GET THAT FILTHY DOG OUT OF MY HOUSE! HE'S OLD, USELESS, AND SHOULD HAVE BEEN PUT DOWN MONTHS AGO!” THE MAFIA BOSS'S FIANCÉE HUMILIATED HIS YOUNG HOUSEMAID IN FRONT OF FORTY GUESTS—BUT WHEN HIS NINE-YEAR-OLD DAUGHTER BEGGED HER FATHER NOT TO LET THE DOG GO, LUCA MORETTI ASKED ONE QUESTION THAT MADE HIS FIANCÉE TURN PALE. -

Chapter 4 – THE PHOTOGRAPH OF THE PAST

I stared at the gun in Vanessa’s trembling hand, my mind racing.

“Vanessa, stop!” I pleaded, stepping entirely in front of Lily. “Marco is going to kill you too! You don’t have to do this!”

“Marco promised me the offshore accounts!” she screamed, her eyes frantic. “He promised me I would be the Queen of Chicago! All I have to do is erase the heir!”

She took a step forward, but her high heel landed directly on the photograph she had dropped.

I glanced down at it in the dim moonlight.

It was an old Polaroid. A picture of Vanessa, much younger, standing next to a man with dark hair. But it wasn’t Marco Rossi. And it wasn’t Luca.

It was Dominic. Luca’s brother.

“You were with Dominic,” I gasped, the realization hitting me like a physical blow.

Vanessa’s face twisted in rage. “Dominic was supposed to be the Boss! He promised me the empire! But their father gave it to Luca instead. Dominic was too weak to take it by force, so I found someone who wasn’t.”

The truth was sickening. Vanessa hadn’t just betrayed Luca; she had been playing both brothers for years, desperately clinging to power.

“Put the gun down, Vanessa.”

The voice came from the doorway, cold and laced with absolute heartbreak.

Dominic stood there. He was bleeding from a cut on his forehead, holding a shotgun. He stared at the woman he had loved, the woman who was about to murder his niece.

“Dominic,” Vanessa whispered, lowering the gun just a fraction. “I did this for us. Marco promised he would leave you in charge of the South Side if you bent the knee.”

“You brought a slaughter into my brother’s house,” Dominic said, his voice cracking. “You endangered his child.”

“She’s not his child!” Vanessa shrieked, pointing a trembling finger at Lily. “Luca’s dead wife had an affair! Lily is a bastard! She doesn’t deserve the Moretti name!”

The room went completely still.

I looked at Lily, who was covering her ears, crying silently.

Dominic’s face drained of color. “You’re lying.”

“Am I?” Vanessa laughed bitterly. “I found the DNA test in Luca’s safe two weeks ago. He knows she isn’t his blood. That’s why he works so much! He can’t bear to look at her!”

Before Dominic could react, the heavy oak doors behind him shattered inward.

Marco Rossi’s men swarmed the study, weapons raised.

Dominic fired his shotgun, taking down two thugs instantly, but he was overwhelmed. A rifle butt caught him in the jaw, sending him crashing to the floor.

Vanessa smiled triumphantly. “Take the girl,” she ordered the men.

I fought with everything I had. I kicked, I scratched, I screamed, but a massive thug grabbed me by the hair and threw me across the room. I hit the mahogany desk hard, the air knocked from my lungs.

They grabbed Lily. She screamed for her father as they dragged her out of the study.

“No!” I gasped, trying to stand.

Vanessa walked over to me, looking down with pure disdain.

She raised her gun, aiming it at my head.

“You should have kept your mouth shut, maid,” she sneered.

She pulled the trigger.

Click.

The gun jammed.

Vanessa cursed, racking the slide frantically.

And in that split second, Bruno lunged from the shadows.