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Chapter 8: The Ghost of the Past
Last Updated:
2025-04-18 13:45:40
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Blood Roses And Bullet Vows Chapter 9: The Spy in the Shadows
The city at night had a way of folding in on itself.Lights bled into puddles. Traffic blurred into a low, restless hum. And the shadows? They moved like they had secrets they weren’t ready to give up.I kept my hood low as I walked past the edge of the parking lot. This wasn’t the kind of place you visited twice. It looked like it had been forgotten on purpose. Rusted metal gates, vines climbing the cracked walls, silence heavy enough to bite.But the black SUV parked beside the abandoned warehouse wasn’t forgotten.It was waiting.I crouched behind a dumpster. Not glamorous, but it gave me cover. From here, I could see the passenger door swing open.Lorenzo.Of course.The man always looked like he was half a second from violence. His coat was wrinkled, dark hair pushed back with fingers that probably knew more about killing than combing.But it wasn’t just him.Another man stepped out of the shadows.And this time, my breath caught.The kind of catch that hurt on the inhale.Elian.
Last Updated : 2025-04-18Blood Roses And Bullet Vows Chapter 10: Dagger and Diamonds
There was no knock.Just the slow creak of the door as it opened, followed by the kind of silence that didn’t ask for permission. Matteo filled the threshold like a shadow slipping through light, and I didn’t need to look up to know it was him.You could always feel him before you saw him.“You moved safehouses,” he said, voice smooth but never soft.I didn’t answer. Not right away.Instead, I kept my gaze on the half-empty glass of water on the nightstand, watching the way the light trembled against its edge.“You’re tracking me,” I murmured, not a question.Matteo stepped inside, letting the door click shut behind him. “I’m watching you,” he corrected, walking in like the room owed him something. “Tracking’s for amateurs.”I didn’t flinch. Didn’t shift. Just looked up.“You don’t trust me,” I said.“I don’t trust anyone.”His eyes flickered over my face, pausing at my collarbone, like he was searching for something under the skin.“Especially not the girl who runs into warehouses al
Last Updated : 2025-04-18Blood Roses And Bullet Vows Chapter 11: Hollow Graves
The grass felt different beneath my shoes. Softer, like it knew how to hold grief without letting it spill over.I never liked cemeteries. Not because they were haunted, but because they weren’t. Because they were quiet and polite and still, while everything in me stayed loud.The silence didn't match the chaos I kept inside.I followed the narrow path through stone and memory. Most of the headstones had names I didn’t recognize, but that didn’t make them strangers. Death made siblings out of all of us eventually.When I reached her grave, I hesitated.It had been too long since I visited.Too long pretending she was still alive in some parallel world, still stirring soup at dawn, still humming love songs like lullabies, still calling my name like it meant something soft.Angela R. Cruz1974–2013.Beloved wife, mother, dreamer.The letters had faded a little more since last time. The marble was cracked in the corner, like the earth had tried to remember her too hard and broken somethi
Last Updated : 2025-04-19Blood Roses And Bullet Vows Chapter 12: The Betrayer
There are moments when the air holds its breath. Like even the sky is waiting to see what you'll do.That was the kind of moment I walked into.The hallway was dim, quiet. Not the calm kind. More like the sharp, waiting kind, like right before lightning strikes.I was coming from the study, the warning note from the grave still folded in my jacket pocket. Matteo hadn’t said much after reading it. He didn’t need to. The silence he left me with was heavier than any answer.I turned the corner toward the west wing. I wasn’t even sure why I was going there. Maybe to think. Maybe to escape the thoughts already crawling under my skin.I didn’t see him at first.Lorenzo.He was standing near the window, back turned, one hand resting on the sill, the other holding something small. Something that caught the light.I paused.The instinct to walk away came too late.He turned.Not slow. Not fast. Just intentional.Our eyes met. His face didn’t shift. Not a single twitch of guilt. Not even curios
