Author's POV
After that night on the terrace of the Smith mansion, nothing in Gia's mind went back to the way it had been before.
She did not scream.
She did not make a scene.
She did not go looking for whatever old man had started floating the idea of marrying her off so she could slap him or threaten him.
What she did was worse.
She became quiet.
And in the family she had grown up in, Georgia Smith's silence was never a good sign.
In the central Smith mansion in Spain, there was rarely any part of the house that was truly asleep. Even at midnight, you could hear footsteps passing through distant hallways, the soft opening of doors, or the movement of security around the vast estate. The house was never careless. It could not afford to be careless, not as the home of a family that had held a throne for that long.
In the west wing on the third floor, the light in Gia's suite was still on.
That was not unusual.
What was unusual was the state of the room.
There were no clothes scattered around. No open bottle of liquor. None of the impulsive mess she usually left behind when she was in a bad mood.
Everything had a place.
And that meant she already had a plan.
She stood in the middle of the dressing room in front of the mirror, wearing a simple black silk robe. Beneath her soft face, beneath the gentle fall of her hair over her shoulders, beneath the kind of beauty people could mistake for innocence and fragility, there was not a single trace of what she was about to do.
That was one of the most dangerous things about Georgia.
She looked soft.
Always soft.
As if blood, guns, and rage did not belong to her.
As if she belonged among flowers and expensive photographs, not in worlds built on gunfire and thrones.
And because of that, many people made the mistake of underestimating her.
Quietly, she shut one drawer, then moved to the hidden panel behind the built in shelves. She checked the contents one by one. Bundles of cash. Small velvet pouches of loose stones. Passports. Jewelry cases worth more than some of the houses outside the estate.
She did not plan to take everything.
She was not stupid.
A woman who wanted to disappear did not move like a thief stealing from her own life. She only took enough to make sure she never had to come back.
She picked up a dark leather duffel bag and set it on the chaise in the middle of the room. She did not rush as she placed several stacks of cash beneath a layer of ordinary clothes. Then two small velvet cases. Then documents. Then another change of clothes that looked far too plain to belong to her.
A moment later, her phone chimed.
Once.
Then twice.
Only a message.
Rafael.
She checked it.
Ready when you are.
She deleted the message at once.
Down below the mansion, in the rear grounds near the stables, Rafael was waiting with two other men she had personally chosen over the years. They were not the loudest. They were not the most visible in the security rotation either. That was exactly why she liked them.
A loyal man was not always the one who spoke the loudest.
More often, he was the one who knew how to stay silent.
A few minutes later, she heard three soft knocks on the door.
Not Rafael.
The rhythm was wrong.
She did not move right away. She looked at herself in the mirror first, then at the door.
"Come in."
The door opened, and Gabriel stepped inside.
There was no surprise on his face. No clear irritation either. But from the way he stood in the doorway, from the weight of his eyes as they immediately took in the duffel bag, the open panel, and the order of everything around her, Gia already knew there was no point pretending.
She did not try to hide the bag.
She did not try to smile in that provoking way of hers either.
She only looked back at her brother.
For a moment, neither of them spoke.
Between the two of them, many things never needed explaining.
"You're doing it tonight," Gabriel said.
It was not a question.
It was not curiosity either.
Just a statement from a man who could count pieces of information fast enough to form the whole picture.
"Yes."
Gabriel's expression did not change. "You picked a bad night."
"Then stop me."
Silence again.
Gia waited for his answer. She did not know if she wanted him to stop her or if she only wanted to see how far his authority over her would reach once she was the one refusing to be held.
Gabriel stepped inside and closed the door behind him.
"Don't test me."
"And yet here I am."
He moved a few steps closer, just enough for his presence to grow heavier inside the room. In their entire family, Gabriel was one of the few men who never needed to raise his voice to make people feel his power. It was in the way he stood. In the way he looked at you as though he already knew your last five decisions before you even made them.
But Gia was his sister.
She was used to him.
"Where are you going?"
"I'm not telling you."
"Wrong answer."
"Try again."
Gabriel's jaw tightened for a brief second. "You're leaving the country without a route cleared by me."
"By you?" Gia lifted a brow slightly. "Interesting choice of words."
"Don't be stupid."
"Don't be arrogant."
The words fell sharply between them. There was no shouting, but both were equally cutting.
Outside, the faint light of a security vehicle passed across the window. Somewhere below, a horse let out a low sound from the stable grounds. Inside the room, the air seemed to grow colder.
"You think I'm doing this for drama," Gia said, her voice lower now. "I'm leaving because I'm not sitting still while people decide which man gets paid to tolerate me."
"I know."
That surprised her.
Only slightly. Almost too little to notice.
But Gabriel noticed anyway.
"Then don't stand there like I'm the problem."
A faint shadow crossed his face. "You are a problem."
She smiled coldly. "At least you're honest."
"You are still my problem."
That made her go quiet.
Not because it hurt.
But because out of everything Gabriel could have said, that was still the line he chose.
Not burden.
Not embarrassment.
His.
The moment passed quickly because Gia herself cut through it.
"Too bad," she said, then turned back to the bag. "I'm taking myself off your hands."
She heard Gabriel's footsteps behind her. He did not do anything dramatic. He did not kick anything aside or shove anything over. But when she reached for the second pouch of jewelry, his hand was suddenly there in front of her, stopping the drawer before she could close it.
