Chapter 1 - The Coldest Table in Chicago
The diamond made almost no sound when it touched the wood, yet every person in the gallery flinched as though an antique mirror had shattered between them. For two long seconds, nobody drew a breath. The rain outside struck the tall, leaded glass panes of the Moretti salon with the rhythmic persistence of small stones thrown against a tomb.
Dante did not immediately touch the ring. His gray eyes, usually as sharp and decisive as an incision, remained fixed on Isabella’s knuckle where the pale band of unexposed skin marked four months of promised devotion. His right hand twitched once at his cuff, the unmistakable reflex of a street-bred king who had suddenly encountered a knife he had failed to anticipate.
""Isabella,"" Dante said, his voice dropping into that low, flat register that emptied entire nightclubs in the West Loop. ""Pick it up.""
""No,"" she said. Her voice didn't waver. That surprised her far more than the sapphire sitting like a pool of frozen poison in Marco’s white-gloved hand. Her pulse was roaring in her ears, heavy and hot, but her spine remained as stiff as rebar. ""You asked for facts, Dante. You wanted an investigation without favoritism. Here is a fact: you looked at your cousins, your aunts, and your lieutenants before you looked at me. You weighed their comfort against my dignity, and my dignity was lighter than a feather on your scale.""
Aunt Sophia let out an offended gasp, lifting a hand to her silk collar. ""The audacity of this girl! After everything our family offered her—after Dante brought her out of that miserable little gallery in Pilsen—""
""Quiet, Sophia,"" Dante barked, not breaking eye contact with Isabella. The snap of his voice made Sophia choke on her own outrage. Dante took one step toward Isabella, closing the gap until she could smell his familiar cologne—black pepper, bergamot, and the faint, bitter tang of gun oil that never truly washed out of his wool coats. ""You are making a public spectacle out of a procedure, Bella. I didn't say you took it. I know you didn't take it. Marco knows it. But the house is locked down. If I let you walk out without clearing the chain of custody, Carlo's people will whisper. Sophia will complain to the elders. You become an easy target the moment you appear protected from the law of this house.""
""I am not your soldier, Dante,"" she whispered, leaning in just close enough that only he could hear the ragged edge of her grief. ""I was supposed to be your wife. A soldier follows procedure. A wife expects her husband to say, 'If you accuse her, you accuse me.' You didn't say that. You told your chief of security to search my purse.""
Across the polished floor, Carlo smoothed the lapel of his navy jacket, an unreadable smirk playing around the corners of his mouth. ""Bella, don't be dramatic,"" Carlo murmured, his tone oozing with theatrical concern. ""Dante is simply being fair. We all respect you. If someone slipped it in there to frame you, we will find them. Let Marco finish the perimeter sweep. Stay the night in the west wing until we check the hall cameras.""
""Stay here under house arrest?"" Isabella looked Carlo straight in the eye, watching the slight flicker of triumph dancing in his pupils. She remembered now. Carlo had stood near the console table by the coat rack when the coffee was served. He had bumped her shoulder, apologized with an extravagant bow, and handed her a fresh linen napkin. She hadn't thought anything of it then. Now, every puzzle piece snapped together with brutal clarity. Carlo wanted Dante’s seat at the high table; discrediting the street-smart girl Dante intended to marry was the fastest way to make the boss look weak, compromised, and blind.
And Dante had walked directly into the snare.
""Marco,"" Isabella said quietly.
The large security chief hesitated, looking between Dante and the young woman who had brought his sick daughter sketchbooks only last week. ""Yes, Miss Rossi?""
""Keep the bag,"" she said. ""Keep the coat in the foyer, too. It was bought with Moretti money, and I don't want a single thread on my back that gives Sophia an excuse to call the police.""
She turned toward the double mahogany doors.
""Isabella, stop,"" Dante ordered, his voice gaining that dangerous, gravelly edge that terrified the dockworkers and aldermen of Cook County. He caught her forearm, his grip firm enough to bruise. ""You do not walk out of this house in the middle of a storm. We are not finished.""
Isabella stopped and looked down at his fingers on her wrist. Slowly, she looked up into the face she had kissed every morning for seven hundred days.
May you like
""Let go of me, Dante,"" she said, her voice terrifyingly calm. ""Or you’ll have to have Marco shoot me in front of your mother to keep me here. Because that is the only way I am staying in this room.""
For three agonizing seconds, the Don of Chicago stared into the eyes of a woman who was no longer afraid of his empire. Slowly, his fingers loosened. Isabella pulled her arm back, turned her back on twenty-two members of the Moretti bloodline, and walked toward the dark night outside.
