Chapter 5

• Damien’s POV
• The air inside the Eton Bar’s VIP reception room could’ve shattered steel.
• No one spoke. No one even dared to breathe too loud.
• The line of staff standing before me boss, managers, security looked like they were on the edge of execution. One wrong word, one twitch, and I wouldn’t hesitate to bring hell down on every last one of them.
• My expression didn’t change. It never did. Cold. Impassive. Empty, the way I’d trained myself to be since I was thirteen and inherited the bloodline’s legacy of death.
• But I knew they could feel it the pressure, the storm coiling inside me, ready to detonate.
• Because my son was missing.
• They’d lost him.
• In my city.
• He was the only soft spot I had left in this brutal, blood-soaked world. And tonight, someone had put their foot on it.
• On the floor, my brother knelt at my feet, looking like a broken dog.
• “Brother Damien I’m sorry!” Logan choked out, his voice cracking with panic. “It’s my fault. I shouldn’t have brought Little Treasure here I thought he’d just sit and draw while I met with that bastard from the Montenegro syndicate! I didn’t know he’d slip away if anything happens to him, I swear ”
• I didn’t let him finish.
• My foot slammed into his chest, sending him crashing backward.
• The sickening crack of bone made even the bartenders flinch. Good. They should be afraid.
• Logan groaned, gasping for air, but dragged himself upright again and dropped back to his knees. A pathetic sight but he knew better than to run from punishment. He was lucky he was my brother.
• Lucky I hadn’t drawn my gun.
• Our parents were still tucked away on their yacht off the Amalfi Coast, blissfully unaware that their grandson my son had vanished into the shadows of a city that had long belonged to us. If they found out before I fixed this…
• God help all of us.
• I felt nothing. No expression cracked across my face, but inside
• Inside, I was ready to burn this place to the ground.
• And then a knock.
• Soft. Hesitant. The kind of knock a ghost might make before dragging you into your grave.
• The bar owner flinched, closest to the door. He opened it slowly, nervously
• And froze.
• “What the Little… Little young master!”
• My head snapped up.
• I was on my feet before my mind even caught up.
• There, standing just beyond the threshold like he had strolled through hell and back without blinking, was my son.
• Little Treasure.
• Logan let out a strangled cry, launching himself forward and collapsing at the boy’s feet, clutching him like a lifeline. “Treasure! My precious little devil, where did you go?! I thought I lost you oh god, I really thought ”
• Tears streamed down his face.
• The rest of the room? Silent. Shocked. The collective inhale of men who had just narrowly escaped death.
• I stepped forward. Logan tried to cling tighter, but I grabbed his collar and yanked him out of the way like garbage in my path.
• I crouched, finally eye-level with my son.
• His clothes were rumpled. His cheeks flushed. A faint scrape along his temple.
• But his eyes his sharp, clear eyes met mine without fear. Only urgency.
• “What happened?” I asked, voice low and quiet.
• He didn’t speak he rarely did but his small hand reached out and gripped mine, tugging hard.
• He needed me to follow.
• Without hesitation, I stood and let him lead me into the dark.
• Wherever he had been, whatever he'd seen someone was about to answer for it.
• And if a single hand had touched him without permission?
• There would be blood.
• The moment I drew closer to my son, something stopped me cold.
• He smelled of alcohol not a surprise in a place like this. But beneath the sharp sting of liquor, there was something else. A faint trace of something delicate. Cool. Clean.
• Like jasmine blooming in the dead of winter.
• Like a whisper of memory I hadn’t let myself remember in years.
• I froze, heartbeat stalling in my chest.
• Where had that scent come from?
• Before I could process it, Little Treasure tugged on my hand again, more urgently this time. His voice cracked in that low, raw sound of his just air and desperation, no words.
• He pointed sharply down the corridor, his small body trembling with frustration.
• I didn’t ask questions.
• I scooped him into my arms and moved.
• My people followed, instincts razor-sharp behind their unreadable masks. Even Logan, wheezing and clutching his ribs, managed to limp behind me.
• Five minutes later, we stood at the top floor, facing a heavy storeroom door.
• Little Treasure squirmed violently in my arms. I set him down and watched as he rushed the door, tiny fists pounding against it like the world was ending on the other side.
• “Treasure?” Logan asked, confused. “What is it? What’s in there?”
• My gut told me the answer.
• I turned to the bar owner. “Open it.”
• “Y-Yes, right away!” the man stammered, nearly tripping over his own feet as he turned to his manager. “Manager , the key!”
• The woman hesitated for half a second too long.
• I noticed.
• The way her pupils shrank. The twitch of her fingers. The panic blooming under her mask of confusion.
• “What are you waiting for?” I asked, voice like ice cracking over a river. “Open. It.”
• She fumbled with the key, hands shaking as she slid it into the lock. A click echoed in the silence. The door creaked open.
• And there sprawled on the cold concrete floor like a broken doll was a woman.
• Her dark hair was splayed around her like a curtain. Her skin ghostly pale, lips barely tinted with color. One arm crooked beneath her head, the other limp against her side. She looked like she had collapsed mid-prayer.
• I stepped forward.
• That scent it hit me full force now. The same delicate note. Cool, faintly sweet, like midnight air through glass.
• And it was her.
• Her.
• The woman from five years ago.
• The night that never left me. The mystery I buried under duty and blood and silence.
• It was her.
• “Ava?” The name slipped from my mouth like a secret I wasn’t supposed to speak.
• The room exploded into chaos.
• “What the hell is going on?!” the bar owner shouted. “Why is there a woman locked inside?!”
• The manager stammered, “S-she wasn’t in there earlier, I I swear, I didn’t know ”
• “Enough.” My tone didn’t rise. It didn’t have to.
• I stepped toward her.
• But before anyone else could move, Little Treasure launched himself forward. His small body curled protectively around hers like a shield. And when one of the staff tried to help, his face twisted feral, fierce and he bared his teeth in a silent warning.
• No one dared take another step.
• I stared at them my son wrapped around a woman like she was his lifeline.
• And I understood.
• In the time I’d spent tearing this world apart for my empire, she had done what no one else had managed.
• She had gotten inside his walls.
• My cold, silent son who wouldn’t speak to doctors, wouldn’t look anyone in the eyes was clinging to her like his heart had finally found a home.
• And something deep inside me cracked.
• I crouched beside them, brushing his trembling back.
• “She’s burning up,” I murmured. “She needs a doctor. Now.”
• Little Treasure looked up at me. His eyes glistened but he nodded.