- Chapter 6
- Celeste stood alone in her father’s penthouse, staring at the city skyline through the glass walls stretched from floor to ceiling.
- The flickering lights below reminded her of how far she had run—and how easily she had been dragged back.
- The name Celeste Beneventi had been buried for years. She had forced herself to forget it. For years, she had whispered a different name.
- Valerie.
- A name that made her small, quiet, easy to overlook. But tonight, she let herself remember.
- Celeste was nineteen when she learned the truth about power for the first time.
- She had hidden behind a carved wooden door, her breath held, her fingers digging into the smooth frame.
- Inside the grand study, her mother knelt on the marble floor. Her delicate hands, once so gentle, were now trembling as they clutched the hem of her father’s expensive suit.
- “Please, Salvatore…” Her voice was soft, broken. She was pleading. “I beg you, please, for the sake of our children—”
- But Beneventi’s boss was not a man who granted mercy. His face, calm and composed, betrayed no emotion as he lifted her chin with his fingers.
- “You disappointed me, Luisa,” he murmured, almost tenderly. “I gave you everything, and yet—you’ve dared to betray me.”
- Celeste’s heart pounded so loudly she thought they might hear it. She knew what was coming. Everyone in their world knew what happened to traitors.
- And her mother was no exception. The ugly truth was discovered to Salvatore—Dante wasn’t his son.
- For years, Luisa had lived a lie, raising Dante under the Beneventi name while letting him carry the blood of her husband’s right-hand man.
- Salatore stroked her cheek, his touch gentle. Almost loving. Then, without hesitation, he nodded toward one of his men.
- A gunshot shattered the silence. Blood splattered across the cold marble floor.
- Celeste didn’t cry. She didn’t scream or even move. She just stood there, frozen, watching her mother’s body crumple like a broken doll.
- Her father wiped his hands, turned, and locked eyes with her.
- “Love makes you weak, my dear.” His voice was eerily calm, steady. “And the weak don’t survive in this world.”
- She had never forgotten those words. But she had tried to outrun them.
- For years, she fled her father’s world. She had erased her name, built a life far away from the shadow of the Beneventi empire.
- She wanted to be another person. Normal.
- And then she met Stephan. A man who was everything she thought she wanted. Powerful, controlled, dangerous, but not cruel.
- Celeste let herself believe that he was different. That he would protect her. Would make her happy. That he could become her home. But love made her foolish. She had trusted him, given him everything, every piece of her heart. And when she was no longer useful, he had thrown her away.
- She would not make that mistake again.
- She was done pretending to be something she wasn’t
- She had tried to be Valerie, but Valerie was weak.
- Celeste Beneventi had been born in blood and gunpowder, raised in the darkest shadows. If the world had feared her father, they would learn to fear her even more.
- A knock on the door caught her attention before Dante stepped inside.
- “Are you okay, sister?” His voice carried across the room as he entered, usual smirk faded when he saw her expression. “You look… different.”
- A slow smile spread across her face. “I just remembered who I am,” she replied. “And it’s time to take back what’s mine.”
- In the days that followed, Celeste stepped fully into her role as the Beneventi heir. No longer the overlooked fiancée, she commanded attention at her father’s right hand during meetings with the criminal elite who had long thought her dead.
- The reactions varied—some watched her with awe, others with barely concealed fury.
- Riccardo Falcone, a longtime rival of the Beneventis, glared at her from across the polished conference table.
- “You should have stayed dead,” he spat.
- “You’re welcome to try.” Celeste met his gaze with cold confidence. “And see what will happen then.”
- A slow, deadly silence filled the room.
- Riccardo’s jaw ticked. Salvatore, watching from beside her, let out a small, approving chuckle.
- She had always feared becoming him. But tonight, sitting at this table, she finally understood.
- She didn’t have to become her father.
- She would become worse.
