Chapter 176

• GUSTAVO
• First light slipped through the heavy curtains in thin lines across the bedroom. The silk sheets were twisted around my legs from a night of turning over the same argument. I sat up slow, elbows on my knees, staring at the wall. Valentina’s voice kept playing in my head. The way she said she was tired of pretending it didn’t hurt. The way her eyes locked on mine and stayed there, fierce and open for half a second before she pulled back. Every sharp word, every charged look, hit me again. Her fire. Her hurt. The way she almost reached for me. I couldn’t call it attraction anymore. Couldn’t call it possession. It was deeper. It had been deeper for a while, and I was done pretending otherwise.
• I looked up at the ceiling. Sunlight crept in stronger now. Warm on my face. And the truth settled in my chest, quiet but heavy. I loved her. Not the idea of her. Not the challenge. Her. The woman who walked into my world with nothing but anger and pride and turned everything upside down. She made me want to be more than the man who ruled through fear. She made me want the clean empire, the legitimate name, the life that didn’t end in blood. She was the reason I’d changed the rules. And I wanted her beside me—not as a prize, not as a weakness, but as my equal. My partner. My wife.