Last Updated : 2025-04-19Blood Roses And Bullet Vows Chapter 13: Veins of Ice
The halls were quieter after death.Not the still kind, but the haunted kind. Every step I took echoed too much, like the house was trying to remember where Lorenzo fell.He died in front of me.Matteo killed him in front of me.And now we were back in this silence, walking like nothing had cracked the air hours ago.I sat at the edge of Matteo’s study couch, hands wrapped around a cup of untouched tea. The porcelain felt too delicate for what I’d seen. For what I’d become a part of.Across from me, Matteo poured whiskey. No ice. Just amber and silence.“Why him?” I asked.My voice wasn’t sharp. Just tired.He didn’t look up as he answered. “Because I didn’t think it’d be him.”He took a slow sip, then leaned back, eyes fixed on nothing in particular.“I grew up with Lorenzo. He was two years older. Taught me how to fake a smile during meetings, how to cheat at cards, how to aim a gun without blinking.”He set the glass down.“When my father died, I was sixteen. The day after the fune
Last Updated : 2025-04-19Blood Roses And Bullet Vows Chapter 14: Broken Mirrors
The house was quieter after grief. Not the haunted kind this time, but something softer. Like a sigh that never quite made it out of someone’s lungs.We stayed in Matteo’s study longer than necessary. Neither of us moved when the clock ticked past midnight. The fire burned low, and shadows crept up the walls, but it didn’t feel dangerous anymore. Just… honest.I traced the rim of the porcelain cup in my hands, lukewarm now, and leaned back into the couch. My body ached, not from injury, but from emotion. Like every tendon had stretched too far from feeling too much.Across from me, Matteo sat with his elbows on his knees, head bowed, fingers laced. He looked tired. Not physically, but the kind of tired you don’t sleep off.“How do you live with it?” I asked.He didn’t look up right away. When he did, his voice was quiet. “You don’t. You just learn how to keep breathing through it.”There was a pause. Not the awkward kind, but the meaningful kind.“You know what’s strange?” I asked, tr
Last Updated : 2025-04-20Blood Roses And Bullet Vows Chapter 15: The Snake’s Tongue
e silence between us the next morning wasn’t harsh. It was... still. Like the ocean before a storm. The kind of quiet that made you think everything might be fine until you realized you were just in the eye of it.I hadn’t spoken much since we left Cavite. Matteo didn’t push. Maybe he understood I needed time. Or maybe he was afraid of what I’d say if he forced me to look at him.I sat by the window in his Manila penthouse, legs curled under me, hands wrapped around a cup of tea I hadn’t touched. Below, the city never stopped moving. Lights, cars, people. Like none of them knew that my world had just cracked open.My father.The word tasted unfamiliar now.I grew up thinking of him as a quiet man. Faint laughter in my mother’s stories. A hand on my head in memories I wasn’t sure were real. A photograph on our altar, framed in dust and silence. But last night, he became someone else. Someone who made deals with men like the Valerios. Someone who signed his name beside blood.I didn’t h
Last Updated : 2025-04-20Blood Roses And Bullet Vows Chapter 16: Crossfire Love
The Manila air carried a strange stillness that night.I knew I shouldn’t have left the penthouse. Matteo told me to stay put. But silence had become unbearable, and the air inside felt like it belonged to someone else. I needed space. I needed the city lights to remind me I wasn’t trapped in some nightmare carved out of family legacies and bloodlines.So I walked. Just past the side streets, not far. Just enough to breathe. I didn’t notice the van. Not until it screeched to a halt and the doors flew open.Three men, faces masked. Guns. One grabbed me by the arm, another shoved something cold against my back.“Quiet,” one hissed, dragging me toward the alley.My breath caught. I froze. My mind spun, but my body couldn’t keep up. Everything blurred.But then... Gunfire.A shot cracked through the air, then another.One of the masked men collapsed beside me, blood blooming across his chest like a violent rose.“Down!” someone shouted.I dropped just as another bullet tore past my ear, s
Last Updated : 2025-04-20
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Blood Roses And Bullet Vows Chapter 24: U going to betray me?
