Chapter 8
Bianca shrank back against the tufted leather ottoman, her champagne-colored silk blouse clinging to her trembling frame. The morning sunlight illuminated the sheer terror etched into her refined features. The grand conspiracy, carefully orchestrated in the shadows of the Sterling syndicate, had just been laid bare on the floor of the breakfast room.
"Vittorio, he's lying!" Bianca shrieked, her voice cracking with desperation. "I love you! I wouldn't try to steal your trust fund! My father set this up, Marcus is just a pawn!"
"Do not insult my intelligence," Vittorio said, his voice dropping to a terrifying, deadly calm. He walked slowly toward her, his polished black shoes crushing the scattered dry cereal on the Persian rug. "You humiliated a four-year-old girl. You forced her to the floor like an animal. You tried to shatter her mind so you could steal her inheritance."
"It was just a strategy!" Bianca cried, tears streaming down her pale cheeks. "It's business, Vittorio! You know how our families work! You would have done the same thing to secure a merger!"
"I am a monster to many men," Vittorio replied, stopping mere inches from the dog bowl at her feet. "I have ruined lives. I have dismantled empires. But I have never, in all my years of violence, laid a hand on an innocent child. That is a line that separates men from rabid dogs."
Marcus groaned from the floor near the shattered map rack, slowly pushing himself up to his knees. "You can't touch us, Moretti. If Bianca and I disappear, the Sterling family will go to war. You'll lose the port contracts. You'll lose the union backing. Is the kid's pride really worth burning your empire to the ground?"
Vittorio slowly turned his head to look at Marcus. The corners of his mouth twitched upward in a dark, humorless smile that chilled Marcus to the bone.
"My empire?" Vittorio whispered. "You think I care about the ports today? You think I care about the unions?"
Vittorio reached into his tailored trousers and pulled out a sleek, black smartphone. He didn't look at it as he hit a single speed-dial button and placed it to his ear.
"Carlo," Vittorio spoke into the phone, his intense gray eyes never leaving Marcus. "Seal the estate. No one enters, no one leaves. And call the Chicago outfit. Tell them the merger with the Sterling family is canceled. Tell them we are at war. Effective immediately."
Bianca gasped, covering her mouth with her hands. "Vittorio, no! You're destroying everything!"
"I am protecting what is mine," Vittorio said, hanging up the phone and sliding it back into his pocket. He looked down at Bianca, his expression completely devoid of mercy. "You tried to break my daughter to take my wealth. Now, I am going to show you what it truly means to be broken."
Marcus suddenly lunged forward from his knees, pulling a small, silver derringer pistol from an ankle holster hidden beneath his charcoal trousers. He leveled the barrel directly at Vittorio’s broad back.
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"Nobody moves!" Marcus screamed, his hands shaking violently as he aimed the gun. "I am walking out of here, Moretti! Tell your men to stand down!"
Vittorio didn't flinch. He didn't raise his hands. He simply turned around slowly, facing the barrel of the gun with an expression of absolute, terrifying boredom.
