Prologue
“Every kingdom has a crown. Every crown has a weakness. And every weakness has a price.”
The night the Princess of the underworld was marked for death, the Mariano estate looked exactly as it always did.
Untouchable.
Thousands of lights illuminated the sprawling black-and-gold palace, reflecting against marble floors and crystal walls. Luxury cars lined the private driveway. Guards stood at every entrance. Men in tailored black suits spoke quietly beneath chandeliers worth more than most people’s homes.
Inside, money moved without numbers.
Deals were made with handshakes.
Names were whispered like threats.
And the Mariano name remained above them all.
At the centre of it sat the King.
Jasper Mariano.
A man whose empire stretched far beyond what the world could see. A man powerful enough to make governments uncomfortable and dangerous enough to make the underworld kneel.
But tonight, the attention wasn’t on him.
It was on his daughter.
The Princess.
Jay-Jay Mariano.
She stood at the far end of the ballroom, surrounded by diamonds, silk and people who had spent their entire lives learning how to hide their intentions.
She smiled.
She laughed.
She had no idea that somewhere beyond the reach of her carefully guarded world, a man had already decided how she would die.
The Wraith stood alone in the shadows.
Black suit.
Cold expression.
One hand resting casually in his pocket.
The kind of man nobody noticed until it was too late.
His eyes moved across the information on his phone.
Not toward the money promised to him.
Not toward the reputation that preceded him.
Not toward the consequences of accepting an assignment that carried the Mariano name.
Toward her.
Jay-Jay.
He had been given everything he needed.
Her name.
Her habits.
Her schedule.
The places she visited.
The people she trusted.
The amount of money waiting for him when the job was finished.
The contract had been simple.
Get close.
Earn her trust.
Make sure nobody suspects you.
Then kill her.
The Wraith had accepted worse assignments for less money.
He had never failed a contract.
Not once.
His phone vibrated inside his pocket.
One message.
BEGIN.
His gaze settled on the name displayed across the screen.
Jay-Jay Mariano.
For a moment, he remained perfectly still. There was nothing unfamiliar about the arrangement, nothing particularly remarkable about the sum he had been offered. A name, a target, a deadline. The details were no different from those he had dealt with before.
And yet, the Mariano name carried a certain weight.
This was not a woman whose disappearance would go unnoticed. Her death would reach far beyond the confines of a private estate, disturbing an empire that had spent generations ensuring that its foundations remained untouched.
The Wraith locked his phone and slipped it back into his pocket.
The decision had already been made.
By morning, the first move would be underway.
Jay-Jay Mariano would continue her life as she knew it, unaware that someone had begun arranging its end. The estate would remain guarded, her father’s empire would stand unchallenged, and every familiar face around her would appear exactly as it had the day before.
Nothing would seem different.
That was precisely how he intended it.
The Princess didn’t know she had been marked for death.
And the assassin had no intention of letting her discover why.
Not yet.
