Chapter 7 - The Forged Bloodline
Vivienne gripped the marble banister, her knuckles turning white. "You have no power here anymore, Damian! I have the boy! I have the documents! The families will follow the bloodline, not a usurper!"
Damian casually reached into the breast pocket of his tuxedo. He didn't pull out a gun. He pulled out a small, folded piece of thick, medical-grade paper. He held it up for the room to see.
"Bloodlines are a tricky thing," Damian said, his voice terrifyingly steady. "Especially when you try to forge them."
He handed the paper to the oldest capo standing in the front row, a grizzled man named Sal. Sal put on his reading glasses and opened the document.
"What is that?" Vivienne demanded, her voice rising in pitch. "It's a fake! Whatever it is, it's a lie!"
Sal looked up from the paper, his face completely drained of color. He looked at Julian, then at Vivienne, and finally at Damian.
"It's a certified DNA test," Sal announced to the silent room. He cleared his throat. "It confirms that the boy, Julian, has absolutely zero genetic match to the Russo bloodline. He is not Marco's son."
The ballroom erupted. Men began shouting. Julian took a terrified step back on the staircase, looking at Vivienne. "Mother, what is he talking about?"
"It's a lie!" Vivienne shrieked, losing all semblance of her elegant composure. "Damian forged it! He's trying to protect his little bastard daughter!"
Damian stepped onto the first marble stair. The room instantly fell quiet again.
"I didn't forge anything," Damian said coldly. "Julian is real. He is your son, Vivienne. But he is not my brother's son. You had an affair with a driver in Paris three years before Marco died. You hid the boy in boarding schools because Marco couldn't have children. You thought you could use him as a chess piece against me when the time was right."
Vivienne was shaking uncontrollably. Her crimson dress felt like a straitjacket. She looked at the faces of the mob bosses in the crowd. There was no respect left in their eyes. There was only disgust, and the cold, terrifying promise of retribution. She had lied to the families. In their world, that was an automatic death sentence.
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"You have nothing," Damian said, his voice dropping to a deadly whisper. "You have no heir. You have no leverage. And the men you sent to my house tonight are currently sitting in the trunk of a car at the bottom of the East River."
Vivienne panicked. She turned and ran up the stairs, leaving Julian completely frozen and alone on the landing. She burst through the double doors at the top of the balcony, desperately looking for an escape route.
