C50 He Shouldn't Care

Dante’s jaw clenched as his mind replayed the last few minutes.

Annabelle’s confused expression when he’d asked her that stupid, impulsive question.

The slight downturn of her lips as she tried to make sense of what he’d said.

“Would you ever betray me?”

He swore under his breath, the words tasting bitter even now.

What the hell had he been thinking?

Dante dragged a hand through his dark hair, his fingers tightening as though he could physically pull the frustration out of his skull.

He shouldn’t have asked her that.

It was ridiculous.

She was nothing like Isabella…or at least that’s what he wanted to believe.

But how could he, when every time he looked at her, those damn emerald eyes stared back at him, carrying shadows of the woman he just realised had been taking him for a fool all along?

“This is fucking ridiculous,” he muttered to himself.

Annabelle wasn’t Isabella.

He knew that. She wasn’t a manipulator.

She wasn’t scheming to claw her way into his world or betray him at the first opportunity.

If anything, she was always looking for the opportunity to get the fuck away from him.

She was raw and real, a storm of emotions she didn’t bother hiding because she didn’t know how.

And yet, the resemblance between them; the delicate features, the purity in her gaze ate at him.

He stared out at his sprawling estate bathed in twilight.

The shadows of the towering trees swayed slightly in the gentle breeze, their silhouettes stretching long across the cobblestone driveway.

He scoffed bitterly.

He shouldn’t care.

After everything he’d learned about Isabella earlier, he should discard anything that reminded him of her.

That was the logical move.

But Annabelle…

He couldn’t let her go.

The thought of her leaving clawed at him, a primal part of him roaring in protest at the idea of her being out of his reach.

She had gotten under his skin in ways he hadn’t anticipated, worming her way past his defences with her fiery stubbornness and unwavering loyalty to her sister.

“And I haven’t even fucked her yet.”

The admission made him laugh humorlessly.

She’d turned his world on its head without so much as a damned kiss.

Yes, he had loved Isabella once, but even then, it hadn’t been this consuming.

He could admit to himself now what much of his initial attraction to his late wife had been.

She’d been fresh, untouched by the dark corners of his world. Or so he’d thought.

Her apparent innocence now seemed to be a lie, a carefully constructed facade that had crumbled with her betrayal.

His hand tightened into a fist at the memory of Antonia’s words.

“She gave her bodyguards the slip to meet her lover.”

And all this while he had been thinking that he didn't protect her enough.

He had lost sleep and half of himself because of self-blame over a woman who had deliberately shunned his protection for some dick.

Dante’s teeth ground together as rage simmered just beneath the surface.

He’d put in a call earlier, contacting trusted sources to verify what Antonia had told him.

He doubted Isabella had been skilled enough to hide an affair without leaving traces.

If she’d been cheating, there would be whispers, people who had seen something.

Even now, there was still a part of him hoping that Antonia or whoever the fuck was on that audio was wrong.

“I couldn’t have been that blind, could I?” he thought to himself.

The thought filled him with equal parts fury and dread.

If he eventually got confirmation that it was true that she’d truly betrayed him…

“Focus, Dante.”

That was when he saw one of his men escorting Annabelle toward the gazebo.

She was walking with determined strides, her back straight, her head held high despite the obvious exhaustion in her frame.

Then, like an infatuated schoolboy, he had turned away before she saw him looking.

The sight of her stirred conflicting emotions in him.

Anger flickered at first, a reminder of how much she resembled Isabella.

But it was quickly overshadowed by something far more dangerous…panic.

He’d heard the resolution in her tone earlier.

She was planning to leave, to take her sister and disappear into the world.

“No,” he muttered, his voice low and venomous. “Not happening.”

The idea of losing her.

Losing the fire she brought to his cold, calculated existence made his hands itch for something to destroy.

She could remind him of every cheater and liar he’d ever known, but that didn’t matter.

She was his.

He didn’t know when it had happened or how, but Annabelle Whitaker had claimed a part of him he hadn’t thought was vulnerable anymore.

But he wasn’t about to let her waltz out of his life without a fight.

The sharp trill of his phone snapped him out of his spiralling thoughts.

He scowled at the phone before he pressed it to his ear.

“Speak,” he barked.

“It’s Sal,” came the urgent reply. “We’re under attack, boss. Mikhail’s people…they’re not going to hold out much longer.”

Dante’s free hand curled into a fist. “Where are you?”

Sal rattled off the location, his voice barely audible over the sounds of chaos in the background.

Shouting, gunfire, and the unmistakable crash of something heavy hitting the ground.

“We need backup. Fast,” Sal added.

Dante didn’t hesitate. “Make sure he didn’t get his head blown off. I’m on my way.”

He hung up and turned sharply towards the driveway.

The cool rage that had been simmering in him now had a focus.

He could have easily sent Angelo to handle this, but that wasn't going to happen.

He needed action, something to tear into to rid himself of the storm raging inside him.

As he barked orders to his men, instructing them to prepare for immediate departure, one thought remained crystal clear in his mind.

“This wasn’t just about Mikhail. This was about regaining control.”

The convoy roared through the city streets, headlights slicing through the darkness as Dante’s men sped toward the location.

Dante rode in silence, his gun resting on his lap.

“Boss?” Angelo’s voice broke through the tense quiet.

“What?”

“You seem… more pissed than usual.”

Dante shot him a warning glare, and Angelo wisely shut his mouth.

His focus returned to the road ahead.

The anger brewing in him was not just about the attack. It was about...everything.

Isabella’s betrayal. Antonia’s information. Annabelle’s stubbornness.

“And yet, you’re not letting her go.”

The admission burned in his chest.

The nightclub loomed ahead, its skeletal frame lit by the flicker of flames from a nearby burning vehicle.

Its windows were shot out already and music was still blasting in the club though its occupants were long gone.

Taken down in the crossfire or lucky enough to escape.

Angelo had taken care to make sure that his men in the force would steer clear of that area no matter what they heard.

Still, the fact that any idiot would make such an obvious fuss annoyed him.

He had better things to do than to have some nosy cops sniffing around his territory.

He was going to kill Mikhail himself if that idiot had caused this bullshit.

With that thought in mind, he came out of the car even before the driver fully parked in the hidden lot.

Gunfire cracked through the night, sharp and jarring, as Dante’s men disembarked swiftly.

“Secure the perimeter,” Dante ordered, his voice cutting through the chaos. “Angelo, with me.”

The air was thick with smoke and the metallic tang of blood.

Dante moved through the shadows like a predator, his gun raised as he assessed the situation.

Something suddenly whizzed past him, and he ducked as a sharp pain exploded in his ear.

Dante felt the trickle of wetness just as he realised what had just happened.

Fuck!