The message contained only a single line, yet it made my heart plummet and soar in the same instant:
Two days from now, the ship docks. Be ready to disappear.
I read the words three times, committing them to memory before deleting the message. Then I walked to the window and looked out at the night sky, where storm clouds were gathering on the horizon.
Two days.
Forty-eight hours until I shed this life like a serpent shedding its skin.
I pressed my palm against the cold glass and made myself a promise: when the moment came, I would not hesitate. I would not look back. I would walk away from the Ashford name, from the Corleone alliance, from every cage they had built around me.
And if they tried to stop me, they would learn that even a woman raised in shadows could become dangerous when she had nothing left to lose.