flash
My phone was still pressed against my ear. On the other end, Marcus—my most trusted lieutenant—was breathing heavily. The sound of muffled police radios and shouting filtered through the speaker. / Chapter 2 / 20

Chapter 2 - The Mask SlipsBy midnight, the news vans were swarming Rebecca’s pristine suburban home in Steiner Ranch.

I watched the live feed on my tablet while sitting in the leather interior of my black Escalade, parked half a block away. Floodlights turned the manicured lawn into a theatrical stage. Flashbulbs popped like lightning storms.

And then, the front door opened.

Rebecca stepped out flanked by two police officers. She wasn't weeping. She wasn't screaming. But the moment the cameras caught her face, the calculated mask of the grieving, fragile widow slipped just enough for me to see the cold, calculating fury underneath.

She looked directly into the lenses of the news cameras.

“This is a mistake!” she cried out, her voice trembling with theatrical perfection. “My husband just died! My children are missing, and Thomas Moretti—their criminal uncle—is manipulating the police! He kidnapped them! He’s framing me!”

Classic projection. She thought she could control the narrative before the authorities even pieced together the basement forensic report.

My phone buzzed. It was a text from Marcus: She’s talking to Detective Vance at the precinct now. Demanding a lawyer and a wellness check on the kids. She thinks she’s untouchable because her brother is a state senator.

I stared at the screen, a slow, humorless smile touching the corners of my mouth.

Her brother is Senator Greg Vance. A clean-cut politician who ran on a platform of family values and law enforcement reform.

Senator Greg Vance had spent five years trying to find dirt on Thomas Moretti to launch his gubernatorial campaign. He thought I was his ticket to the governor’s mansion.

He didn't realize that his own sister was running a private torture chamber in her basement.

“Marcus,” I said into the Bluetooth earpiece.

“Boss?”

“Send the file to Senator Vance’s private email. Not the office line. The personal one. Let him see what his beloved sister has been doing in the dark while he was shaking hands on the campaign trail.”

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The silence in the dining room felt heavier than the marble beneath my shoes. For twenty-five years, Victor Salvatore had been my shadow. When rival factions tried to poison my water supply in Naples back in '98, Victor caught it. When the tax authorities in Milan tried to freeze my accounts, Victor rerouted them. He was more than a chief of staff; he was the architect of my survival.

The silence in the dining room felt heavier than the marble beneath my s...

My heart hammered against my ribs like a trapped bird, each beat echoing the phantom sensation of that tiny shift in my right shoe. Ninety-nine specialists had labeled my paralysis permanent—a psychological blockade fused with trauma after Audrey’s fatal car crash. Yet, here I was, staring at an eight-year-old girl who looked entirely unsurprised.

My heart hammered against my ribs like a trapped bird, each beat echoing...

The helicopter touched down on the private helipad atop the Moretti Grand Hotel just as the Chicago sun began to melt into Lake Michigan, staining the horizon the color of fresh blood.

The helicopter touched down on the private helipad atop the Moretti Gran...

“And if he tries to bury it?”

“He won't,” I replied, shifting the Escalade into drive. “A politician cares about one thing more than his family: his brand. And right now, Rebecca is a toxic waste dump.”

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