"Seraphina," he sneered, "your precious old man isn't here to protect you anymore. The Rossetti name doesn't open doors in this city. Not anymore. Who are you pretending to be so pitiful for?"
Before I could answer, the Family's private physician arrived, bag in hand, flanked by one of Dominic's soldiers who held the door.
Brushing past me like I didn't exist, Dominic led him straight to Daniela's side.
While Dominic's world revolved entirely around Daniela, I walked swiftly out the door.
I had barely stepped beyond the foyer of the estate when a car horn sounded twice from the darkness beyond the perimeter wall.
Two short blasts. A signal.
I saw a silver sedan idling just past the iron gate, its headlights off, and quickened my pace, hope rising in my chest like something I hadn't allowed myself to feel in years.
But before I could reach the gate, two of the Family's soldiers materialized from the guardhouse shadows, moving with the practiced silence of men who had done this before.
They grabbed me roughly, one on each arm, and dragged me back into the estate without a word, their grips bruising through the fabric of my sleeves, as if I were contraband being returned to inventory.