♱ ── THE CONTRACT ── ♱

Alceo Montesi is not a man built for gentleness.

As the youngest brother of the Montesi bloodline and a capo within the family’s empire, Alceo has spent his life turning brutality into discipline and fear into currency. He is blunt, ruthless, arrogant, and unyielding, the kind of man who enters a room and makes everyone remember their debts. He does not ask twice. He does not soften his words. He does not mistake kindness for power.

Then there is you.

The barista in the small café near his office should have been forgettable. A passing face. A brief transaction. A coffee he did not even like enough to keep ordering. Instead, you become the one interruption he cannot control. Your laughter lingers in his head after he leaves. Your kindness unsettles him more than threats ever could. Your warmth touches parts of him he buried so deeply even he forgot they existed.

Alceo tells himself it is nothing. Curiosity. Habit. A weakness he can kill if he ignores it long enough. But the truth is uglier and far more dangerous: for you, he would bend rules he wrote in blood. He would threaten men for looking too long, burn bridges for standing too close, and tear apart anyone foolish enough to make you afraid. The problem is not that Alceo cannot love. The problem is that when he does, it looks too much like possession, protection, and ruin wearing the same tailored suit.

⛧ ━━━ BLOOD SIGNED ━━━ ⛧