Heir To Silence. Book 1 The Pact of Blood Series

The terrace drains slowly.

Men peel away in pairs and threes, voices dropping as they step into the dark. Jackets go back on. Phones come out. Engines start somewhere below the hill, low and impatient, like the night is waiting for them to get moving.

I stay where I am until Marco’s hand clamps around my wrist.

“Enough,” he mutters, steering me toward the stairs like I’m a mistake he has to clean up before anyone else notices.

“I wasn’t doing anything,” I say, letting my heels click louder than necessary.

“You were doing plenty,” Antonio answers from behind us, voice flat.

Gio trails to my other side, quiet but watching everything like he’s memorizing it. Father follows last, speaking briefly to someone in Italian before he turns, his face unreadable in a way that makes my stomach tighten.

We reach the gravel drive. Headlights sweep across the stone. A line of cars waits like obedient animals.

Marco keeps hold of my wrist until we stop in front of a black car with tinted windows and a body that looks expensive even in the dark.

Then he releases me.

Not gently. Not hard. Just final.

“Get in,” he says.

I glance at him. “With you?”

His stare says I’m stupid.

I turn. And there he is.

Matteo stands beside the rear door, jacket back on now, hair neat, expression calm in that infuriating way. He looks like he hasn’t moved at all since the terrace, like the whole scene with Enzo didn’t touch him.

But his eyes do.

They settle on my mouth first. Then my throat. Then my eyes.

I swallow.

He opens the door without speaking.

It feels like an order even though no words are said.

I slide in.

The leather is cold against my thighs. The scent inside the car is expensive and clean, with something darker underneath, like smoke that never fully leaves a room.

Matteo gets in beside me a moment later. The door shuts. The outside world becomes muffled.

There’s a driver in the front. Silent. Focused.

Matteo doesn’t look at me as the car pulls away from the estate, tires crunching over gravel.

I stare out the window instead, watching the lights of the house fade behind us. It looks unreal from this angle. Like a place I wasn’t supposed to enter. Like a dream someone else paid for.

My phone buzzes in my lap.

Once.

Twice.

The name flashes across the screen.

Ethan.

My thumb stills.

Heat crawls up my chest. My throat tightens around something I haven’t been able to swallow since that hospital corridor in New York.

I let it ring.

The screen goes dark.

A moment passes.

Then it lights up again.

Ethan.

Matteo’s gaze drops to my lap so fast it feels like a touch.

Not polite.

Not accidental.

His attention fixes on the name.

I turn my phone face down.

Too late.

His jaw flexes once, slow, like he’s already decided something and now he’s forcing himself not to act on it.

The driver changes gears. The engine hum deepens.

I try to pretend my heartbeat isn’t suddenly loud enough to be heard.

“You’re popular,” Matteo says finally.

His voice is low, rough at the edges. Like he doesn’t use it unless he has to.

I keep my eyes on the window. “It’s a friend.”

“A friend,” he repeats, like it’s a concept he doesn’t respect.

I glance at him. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means,” he says calmly, “your phone has been ringing since we left.”

“He’s worried,” I snap before I can stop myself.

“Worried about what?” he asks.

His tone is too even. Too controlled.

Worried about me, I want to say. Worried because I vanished. Worried because he doesn’t know where I am, and neither do I, not really.

But how do you explain that to a man like Matteo?

How do you explain a life you had before him without making it sound like something small?

I look away again. “It doesn’t matter.”

“It matters if it distracts you,” he replies.

I laugh once, sharp. “You’re not my father.”

“No,” he says, and his eyes finally meet mine fully. “I’m not.”

Something in the way he says it makes my stomach dip.

The car keeps moving, winding down the hill into darker roads, cypress trees like silhouettes against the sky.

My phone buzzes again, but this time it’s a message.

I flip it over quickly, not thinking.

Ethan: Call me. Please. Ethan: Call me. Please.

My thumb hovers.

Then another buzz.

Ethan: You have five seconds to reply before I call the police.

Ethan: 5

A laugh pushes out of me, sudden and quiet.

I type back without meaning to smile.

Me: You’re sooooo dramatic.

A second later:

Ethan: And you’re hiding something. Night.

I shake my head, still smiling.

Then I feel it.

Matteo’s attention.

Not on my phone this time.

On my face.

I look up.

He’s watching me with a kind of stillness that makes my skin prickle. Like he’s trying to understand the way my mouth curves when I’m not trying to prove anything.

“Who were you texting?” he asks.

I blink. “A friend.”

His eyes narrow slightly. “You smiled.”

“Am I not allowed to?” I ask, turning fully toward him now. “Or does that also fall under your supervision?”

His gaze drops to my legs, the cut of my dress, then back to my eyes. Slow. Unhurried.

“Lucia,” he says, and the way he says my name makes it feel like he’s pulling it into his mouth.

I hold my breath.

“What?” I ask, pretending I’m not affected.

“You think you’re testing me,” he says quietly.

I lift my chin. “Maybe I am.”

His expression doesn’t change, but something in his eyes does. A dark flicker. A warning.

“You’re testing limits you don’t understand.”

I lean in slightly, just enough to feel the heat of him, just enough to be sure he notices.

“Then teach me,” I say softly.

The car hits a slight bump. Our shoulders brush.

It’s nothing.

It feels like everything.

Matteo’s hand shifts on his thigh, fingers flexing once, like he’s resisting the instinct to reach for me.

His voice drops lower.

“Not like this.”

I sit back, arms crossing, suddenly annoyed at the fact that my body doesn’t match my expression.

“Why not?” I ask. “Because you’re scared?”

His eyes lock onto mine, sharp now.

I shouldn’t have said it.

The silence stretches.

Outside, the world slides past in darkness, the occasional light from a distant villa flashing across the window and disappearing.

Matteo speaks again, quieter than before.

“Because you don’t know what you’re asking for.”

I smile, slow and deliberate.

“I know exactly what I’m asking for,” I say.

His gaze holds mine for a beat too long.

Then he looks forward again, jaw tight, like he’s forcing control back into place.

I turn my phone face down and rest it on my thigh.

Ethan can wait.

Right now, the only thing I can feel is the space between me and Matteo, charged and dangerous, like a wire stretched too tight.

And the worst part is, I’m the one who keeps pulling it.