The room was quiet except for the steady hum of the ceiling fan above us, its rhythmic whirr doing little to calm the tension in the air. My heart was racing, a storm of confusion swirling in my chest as Matteo stood before me, his usual confident demeanor replaced with a rare vulnerability. I couldn’t help but notice how his hand twitched at his side, a gesture that betrayed the calm he was trying to project. The weight of the conversation hanging between us was too heavy. It had been too heavy since the moment he told me about the blood contract. “Amara…” Matteo started, his voice low, measured. “You need to understand something. This blood contract—it was forged, against my will. Rafael forced me to sign it. Tortured me until I didn’t have a choice.” I blinked, struggling to process his words. “Tortured you? But you’re the one who…” I trailed off, unsure of what to say. The lies, the manipulation, everything I had known about him felt like a cruel joke. “I had no choice,” he co
Blood Roses And Bullet Vows Chapter 23: Queen On The Board
The air was thick with tension. Every step I took felt like it echoed in the silent room, my shoes clicking sharply against the polished floors. The walls were adorned with dark, intricate paintings—power, money, blood—they seemed to mock me. I wasn’t just in Lazaro Reyes’ territory now. I was standing on the precipice of a world I had only heard about in whispers, a world where people like me didn’t belong. Lazaro stood at the other end of the room, his back to me, looking out over the city. The view was stunning—everything below looked like it was mine for the taking. I swallowed the lump in my throat, wondering just how deep this game went. “You've come a long way, Amara,” Lazaro said, his voice smooth and measured. “And now, you're in a position to make choices. The choices you never had.” I took a step forward, resisting the urge to turn and walk right back out. This wasn’t some simple meeting. This was an offer. A dangerous, seductive offer. “I don’t need your pity,” I said,
Blood Roses And Bullet Vows Chapter 22: Blood Debt
The morning light crept through the cracked stained-glass windows of the abandoned cathedral, casting colorful streaks across the dusty floor. I could hear the faint rustling of fabric, the quiet footsteps of someone moving through the shadows. My breath was caught somewhere between anticipation and dread, but there was no turning back now. I had come this far—too far, perhaps. I stepped inside, my heart hammering, but I refused to let fear control me. I had to face this. Whatever this was. And then I saw him. Lazaro Reyes. He stood in the center of the room, his silhouette framed by the sun filtering through the stained glass. His face was sharp, cold—too much like the stories I had heard growing up. The leader of one of the most dangerous syndicates in the world, the very man I had been taught to hate. But there was something different about him now, something that made my chest tighten. Lazaro’s eyes locked onto mine, and for a moment, the world around me faded into nothing. I
Blood Roses And Bullet Vows Chapter 25: The Funeral
The night was silent except for the faint rustling of the wind outside, carrying with it the scent of rain. I sat in the dimly lit bunker, my legs pulled up to my chest, the cold concrete pressing against my skin. My heart felt like a stone lodged deep in my throat, suffocating me.I had died today. Or at least, the world thought I had.The car crash had been staged perfectly—a fiery explosion that left nothing but ash. Matteo had been the grieving man, the one caught in the middle of it all. He had cried on camera, his emotions raw and public, while I sat in the shadows, hidden away in a place that no one could find. It was all too much, too much to process. How could anyone live in a world where everything, even death, was fabricated?I pushed myself off the floor, my eyes scanning the dimly lit room. The cold walls, the old furniture—it all looked so familiar, as if it had been waiting for me all this time. Matteo had prepared this place long ago, anticipating the possibility of so
Blood Roses And Bullet Vows Chapter 20: Liar
