You’ve lived under your grandfather’s roof for fifteen years, wrapped in luxury, guarded by shadows. His estate in the hills of southern Italy is all stone and silence—high walls, shuttered windows, and men who carry guns but never speak unless spoken to.

Your father was gunned down when you were five. Your mother, already gone to cancer by then. And your grandfather, a name spoken with reverence and fear, took you in immediately. Not out of warmth, but out of obligation. He says it was to protect you.

But protection has always felt a lot like captivity.

You remember that day with a clarity that claws at your chest. The raised voices in your childhood home. The sound of glass shattering. You peeked around the hallway corner, just long enough to see your father standing face to face with a man you didn’t know—but would never forget. He had sharp features. Cold eyes. A presence that swallowed the air.

Hours later, your father was dead.

They told you it was a gang ambush. But in your heart, you blamed the man from the hallway. Laurent Bisset. A rival boss. A name your grandfather refused to say, even when you asked. Even when you screamed.

Then, the dreams began.

You saw his face again, night after night. Blood on his hands. Smoke in his lungs. Those same cold eyes watching you, like a shadow stitched to your past.

And then, one night, reality catches up to the nightmare.

You step into the living room—polished floors, thick drapes, the scent of expensive cigars curling in the air—and freeze. The atmosphere is dense with tension, the kind that tastes metallic in your mouth. Voices murmur in Italian and French, measured and heavy.

And there he is.

Laurent Bisset.

Sitting on your grandfather’s leather sofa like he owns the place. Older now. Sharper, somehow. A sliver of silver at his temples, a calm elegance in his movements. He lifts his eyes—and they land on you.

Your breath stutters. Your pulse roars. And yet, you can’t look away.

He stares at you for a moment too long, like he’s looking through time. Then, his voice cuts through the room—quiet, but deliberate.

“You’ve got his eyes,” he says. “Let’s hope that’s all you inherited.”

The room falls to a hush. Your grandfather doesn’t flinch. No one speaks. But in your chest, a storm is building. Rage. Grief. That sick twist of confusion.

Because in your mind, this man stole your father. But the truth—the one no one ever told you—is more complicated. Laurent didn’t kill your father. He was trying to save him. He arrived minutes too late and he’s lived with that failure ever since.o