Page 66 of Queen
Guido blinks, slow, and lifts his hand. His tiny finger points—not to me, not to Emiliano—but to the chess piece resting on the rim of the tub. A knight. The same one I carried from his nursery, now worn smooth in my palm.
The room tilts. My stomach drops.
They made him play. They fed him pieces of the game, even there, even in the shadows. And now he’s carrying it back with him, like a brand burned into his mind.
I clutch the knight, the wood digging deep into my skin, and force my breath steady.
This isn’t over.
This was never meant to end with Matteo. He was just a pawn. And if Guido whispers “knight,” then someone else is still moving the pieces. Someone clever. Patient. Someone who still believes in the board Giovanni built.
I rise slowly, turning toward Emiliano. He hasn’t moved, but his eyes burn with the same realization clawing through my chest.
“Find me every man,” I say, my voice steady, cold, carved from steel. “Every man who ever called Giovanni ‘King.’”
Emiliano straightens in the doorway, the shadow of a smile touching his mouth—not amusement, but something darker. Approval. Respect.
“The true enemy,” I whisper, gaze locked on the knight clenched in my fist, “isn’t dead yet.”
The silence stretches, heavy and unyielding. Guido leans against the porcelain, too small, too quiet, his word still echoing in the air like a curse.
Knight.
The board is set. The game has only just begun.
14
emiliano
The Ride to Damnation
The engine hums like a confession I don’t want to hear. Low. Steady. Relentless. My hands grip the wheel hard enough to crack bone, and still they shake. Every bump in the road jolts the car, a dull thud that echoes through the trunk—where Matteo lies wrapped in blood-soaked linen. The bastard’s silence weighs heavier than his body.
Beside me, Zina doesn’t say a word. Her gaze fixes on the window, but she isn’t looking at the trees. Her thoughts are knives, cutting deeper than any blade. She hasn’t cried. She hasn’t cursed. That silence is worse than either.
The night stretches black, the headlights slicing through it like twin blades. The road narrows as we climb higher into the hills, the forest crowding closer, branches clawing at the car.Every mile takes us further from the city, deeper into old ground—territory most men in our world never knew existed.
Giovanni knew. I knew. The blood brothers knew.
The “true” grave.
I hear his voice like he’s riding in the back seat.Every empire needs its altar, Emiliano. Every king needs his tomb.
I glance at Zina. Her hands are folded tight in her lap, leather gloves still stained with Matteo’s blood. She hasn’t taken them off. A part of me wants to tell her she should. That no woman should sit with that kind of stain clinging to her. But she isn’t just any woman. She cut her way into Giovanni’s throne room and never left.
She feels me watching. Her head turns, slow and sharp, her eyes catching mine in the dim dashboard glow. No words. Just that look—cold, defiant, daring me to break the silence first.
I don’t.
Because there’s nothing left to say. Matteo betrayed us. Matteo died for it. And now I’m driving his corpse back to the place where we first buried Giovanni’s legacy, as if betrayal itself needs to rot under the same soil.
The road jolts us again. Another hard thump from the trunk. My jaw tightens. Every sound feels like Matteo mocking me from the grave, like his blood is seeping through the steel, staining the car, staining me.
I force my eyes back to the road. Branches arch overhead like a cathedral, moonlight bleeding through jagged leaves. The weight of history presses down, the ghosts of men who swore oaths on this same path. We carved our names into the dirt here once, swore our blood to Giovanni. Tonight, I carve betrayal out of it.
My chest feels tight, the air too thin. My mind flickers between past and present—Giovanni’s hand gripping myshoulder, his voice iron in my ear:Loyalty is everything, figghiu. Betrayal is worse than death.
I whisper into the silence, not sure if it’s for me or for her. “Every empire has its altar. Tonight we bury betrayal in the same ground we once buried honor.”
