Chapter 10

"It wasn't me who killed him! It was you! Your cowardice! Your pathetic attempts to cover it up!"

Isabella froze, then tossed the bottle aside, her calmness terrifying.

"You're right. I was the one who started it all."

"None of us will escape. We will all pay back what we owe Jacob, in full."

She wiped the blood from her wounds as she gave orders.

"Save them all! Send them to Devil's Island!"

That night, Isabella's men cleaned house.

Sebastian, Briggs, Torres, the guards, the middlemen, the shell company lawyer — everyone connected to the conspiracy against me was rounded up and sent to Devil's Island in chains.

But Isabella reserved Sebastian's punishment for herself.

In the same basement where she'd confronted Briggs, she sat across from the man she'd once planned to marry. He was still handsome, even now. His suit was rumpled, his tie loosened, but his eyes were sharp and calculating, looking for an angle.

"Isabella, darling, let's be reasonable—"

"Don't."

The single word carried enough weight to silence him.

"You came into my life, my home, my bed, and the entire time you were plotting to kill a boy I swore to protect." Isabella's voice was quiet, almost conversational. "You used my love for you as a weapon against him."

"He was an obstacle—"

"He was a child!" Isabella slammed her fist on the table. The sound echoed in the basement like a gunshot. "A traumatized, lonely child who had just lost his father, and I handed him to you on a silver platter."

Sebastian's mask finally cracked. He lunged forward against his restraints.

"A child? He was obsessed with you! He sniffed your clothes, for God's sake! You were disgusted by him — I saw it in your eyes!"

"I was disgusted by a teenage boy's confusion. You were disgusted by competition for my money."

Sebastian fell silent.

"Do you know what they did to him on Devil's Island?" Isabella pulled out a folder — the full medical report. "They removed his kidney. Broke his ribs. Made him eat off the floor. Locked him in cages with rats. Played recordings of my voice while they beat him until he associated me with pain."

She threw the folder at Sebastian's feet.

"And you suggested I send him there. You whispered it in my ear like a bedtime story."

Sebastian's composure shattered. "Everything I did, I did for us! For our future! The Blackwood empire needs a strong leader, not some broken boy with daddy issues—"

Isabella raised her hand. Sebastian went silent.

"You're going to Devil's Island. Same cell as Briggs. Same treatment Jacob received. Every. Single. Day."

"You can't! My family will—"

"Your family has been informed that you embezzled $4.7 million from our joint ventures. They're not coming to rescue you. They're billing you."

The color drained from Sebastian's face.

Isabella stood, smoothing her jacket. At the door, she paused.

"One last thing. On the island, they'll play a recording for you. Every night. On loop."

"What recording?"

"Your own voice. Confessing to everything."

She left without looking back.

Two weeks later, I was discharged from the hospital.

Isabella was waiting outside, leaning against a car. Not a limo — a modest sedan. She looked different somehow. Smaller. Less like a mob boss, more like a woman carrying too much.

"I can take a bus," I said.

"I know."

"I have seven hundred dollars."

"I know that too."

We stood there, the autumn wind pushing leaves between us.

"Jacob, I'm not going to ask you to come home. I'm not going to ask you to forgive me. I know I don't deserve either."

She held out an envelope.

"This is a bank account in your name. Enough to live comfortably for years. It's not guilt money — it's what your father's service earned. It should have been yours all along."

I took the envelope. It felt heavy.

"There's also the deed to an apartment downtown. Near that art school you used to talk about."

My throat tightened. Before Devil's Island, I had dreamed of being an artist. I'd almost forgotten.

"My drawing hand—"

"I know I broke it. And I know you've been doing exercises with your left hand when you think the nurses aren't looking."

I looked up at her sharply.

She almost smiled. "I had cameras in your hospital room. Old habits."

"That's creepy."

"I know."

Another silence. This one felt different — not hostile, not painful. Just... tired.

"I'm going to find my mother," I said.

"I know. I had my people locate her. She's in a small town upstate. Runs a bakery."

"Of course you did."

Isabella took a step closer. I didn't flinch. It was the first time in over a year that her proximity didn't trigger panic.

"Whenever you're ready — if you're ever ready — you know where to find me."

She got in the car. The window rolled down.

"Jacob?"

"Yeah?"

"Your drawing hand. My best surgeon says with therapy, you could get 80% function back. The appointment is already booked, but only if you want it."

I stood on the hospital steps, holding an envelope full of money and a future I hadn't dared to imagine.

"I'll think about it," I said.

She nodded, rolled up the window, and drove away.

I watched the car disappear, then looked down at my hands. The right one — the one she'd broken — curled and uncurled slowly. It hurt. But it moved.

I pulled out my mother's address one last time. The paper was worn soft as cloth.

Then I walked to the bus station. This time, nobody came to stop me.