I didn’t expect to feel it. Not now. Not after everything that’s happened. But there it was—the unmistakable weight of betrayal pressing down on my chest. My heart pounded in my ears as Matteo spoke, the words too much to handle. “Rafael lied to me, Amara,” Matteo’s voice was low, tight. He stood across the room, his fingers drumming against the back of a chair. “He told me your father was the mastermind. That killing him would put an end to this. But I think he set your father up.” The words were like a blow to my stomach. I stumbled back, the cold air around us suddenly suffocating. It felt like the ground beneath me had cracked open, pulling me deeper into something I was never meant to be a part of. “Set him up?” I asked, barely able to form the words. “But why?” Matteo’s jaw clenched as if the answer hurt him too. “I don’t know. But your father wasn’t just some henchman, Amara. He had something more important than just his name on the line. And Rafael—he’s been playing bo
Blood Roses And Bullet Vows Chaptee 19: The Burn File
I didn't know how long I'd been staring at the papers scattered across the desk. Minutes? Hours? The numbers blurred together. The words, too. Everything felt like it was spinning out of control, but it was all undeniable. My hands trembled as I flipped through each file, each page revealing more than I ever wanted to know. My father. My own flesh and blood. A man I had trusted with everything I was. Everything I thought I could be. And yet, here it was. Evidence. Corruption. Dark deals. He wasn’t the man I thought he was. I gripped the edge of the desk, steadying myself. But it didn’t help. My pulse was erratic, my breath shallow as I sifted through photo after photo, some from the day I was born. I didn't recognize it at first—at first, I thought it was just a photo from some family gathering. But then I saw the faces behind me. Different kids. Too many of them. Too many unfamiliar faces that didn’t belong. I blinked hard, trying to force the image away, but it stayed. I h
Blood Roses And Bullet Vows Chaptee 18: He Killed Him
The drive was long, the world outside a blur of darkened trees and winding roads. But the silence inside the car was deafening. Matteo’s grip on the steering wheel was tight, his jaw set in that familiar way. The tension between us thickened with every passing mile, like it could choke me at any second. I kept my eyes on the dark landscape, though I wasn’t really seeing it. My mind replayed everything—the kiss, the way his lips had burned into mine, his words, his touch. But mostly, it replayed the one thing I didn’t want to think about: the confession. I killed your father. The words echoed in my head, over and over. I couldn’t escape them. My chest felt hollow, like a part of me had just cracked open. And the worst part? I didn’t know if I hated him for it. How could I? If what he said was true, my father wasn’t who I thought he was. But then… did that really change anything? He was still my father. The man who raised me. Who protected me. Who I trusted. And Matteo—he kill
Blood Roses And Bullet Vows Chapter 21: Ghost of The Bloodline
The air inside the old, forgotten orphanage felt thick, stale with memories and dust. Every step I took seemed to echo, reminding me of the silence that had surrounded this place for years. Matteo was beside me, his presence like a weight on my shoulder, but I couldn’t bring myself to push him away. Not when I was standing on the precipice of something I hadn’t known I was ready to face."Are you sure about this?" Matteo's voice broke the silence, low and hesitant.I looked at him, seeing his concern reflected in the dark shadows under his eyes. He'd never shown this much vulnerability before, and it made me feel like I was drowning in a sea of things I couldn’t control. "I have to know, Matteo. I have to know what happened to me... who I really am."The words tasted bitter on my tongue. It felt like a betrayal to the man I thought was my father. But there was no turning back now. My entire life had been built on lies, and I was too tired to pretend anymore.Matteo sighed, his fingers
Blood Roses And Bullet Vows Chapter 17: The Kiss
I didn’t sleep after he kissed me.How could I? That kind of closeness doesn't just fade into nothing. It lingers, burns. It rewrites everything you thought was real.His lips still haunted the corner of my mouth, like a secret only my skin could remember.Matteo sat across the room, back turned, pretending the moment hadn’t happened. Pretending like he hadn’t just torn down the walls he built between us only to raise another.“You’ll hate me,” he’d said.That sentence played on repeat in my head like a warning I didn’t know how to obey.The silence between us stretched like an old wound. I wanted to reach for him. To pull the truth out from wherever he’d buried it. But a part of me already knew—whatever he was hiding would break me more than any bullet ever could.The rain outside barely touched the glass. It was soft, like whispers I wasn’t meant to hear. I stared at the window anyway, waiting for something—anything—to make this weight in my chest feel lighter.But the quiet shatter
