Page 115 of Obsession & Oath

“We’re a family now,” he murmurs. “You, me, and our little one.”

A tear slips down my cheek, but for once, it’s not from pain or fear. It’s from something else—something warm, somethinghopeful.

“We’ll be okay,” I whisper.

Dante pulls me even closer, wrapping me in his warmth. “We will.”

For the first time in my life, I don’t feel like I belong to someone else. I don’t feel like a pawn in a game I never wanted to play.

I belong tomyself.

Tohim.

Tous.

And as I close my eyes, nestled against the man I love, cradling the life between us, I know something with peaceful finality.

This is just the beginning of forever.

Epilogue - Carmen

Months pass. The ash washes away from where the Rubio Mansion burned. My father is buried with a bullet hole in his chest. Life can never be the same again.

But I don’t want it to be, either.

The war is over, but peace doesn’t happen overnight.

At first, I didn’t want anything to do with it.

But the negotiations were slow, tense, full of old grudges and fresh wounds. The Cartel surrendered to avoid bloodshed, but they were more than capable of causing headaches.

And at some point, between Dante’s complaints and late nights, moving from hotel to hotel, to purefrustrationat my morning sickness and sheer, inescapable boredom, I walked into the Prince’s Guild casino and sat myself down at the table.

Mia was on one side, and Dante was to my left. Both were capable of taking out anyone who had any problems with me.

The remaining factions of the Cartel refused to negotiate with Leon after what happened. Bitterness and frustration from both sides only fueled those fires.

But me? Ironically enough, the Cartel seemed to view killing your father as a right ofpassage.At least, that’s what they told me. Dante theorized they were trying to get a handle on the power vacuum that my father and Lacruz left behind.

So, the Cartel surrendered. Undermyterms.

It was strange at first, stepping into that role. I had spent my whole life beingownedby the Cartel, a daughter, a pawn, a symbol of their empire. But now, I sat at the table as something else. Not a princess, not a prisoner—a leader.

Dante doesn’t love it. I see the way his jaw clenches every time I step into another meeting, the way his hand always hovers near his gun when we sit down with men who used to call themselves my father’s most loyal.

But he doesn’t stop me. He trusts me to make the decisions I need to make.

Mia, too, has been by my side through all of it, offering insights or a discrete assassination when we debrief afterward. Often, while the redhead indulges in a glass of wine and offers me herbal remedies for my horrendous pregnancy symptoms.

I end up meeting Cassandra and Isabella, too. Rocco and Teo’s partners end up welcoming me into their group with surprising ease.

Isabella is sharp-tongued and devastatingly beautiful. She is completely ruthless when she wants to be, but she laughs wildly and freely and draws me in with a surprising gentleness.

Cassandra is quieter, but there’s a steel in her that’s impossible to ignore. It takes a while for her to open up, tosingfor me. But after hearing her voice, there was no going back. I was always going to be totally enamored by her.

Between the three of them, I have something I haven’t had in years—friends.

And when we meet together, when they bring their children and share their own stories and happiness, I see my own child’s future. This is the next generation of powerful leaders—capable of anything they put their minds to.

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