Chapter 5 - The Web Of Betrayal
Elena ran to the ladder, but Rosa grabbed her arm with surprising force. "Wait! Do not trust anyone!"
"It's Mark! He's alive!" Elena pleaded, pushing open the trapdoor just enough to look out into the dimly lit chapel.
Mark stood in the center of the chapel, his clothes scorched and covered in soot, his face bruised. But right behind him stood an older man in a sharp, expensive dark suit, surrounded by four armed bodyguards.
"Mark?" Elena stepped out, her eyes wide with relief and terror.
"Elena! Thank God you're safe!" Mark took a step forward, but the man in the suit laid a heavy hand on his shoulder.
"Easy, nephew," the older man said smoothly. "Let's handle this with dignity."
Elena froze. "Nephew?"
"Meet Don Cesare Moretti," Mark said, his voice flat, emotionless, and cold.
Elena looked at her husband in disbelief. The man who had held her as she cried, the man who had fathered her children, stood beside the head of the syndicate without a scratch of restraint on him.
"You... you led them here?" Elena whispered, her world shattering for the second time in twenty-four hours.
"He had no choice, my dear," Don Cesare sneered, stepping forward. "Mark played his role brilliantly for seven years. Did you really think it was a coincidence that the son of a Moretti enforcer bumped into the lost Castiglione heiress at a university in Boston? We always knew where you were, Sophia. We let you grow up. We let you marry Mark. We waited until you had heirs."
Elena felt sick. "Why?"
"Because your father’s will was ironclad," Cesare explained with a malicious smile. "The Castiglione fortune of three billion euros cannot be accessed by anyone unless a blood heir turns thirty years old—or unless that heir dies and leaves behind legitimate children whose legal guardian is a Moretti."
Cesare looked toward the cellar trapdoor where the three little girls were hidden.
"You turn thirty next month, Sophia. But if you die tonight, Mark—as your legal husband—inherits full control of the Castiglione estate on behalf of your daughters. And Mark answers to me."
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"You monster!" Elena screamed, rushing toward Mark, but a bodyguard grabbed her arms, pinning her back. She looked into Mark's eyes, searching for any trace of the man she loved. "Mark... please! Our daughters!"
Mark stared at the floor, refusing to meet her gaze. "I'm sorry, Elena. Family comes first."
