world in a way I hadn’t fully understood until now.

Before I could talk myself out of it, I pulled out my phone and took a picture. The flash was off, but my hands trembled so much that I nearly dropped the phone. I captured images of every document in the file before I closed the drawer.

“Should we be doing that?” Theo hissed. “We’re only here for the car keys.”

“A little rebellion is good for the soul,” I mumbled, slipping my phone back into my pocket. “Let’s go.” My heart pounded with the implications of the words I’d seen, the blood rushing in my ears as I spied the keys.

“Got ‘em,” I whispered, holding them up.

Hunched over my phone in the dark, Theo and I examined the image, enlarging the words and names it contained—alliance, blood oath,‘The Commission,’trafficking. Theo gulped beside me as she turned to face me, her eyes wide as she connected the dots. We had tucked ourselves into an empty booth, as far away from everyone as possible, while we tried to process everything.

The document was signed by Alexei Volkov, Cormac O’Kelly, Yianni Anthakos, and Stefano Santelli—my father. Angelo, Ilias, Maxim, and Conall added their signatures at the bottom; however, it was dated fifteen years ago, when Angelo was only eleven years old…

“Look at this part,” Theo said, running a fingernail over the screen. “They agreed. The boys would marry into the other families,andso would their daughters. That’s what this agreement was about.”

“What? They sold us off? Like cattle? My brother would never!” I glanced at the men gathered, drinking their whiskey and scotch as if they were celebrating. A wave of red-hot anger coursed through me.

“Well,” Theo hedged. “I’m not sure they had any choice in the matter. This is old. Ilias was ten years old. What could he have done?” Her shoulders slumped in defeat. “There are two girls in my family. I wonder which one of us has to do it.” She ran her fingers over the screen and then glanced at the group of men who were unaware of the explosive knowledge we’d uncovered. “I’ll make sure it isn’t Polina.” Her mouth set in a firm line.

Her sister was still a baby, and I couldn’t understand how this was real. She was taking it better than I was.

“You don’t think we still have to do it? Our fathers are dead.” I didn’t want to get married.Ever. The idea of having children and raising kids filled me with anxiety. I’d seen what kind of mother my own had been. It hadn’t inspired me to pursue the roles of wife or mother. Perhaps she passed on some kind of gene to me. Perhaps I’d end up like her —awful and mean. The thought brought tears to my eyes.

Then I stopped.

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