Love Between Two Enemies Part Nine

The Final Bargain


The place Luca chose was symbolic.

An abandoned riverside warehouse on the edge of the city—the same river where the original deal had been sealed decades ago. The same water that had carried secrets, bodies, and silence.

Night swallowed the structure whole.

Ethan parked the car a block away. Neither of them spoke as they stepped out, the cold air biting hard against their skin.

“This is where lies go to die,” Isabella murmured.

“Or where the truth gets buried again,” Ethan replied.

They walked hand in hand anyway.


---

Inside, the warehouse was lit by a single row of industrial lamps, casting long shadows across cracked concrete. Luca stood at the center, immaculate as ever, coat buttoned, expression calm.

Too calm.

“You came,” Luca said. “I hoped you would.”

Isabella’s jaw tightened. “Cut the performance.”

Luca smiled faintly. “Still sharp. Good.”

Ethan stepped forward. “You asked for a meeting. Speak.”

Luca glanced between them. “You’ve done impressive damage. Markets shaken. Old men terrified. Regulators sniffing around like dogs.”

He tilted his head. “But you haven’t destroyed me.”

“Yet,” Ethan said.

Luca laughed quietly. “Confidence. I respect that.”

He gestured to a metal chair. “Sit. Let’s talk like adults.”

They didn’t sit.


---

“You killed my family,” Isabella said, her voice steady but low. “You burned evidence. You threatened my brother.”

Luca’s expression darkened for the first time. “I protected what was mine.”

“No,” Ethan said coldly. “You inherited a crime and decided to keep profiting from it.”

Luca exhaled slowly. “You think this ends with me? You release everything, and the world burns. Your father. Her mother. Boards collapse. Employees lose jobs. Innocent people suffer.”

He stepped closer. “You’ll be remembered as heroes—or villains. Depends who writes history.”

Isabella met his gaze without flinching. “That’s not leverage anymore.”

Luca studied her. “Isn’t it?”


---

He pulled a phone from his pocket and placed it on a crate.

A video played.

Isabella’s brother, sitting in a room she didn’t recognize. Bruised. Alive.

Isabella’s breath caught sharply.

“Touching,” Luca said softly. “Family does motivate, doesn’t it?”

Ethan felt rage surge—but he forced it down. “If you hurt him—”

“I won’t,” Luca interrupted. “Not if we make a deal.”

Silence thickened the air.


---

“Here’s my offer,” Luca said. “You give me Margaret Whitaker’s full files. All of them. No leaks. No backups.”

Ethan laughed humorlessly. “You think we’re idiots?”

“And I disappear,” Luca continued. “I leave the country. Assets frozen. Publicly disgraced but alive.”

He looked directly at Isabella. “Your brother walks free.”

Isabella felt her knees weaken—but she stayed upright.

“And if we refuse?” she asked.

Luca’s smile vanished. “Then everyone bleeds.”


---

Ethan stepped forward until they were inches apart.

“You’re scared,” he said quietly.

Luca’s eyes flashed. “Careful.”

“You’ve already lost,” Ethan continued. “You just don’t know how badly yet.”

Luca leaned in. “Then why are you here?”

Ethan smiled—slow, dangerous. “To give you a choice you don’t deserve.”


---

He pulled out a small device and placed it on the crate beside Luca’s phone.

“Every file,” Ethan said. “Already scheduled. International release. Journalists. Courts. Regulators.”

Luca’s breath hitched.

“All we have to do,” Ethan continued, “is walk away.”

Isabella watched Luca’s confidence fracture.

“You bluff,” Luca said.

Ethan tapped the device. “Countdown.”

Numbers glowed.

Five minutes.


---

“You won’t,” Luca said. “You care too much.”

Isabella stepped forward now.

“You’re right,” she said softly. “We do.”

She looked at Ethan. “Which is why we won’t become you.”

She turned back to Luca. “You’re not getting the files.”

Luca’s voice dropped. “Then your brother dies.”

Isabella didn’t hesitate.

“Then the world learns the truth.”

Luca stared at her, stunned.

“You’d sacrifice him?”

Her voice broke—but didn’t waver. “I’d sacrifice your power.”


---

Something in Luca snapped.

He lunged.

Everything happened at once.

A gun flashed in his hand.
A shot echoed.

Ethan moved without thinking.

Pain exploded through his shoulder as he tackled Luca to the ground. The gun skidded across concrete.

Isabella screamed his name.

Luca struck wildly, rage replacing control. “You should have stayed afraid!”

Ethan drove his fist into Luca’s jaw. “You should have stayed hidden.”

They crashed into crates, breath and blood and fury tangling.

Isabella grabbed the gun, hands shaking.

“Stop!” she cried.

They froze.

Ethan looked up at her—blood soaking his sleeve.

Luca laughed, coughing. “You won’t shoot.”

Isabella raised the gun anyway.

Her hands steadied.

“You’re right,” she said quietly. “I won’t.”

She fired—not at Luca.

At the device.

The countdown vanished.

Ethan stared at her. “Isabella—”

“I already sent everything,” she said softly. “Before we walked in.”

Luca’s face drained of color.

“You—”

She met his eyes. “It’s over.”


---

Sirens wailed in the distance.

Luca collapsed backward, staring at the ceiling.

“All this,” he whispered. “For love.”

Isabella answered calmly. “For truth.”


---

Police flooded the warehouse minutes later.

Luca was taken in handcuffs, screaming threats that sounded hollow now.

Ethan was rushed to a hospital.

Isabella rode with him, gripping his hand, refusing to let go.

“You stayed,” he whispered weakly.

“Always,” she said, tears finally falling. “You don’t get rid of me that easily.”


---

News exploded by morning.

Headlines. Arrests. Resignations.

Empires shook.

But not everything was resolved.

As Ethan slept, Isabella sat beside his bed, phone buzzing endlessly.

One message froze her blood.

Unknown Number:
You destroyed the wrong man.
The real architects are still free.

Attached was a single photo.

Two men.

One Ashford.
One Moretti.

Alive.
Smiling.

Together.


---

Isabella slowly looked up at Ethan.

And realized the war hadn’t ended.

It had just changed its shape.


In Part Ten: “Blood Over Love”

Old alliances resurface.
Parents become enemies.
And Ethan and Isabella must face the truth they feared most…

What if love isn’t enough
to survive the people who made you?