Page 227 of The Obedient Lie
What came next should’ve been execution. For any other man in the dynasty, itwould’vebeen. You kill your own blood, you don’t get a trial. You get a bullet.
But Damius didn’t pull the trigger. Because he saw something.
Potential.
He saw Vince as raw material—blood-soaked, willing to do what others wouldn’t. And he had leverage.Us. We were Vince’s weakness. So he let him live. Let him owe. And Vince has been paying for it every day since.
I swallowed hard. “He didn’t spare him. Heclaimedhim.”
“That’s what he does.”
And now he was circling us. Just like he’d done with Vince.
Just like he was with Rome—who was already being pulled deeper into Damius’s grip not by choice.
Because he saw potential.
The room felt still after she left it.
Luca sat on the edge of the bed, hunched forward, his hands laced behind his neck. His chest rose and fell like he’d just been hit in the ribs.
“So what do we do?” His voice cracked on the last word. “Just let them take her?”
He jerked his chin toward the contracts on the dresser.
The gold seals had already been broken.
So had we.
“We can’t keep her out of their grips,” he muttered.
I didn’t answer right away. Because he was right. We couldn’t stop them.
Not like this.
Notyet.
But I wasn’t spiraling anymore.
I was done begging the world to let us keep her.
I wasplanning.
I crossed the room, picked up the top page. The name inked in the corner curled like smoke—one of the many dynasty sons promised a meeting with her.
“We’re Crows,” I said quietly. “We don’t keep her out of their grips.”
I looked back at Luca.
“We just make sure they’re not alive long enough to reach for her.”
He froze. Just the still, sharp silence of someone who understood what I meant.
Boating accidents happen.
Planes drop out of the sky.
Brake lines wear thin. Real thin.