"Not that one."
She turned to look at him. "Excuse me?"
"That set can be traced."
"And the others can't?"
"That one faster."
Gia let out a dry, short laugh. "Look at you. Helping."
Gabriel did not respond to that. Instead, he closed the wrong drawer and moved to another compartment below, one they had never even talked about before.
Of course he knew.
Of course he knew her room better than anyone admitted out loud.
From there, he took out a smaller black case and set it beside the bag.
"These first," he said.
Gia looked at the case, then at him. "Are you serious?"
"Yes."
"Are you letting me go?"
"No."
"Then what is this?"
Gabriel held her gaze. "Insurance that when I find you, you're still alive."
She did not answer right away.
And that almost never happened.
The door opened again without a knock.
Both of them turned.
Anthony entered.
He did not look like someone who had just walked into trouble. He did not look like he was intruding on a scene that was not his either. He simply stepped into the room as though he had long been part of this world. Serious as always. Controlled. Clean. There was not even the slightest trace of him being a secondary figure in anyone else's presence.
His eyes stopped on the bag, the open compartments, then on Gia.
"So it's tonight."
"Did he call you?" Gia asked at once, looking at Gabriel.
"No," Anthony answered before his cousin could. "I walked in and saw Rafael moving the wrong vehicle."
That made sense.
Anthony was the kind of man who would notice one wrong movement on the entire property even when he was not looking for it. It was not curiosity. It was reflex, the kind that came from a life built inside structures where mistakes were never allowed.
He moved to the table and opened the black case Gabriel had set down.
Inside were sealed IDs, a compact firearm, and a thin envelope of foreign contacts.
That was the moment Gia's eyes sharpened.
"You really are helping."
Anthony closed the case. "No."
"Could've fooled me."
"I'm correcting weak planning," he said coldly. "If you disappear badly, you create noise. Noise invites enemies."
Gia looked at him for a long moment, then smiled faintly. "Still sweet, cousin."
Anthony ignored that. He did not smile. "You're not taking the coastal route."
"Why not."
"Too obvious."
"Then which one."
"Land first. Change once. Fly only after you've cut the pattern."
That was not a suggestion.
That was expertise.
And because this was Anthony, he did not sound like he was simply following Gabriel's lead. He sounded exactly like what he was. A man who controlled his own continent and knew perfectly well how disappearance, money, power, and blood moved across borders.
"Interesting," Gia said. "So now both of you are involved."
Gabriel's voice stayed flat. "No. We're making sure you don't make this worse."
"I can do this without either of you."
Anthony looked at her, steady and unreadable. "Yes. You can."
No condescension.
No doubt.
Just fact.
And maybe that was exactly why there was no point in pushing too hard against these two men. They were not underestimating her. They knew exactly what she was capable of.
That was why the way they looked at this decision of hers was more dangerous.
A few silent seconds passed before Gabriel spoke again.
"You leave through the east gate. Not the main one."
Gia turned to him. "You really are helping."
"I'm controlling damage."
She smirked. "Liar."
He did not answer.
On the other side of the room, Anthony glanced at his watch. "You have thirty minutes before a rotation changes."
That sharpened everything.
Thirty minutes.
Suddenly the room felt more real. The bag. The cash. The night itself.
Slowly, Gia zipped the duffel shut and stood up straight. She was not shaking. She was not afraid. But deep in her chest, something was already moving fast, a strange mix of excitement, insult, and rage that had been looking for a way out for a long time.
Her face still looked soft.
Her eyes did not.
She looked at the two men in front of her. Gabriel on one side. Anthony on the other. Both terrifying. Both still. Both men who could have stopped her if they had chosen the ugliest route.
But they did not.
Maybe because they knew she would tear the whole house apart first.
Maybe because they understood her too well.
Or maybe because, in their own brutal way, they respected her too much to cage her.
She swung the bag over her shoulder.
"Don't follow me tonight," she said.
Gabriel answered first. "No."
Anthony answered after. "No."
Same word.
Different meaning.
Both of them could lie straight to someone's face without leaving a single mark in their voice. That was exactly why Gia did not bother arguing with them.
She stopped at the door when she reached it.
She did not turn immediately.
"Tell Georgina I left before morning."
Gabriel answered, "She already knows."
Of course.
A faint smile touched Gia's lips in the dark before she finally glanced back over her shoulder.
Gabriel was just standing there, his face still hard, but his eyes were already reading her entire route even though she had not said a word. Anthony still stood with the same composed posture, quiet and serious, looking less like a man trying to stop her and more like one already counting all the countries she might pass through.
"Try not to die," Gabriel said.
Gia raised a brow. "That sounded emotional."
"It wasn't."
From Anthony came the last words before she finally left.
"Be harder to find than usual."
It was not affection.
It was not a joke either.
Just an instruction.
From Anthony, that meant more.
Gia smiled slightly. "Always."
When she stepped out of the suite, the hallway felt colder than before. The whole Smith mansion was quiet, but within that silence, the pulse of the house was still there. The old power. The bloodline. The throne. The kind of family that did not beg people to stay.
They simply made sure the world bled for the wrong exit.
As Gia walked down the back corridor, only one thing was clear in her mind.
No one was handing her over.
Not if she vanished first.