The nursery grew so quiet that the hum of the electronic air purifiers sounded like a jet engine. I stared at the underside of Theo’s mattress, my chest tightening with a cold, metallic dread that I hadn't felt since my early days in the underworld.

By noon, the estate had returned to a deceptive semblance of peace. The manicured lawns glistened under a warm autumn sun, the fountains bubbled softly, and the security drones hummed quietly as they patrolled the perimeter fences. Inside the nursery, Theo, Miles, and Nora were laughing, chasing each other around a soft foam playpen as Elena watched over them with a warm, relieved smile.

I stood by the floor-to-ceiling windows of my study, looking down at the courtyard where Sophie was sitting on a stone bench, feeding crumbs to a pair of sparrows.

She looked so fragile from a distance, yet the memory of how she had dismantled that high-frequency transmitter with her tiny fingers—instinctively knowing where the weak seam of the doll was—flashed through my mind. It wasn't luck. It was intuition encoded in her DNA. A Moretti mind operating beneath a quiet, unassuming exterior.

My encrypted desktop terminal chimed, cutting through my thoughts. A high-priority red alert flashed across the curved monitor.

Incoming encrypted transmission from Zurich, Switzerland.

I walked over, sat down in my leather executive chair, and hit accept.

The screen flickered, resolving into a dark, wood-paneled boardroom. Three figures sat around a massive mahogany table, their faces obscured by deep shadows cast from overhead pendant lights. Only their voices came through the encrypted audio channel, filtered and deep.

"Adrien Moretti," the center figure spoke first, his accent a precise blend of Swiss-German and high-class Italian. "You dismantled Dante’s operation with impressive efficiency. But you seem to forget that Dante was merely a tenant on our land."

"Then consider me the landlord evicting a squatter," I replied evenly, resting my elbows on the desk. "If you're calling to negotiate a settlement, save your breath. Your accounts are frozen, your local assets are seized, and your primary enforcer is currently bleeding out in a federal prison hospital."

A low, cold chuckle echoed from the shadows. "You think money is the only currency that matters in our world, Adrien. You forget about leverage. About blood."

My posture stiffened instantly. "If you touch a hair on my children's heads, I won't just burn your Swiss banks—I will salt the earth beneath your headquarters until nothing is left."

"We aren't interested in your triplets today," the voice replied smoothly. "We are interested in the fourth child. The little girl currently sitting in your courtyard. The one who carries the true bloodline of Vincent Moretti."

The blood rushed to my ears. They knew. Somehow, the board in Zurich had pieced together the truth about my father's hidden lineage before I had even finished reading his letter.

"If you know what blood runs in her veins," I whispered, the threat dripping from every syllable, "then you know what happens to anyone who dares to look in her direction."

"We aren't here to threaten her, Adrien. We are here to trade," the voice said calmly. "Bring us the master ledger your father left behind—the one containing the true ownership deeds to the global syndicate—and the girl remains untouched. Refuse, and tomorrow morning, every assassin from here to Marseille will have her picture."