Chapter 71: Only I can make it go away

Sienna simply closed her laptop, slow and careful, the screen folding shut with a quiet click, and looked up at the three people now standing in her room like she had been expecting them all along, even though her heart was hammering hard enough that she was sure they could hear it.

"I don’t know what Viktor sees in you," Elena said. Her voice was cold, clipped, the voice of a woman who had already decided exactly what she thought of Sienna long before she ever walked through that door.

She was Viktor’s stepmother, and she wore that title the way some women wear jewelry, letting it sit heavy and obvious on her, a reminder to anyone who forgot their place.

"I should kill you," Elena went on, taking a step further into the room. "Do you know what you have caused? Because of you, Don Amel and Lion are dead, and now everyone is out to get us." Her voice rose, sharp and furious, each word landing like a slap. "You are trouble. Since the moment you walked into this house, it has been one trouble after another."

Elena’s eyes were burning now, her whole body tight with a kind of rage that had clearly been building for far longer than this one morning, far longer than one dead man or two.

Sienna sat very still on the bed, her laptop clutched against her chest, and said nothing at all, watching the three of them, waiting to see which one of them would move first.

"Listen to me," Aliya said, stepping forward now, her voice smooth and slow, like honey poured over something sharp.

"I know a man like Viktor is hard to come by. I’m willing to let what happened at the gala slide, if you promise to leave him." She paused, letting the words settle, watching Sienna’s face for any sign of a crack.

"If you do that, I believe my father will back Viktor, and together, they can make all of this go away."

She spoke the way someone speaks to a child, or to someone they believe is too foolish to see through them. As if Sienna could not tell exactly what game was being played here, exactly what threads Aliya was trying to pull.

Sienna said nothing. In her mind, a dozen sharp answers rose up, ready to be thrown across the room, but she swallowed every one of them and let her face stay still, blank, unreadable.

They thought their words were landing like blows. She would not give them the satisfaction of seeing otherwise.

"I have the divorce papers," Aliya went on, reaching into the small bag at her side and pulling out a folded stack of documents.

She held them out, almost gently, as if she were offering Sienna a gift instead of an escape route with a price tag attached.

"Sign these, and you and Viktor can go your separate ways. Once he marries me, your life will be spared."

"You heard her," Elena said, her voice cutting sharp through the quiet room. "Sign the papers right now. She’s the only one who can make this go away."

Through all of this, Marcel had remained silent, standing a little apart from the two women, his arms crossed, his bruised face unreadable in its own way. Sienna kept her eyes on him for a moment, waiting, wondering what he was thinking, wondering what he had really come here for.

"This damn paper isn’t going to solve anything," Marcel said finally, and both women turned to look at him, surprised. He shook his head slowly. "Listen to me, Sienna. I don’t care what my mother or Aliya is saying. They both have their own reasons for wanting this. But the truth is, a war has already started, and it’s going to get messy. This is not something you want to be caught in the middle of."

He took a small step closer, his voice lowering, softer now, meant only for her.

"How long do you think Viktor can actually protect you?"

Sienna tilted her head slightly, watching him now, really watching him, the way a person watches someone they are not sure whether to trust.

"I deeply care about you," Marcel said, "and I will not let anyone force you to do something you don’t want to do. You’re a smart woman." He paused, glancing once at his mother, then back to Sienna. "If you want, I can help you get out of here. Far away. Somewhere Viktor can never find you."

For a moment, nobody in the room spoke.

Sienna’s mind moved quickly behind her still face, turning his offer over the way she had turned over every piece of information she had dug up this afternoon, looking for the crack in it, the hidden cost.

Marcel had seemed different from Elena and Aliya, softer, less obviously hungry for something. But she had learned enough, in her time in this house, not to trust softness just because it wore a gentler voice.

"Why would you do that," Sienna asked slowly, her voice careful, testing. "Viktor will bring his anger down on you. You saw what he did to you the last time." She let the question hang there, watching his face closely, curious to see what answer he would give, curious whether he even had one worth believing.

"I don’t care what Viktor does to me," Marcel said, and there was something in the way he said it, low and steady, that almost sounded like the truth. "All I care about is you."

"Take the deal, if you’re smart," Aliya said, cutting back into the conversation, her patience clearly running thin. "This world does not belong to you."

"She’s right," Elena added, her arms crossed tightly over her chest. "You will never belong here. Not really. Not the way you think you do."

Sienna sat quietly through all of it, letting their words pile up in the air between them, unanswered.