The hum of the engine was the only sound between them as Dante’s black SUV tore through the rain-slicked streets of New York, the city’s neon glow reflecting off the wet pavement like shattered glass. Elena sat in the passenger seat, her fingers curled tightly around the edge of the leather seat, her knuckles white. The weight of the gun she had just fired—*the gun she had used to kill her own father*—still echoed in her bones, a phantom vibration that refused to fade. She could still see Vincenzo’s face, the way his cold gray eyes had widened in shock just before the bullet struck. There had been no fear in them, only disbelief, as if he couldn’t fathom that his own daughter—*the daughter he had abandoned, the daughter he had never truly seen*—could be the one to end him.