Chapter 10 - THE WOMAN WHO THOUGHT SHE WOULD BECOME MRS. MORETTI
Bianca Romano looked like she belonged on a magazine cover.
Perfect hair.
Perfect dress.
Gun against my sister’s throat.
“Let her go,” Dante said.
Bianca smiled.
“For the waitress?”
“For the woman you kidnapped.”
“That’s less romantic.”
Rachel rolled her eyes despite the gun.
“I hate her.”
“Quiet,” Bianca snapped.
Rachel smiled.
“Now I hate you more.”
I almost laughed from panic.
Dante remained terrifyingly calm.
“What do you want?”
“Elena’s key.”
“You’re late.”
“The vault?”
“Opened.”
Bianca’s smile vanished.
“Where are the ledgers?”
“Safe.”
“With whom?”
“People you can’t reach.”
Her expression twisted.
“You ruined everything.”
Dante laughed once.
“I didn’t realize we had something together to ruin.”
That hurt her.
Good.
Bianca had spent years believing an alliance between their families would become marriage.
Antonio encouraged it.
Because Bianca’s father had helped maintain the blackmail network.
A marriage would reunite control beneath Dante without him realizing what he inherited.
“But then Orion chose her,” Bianca said, looking at me.
I frowned.
“This is about a dog?”
“No.”
Her voice sharpened.
“It made Dante curious.”
She was right.
Without Orion, I remained a waitress with a buried past.
With Orion, I became a question Dante could not ignore.
Bianca pressed the gun closer to Rachel.
“Give me the originals.”
Dante looked at me.
I understood the silent question.
Trust me?
I nodded.
He walked toward the desk.
Bianca watched.
That was her mistake.
Orion moved.
One second he was beside me.
The next he launched himself at Bianca’s gun arm.
She screamed.
The weapon fired into the ceiling.
Rachel kicked the chair sideways.
Dante crossed the room.
His guards rushed in.
Within seconds, Bianca was disarmed.
Orion stood over her, snarling.
I grabbed his collar.
“Orion.”
He stopped.
Immediately.
Everyone stared.
Even Dante.
“Good boy.”
His tail thumped once.
Bianca laughed from the floor.
“You think this ends with me?”
Dante looked down.
“No.”
Her smile weakened.
“Antonio has everything he needs.”
“For what?”
“To take your empire.”
Dante’s face became almost bored.
“He can have it.”
Silence.
Bianca stared.
“What?”
Dante looked toward me.
Then Rachel.
Then Orion.
“The parts built by my father and uncle? He can burn them.”
Bianca looked genuinely shocked.
Men like Dante were supposed to want power more than oxygen.
Perhaps Dante once had.
Not anymore.
Bianca was arrested through federal channels tied to the investigation.
Her cooperation exposed bank accounts.
Judges.
Police officers.
A state senator.
Antonio remained missing.
Then Rachel found something in Bianca’s confiscated phone.
A photograph.
Antonio standing beside my mother Laura.
Taken three years ago.
One week before the fire.
On the back of the digital scan, Bianca had typed:
LAURA ACCEPTED THE DEAL.
I stared.
“What deal?”
Rachel opened the next photograph.
Laura handing Antonio an envelope.
May you like
My mother had met the man hunting me.
Willingly.
