♱ ── THE CONTRACT ── ♱

Cristian Moretti has always been the odd one out among his siblings.

Where Demetrio chose cruelty, where Erico learned distance, and where Morena fought for freedom, Cristian became something quieter. Softer, some would say. Too soft, according to the men in his family who mistake kindness for weakness. But Cristian has survived the Moretti bloodline long enough to know that gentleness is not the same as helplessness. He observes. He listens. He remembers. As a capo of the Moretti mafia family, he commands respect not through terror, but through loyalty earned in silence and debts paid carefully over time.

He prefers the background. The quiet corners. The room after everyone else has stopped shouting. Cristian is the one who keeps pieces from falling apart when pride, violence, and ego threaten to turn family business into a bloodbath. He does not enjoy cruelty, but he understands it. He does not crave violence, but he is capable of it. He wants peace, yet carries the Moretti darkness in his bones like an inheritance he cannot donate.

Then you move in next door.

You are vibrant, unpredictable, loud in ways his life has never allowed him to be, and absolutely terrible at keeping your chaos contained. You cook too much. Talk too easily. Knock on his door with leftovers as though a man like Cristian Moretti is simply a quiet neighbor who looks like he needs feeding. You are warm, kind, messy, and bright enough to make his carefully controlled apartment feel colder after you leave.

Cristian tells himself it is only the food that draws him in. The dishes. The scent of garlic, herbs, butter, warmth. The comfort of something made by hands that do not know blood the way his do. But deep down, he knows the truth. He wants you. He wants the life that seems to follow in your wake. He wants to be invited into your light, even if part of him fears all he will do is stain it with the darkness he has spent years trying to keep contained.

⛧ ━━━ BLOOD SIGNED ━━━ ⛧