Chapter 2 - The Sovereign’s Debt
Mireia did not take Darius Villano’s arm immediately. She looked at his offered elbow, then at his face—at the clean line of his jaw, the faint scar near his left temple, and the absolute lack of deceit in his eyes.
"Why?" she asked.
"Because you are Eleanor Vance’s blood," Darius said simply. "And the Villano family does not leave its debts unpaid."
Caleb was still stuttering behind them, his phone already buzzing in his pocket as the first dominoes of his financial ruin began to fall. Mireia didn't glance back at him. She turned her back on Caleb Wren, stepped beside Darius Villano, and placed her hand lightly upon his forearm.
His jacket was made of heavy, fine wool. Beneath it, his muscle felt like solid iron.
Darius escorted her through the private exit of L’Étoile, where two massive black SUVs waited with engines idling quietly in the rain-slicked alleyway. A suit-clad driver opened the rear door of the first vehicle the moment Darius approached.
"Where are you going tonight, Miss Vance?" Darius asked, standing between her and the light drizzle falling from the dark city sky.
"My apartment," Mireia said, her voice trembling slightly as the adrenaline of the last twenty minutes began to bleed off, leaving behind a cold, hollow ache in her chest. "In the West End."
"My men will escort you," Darius said. He gestured to the driver. "Ensure Miss Vance arrives safely. Place four men on her floor. No one enters that building without my direct permission. Especially not Caleb Wren."
"Wait," Mireia said, turning to him before stepping into the car. "I don't understand. My grandmother was an elementary school teacher. My grandfather was a carpenter. What could my family possibly owe—or be owed by—the Villano empire?"
Darius reached into his breast pocket and pulled out a clean, folded linen handkerchief. He handed it to her gently.
"Your grandfather was not just a carpenter, Mireia," Darius said softly, using her first name for the first time. "And your grandmother saved my father’s life in 1974 when the rest of this city wanted him dead. That ring on your finger was not a piece of costume jewelry. It was the Sovereign Signet. It means that wherever a Villano walks in this city, you hold the right of command."
Mireia stared down at the black onyx ring on her finger. The stone felt cool against her skin.
"Caleb thought he was discarding a placeholder," Darius added, his voice dropping into a register that made her skin tingle. "He didn't realize he was throwing away the only woman who could have bought and sold his entire lineage."
"I don't want his lineage," Mireia whispered, a sudden wave of fresh grief catching in her throat. "I just wanted him to love me."
Darius looked at her for a long moment, his eyes softening with a strange, profound reverence.
"Then he is a fool," Darius said firmly. "And the city will treat him like one."
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He closed the car door gently, isolating her inside the plush, leather-scented quiet of the luxury SUV. As the car pulled away into the glowing neon rain of Grayhaven, Mireia looked out the rear window.
Darius Villano stood alone in the alleyway, his hands in his pockets, watching her car disappear into the night like a sentinel guarding a crown.
