Chapter 74: I know exactly how

Aria’s smile faded slowly as she studied her friend’s face, really studied it, taking in the tightness around her eyes, the way her hands trembled slightly where they gripped the suitcase handle.

"Okay," Aria said finally, her voice quieter now, more serious. "Okay. Let’s go."

"Are you in trouble?" Aria asked, once they were out on the street, walking fast, her eyes darting toward every parked car like she expected trouble to jump out from behind one of them.

"Yes," Sienna said. "Big one."

Aria didn’t ask anything else right away. She just nodded, the way she always did when things got serious, her playful edge dropping for a moment into something steadier. "Okay. Come on. My car’s parked around the corner."

She led Sienna to a sleek sports car tucked along the curb, and once they were both inside, doors locked, engine humming, Aria pulled out onto the road without another word. They drove for a while in silence, the city slipping past the windows, until they finally reached the tall iron gates of Aria’s family home.

It was a big house, the kind that made a statement just by existing. Aria’s parents were very wealthy, old money mixed with newer money, and the house reflected it in every polished corner.

But for all its size, it always felt strangely empty. There were maids moving quietly through the halls, guards stationed near the gates and doors, but rarely any actual family. Aria’s parents were almost always away, chasing business deals in cities Sienna could never quite keep track of.

Once they were inside, safely behind those iron gates, Aria turned to her, arms crossed, her earlier calm slipping away fast.

"Are you okay?" she asked. "Your heart was pounding the whole ride over. I could practically feel it from the driver’s seat. Will you please tell me what happened? Where have you even been?"

Sienna sank down onto the edge of a couch, suddenly feeling every hour of exhaustion catching up to her all at once.

"It’s a long story," she said slowly. "But the short version is... I was forced to marry a mafia guy. And I managed to escape."

She kept the rest of it locked away behind that one simple sentence. Not the murder, not the gala. Not Italy, or San Luca. Not Elena’s cold eyes or Aliya’s careful smile. Not Marcel’s strange, complicated offer, or the sound of Viktor’s voice, low and unreadable, sitting in the chair beside her bed just that morning.

If she told Aria everything, all of it, her best friend would be pulled straight into the middle of a war that had nothing to do with her. Sienna would rather carry the weight of it alone than watch Aria get hurt because of her.

Aria’s mouth dropped open.

"Stupid," she said, and it took Sienna a second to realize the word wasn’t aimed at her. "What the... " She caught herself, shaking her head.

"You know my family is pretty deep in that world, too, right? We’re one of the most powerful families out there. Don’t worry. My uncle will protect you from that jerk." Her hands curled into fists at her sides.

"I can’t wait to get my hands on that guy. How dare he kidnap my best friend?"

She was still angry, pacing now, muttering things under her breath that Sienna only half caught.

"Yeah, well," Aria said suddenly, stopping mid-step, pulling out her phone. "What did Simon say about all of this? I should call him. He might be able to help calm you down."

Sienna’s whole body tensed at the name.

"Wait," Aria added, her thumb hovering over the screen, pausing halfway through dialing. Her eyes went wide with sudden alarm. "Please tell me that mafia guy didn’t take your v-card."

"No," Sienna said quickly, sharper than she meant to. "But don’t call Simon. That jerk."

Aria blinked, lowering her phone slowly, studying Sienna’s face with the kind of careful attention only a lifelong best friend knew how to give. There was a story hiding behind that sharp little answer, Aria could tell, something old and sore that had nothing to do with mafia husbands or kidnappings at all.

But she let it go, for now. She slipped her phone back into her pocket and sat down beside Sienna instead, close enough that their shoulders touched.

"Well, good," Aria said after a moment, leaning back against the couch cushions, studying Sienna carefully. "At least he wasn’t all a monster." She tilted her head, curiosity creeping back into her voice despite herself. "But why not call Simon? What did he do? What did I miss?"

Sienna stared down at her own hands for a long moment before she answered. The words felt heavy, even now, even after all this time.

"I caught him with Lily," she said quietly. "In the act."

Aria went very still.

"No way," she said, her voice dropping into disbelief. "No way. You mean our friend Lily? Lily Brown?"

"The same one," Sienna said. Her voice was flat, careful, the way a person speaks when they have practiced not letting their voice shake over something for a long time.

"She wasn’t even sorry about it. She told me I was starving, Simon sexually. That was her excuse. And that wasn’t even all of it." Sienna’s jaw tightened. "They drugged me. They wanted to..."

She stopped there. She couldn’t finish it. The words simply refused to come out, catching somewhere in her throat, thick and ugly and impossible to say out loud even now.

Aria didn’t push her to finish. She didn’t have to. The silence said enough.

"That bitch," Aria said, low and furious, the words dropping like stones into the quiet room. She sat up straighter, something hard settling into her eyes.

"In fact, get to work. Right now. Those two cannot go unpunished. Damn it, Sienna, I want to kick her ass right now, I swear."

"I still don’t know how to deal with them yet," Sienna admitted, rubbing at her temple, exhaustion pulling at the edges of her voice.

"I know exactly how," Aria said, already leaning forward, her mind clearly racing far ahead of the conversation.

"This means Simon’s probably been cheating for a long time. Not just with Lily. Hack into his computer. I bet we’ll find something perfect, especially now, since they’re probably both asleep and won’t notice a thing." She looked at Sienna, eyebrows raised, half daring her. "You can do that, right?"