Ella es humana

The moment I pressed the 'Confirm' button on the university portal, my life in Chicago was over before my heart even had a chance to stutter.

The screen flashed a sterile green banner: Enrollment Finalized: Columbia University, New York City.

My hands didn't shake.

They should have.

I was Elena Vitiello, the only daughter of the Chicago Outfit's Underboss, raised in a gilded cage where loyalty was the only currency that mattered, and betrayal was a debt paid in blood.

Moving to New York wasn't just a transfer.

It was a defection.

Because New York belonged to the Famiglia. It belonged to Dante Moretti.

Even a thousand miles away, the name tasted like gunpowder and aged scotch—acrid, rich, and lethal.

And I was voluntarily walking into his lion's den. Because the wolves in my own house had already started to eat me alive.

My phone vibrated against the mahogany desk. A new notification from Instagram.

It was Sofia.

The caption read: VIP treatment at the Gala. So grateful for my boys.

I tapped the photo.

There she was, standing between Luca Rossi and Matteo Bianchi.

My Luca.

My Matteo.

They were my sworn protectors, the soldiers who had cut their palms and mixed their blood with mine when we were ten years old, promising that nothing would ever touch me.

In the photo, Sofia was wearing a white silk gown.

My custom-made gown.

Around her neck hung a string of rare pink pearls.

My mother's pearls.

The ones kept in the biometric vault in my wing of the estate. The vault only three people had access to: Me, Luca, and Matteo.

A cold sensation spread through my chest, like someone had replaced my blood with liquid nitrogen.

This wasn't just theft.