Chapter 1 - The Weight of Red Lace
The rain was an absolute, blinding deluge, turning the stone steps of St. Clement’s into slick sheets of slate as my ruined heels clattered against them. Every step was weighted down by yards of soaked, heavy French lace. The hem was no longer ivory; it was a deep, rust-colored crimson that clung to my shins, freezing and sticky. Behind me, the muffled wails of wedding guests were drowned out by the rising crescendo of sirens bouncing off the Manhattan skyscrapers.
Marco Carbone did not touch me. He didn't grab my arm or shove me into the idling vehicle like a petty street thug. He simply paced beside me, an umbrella held at an exact angle to shield my head, though the gesture was almost absurd given that my dress was already dripping wet. His posture remained as unhurried and disciplined as a priest leaving mass.
Two men in identical charcoal wool coats held open the rear door of an armored black Mercedes-Maybach.
""Get in, Isabel,"" Marco said, his voice level against the howling wind.
I climbed inside, the stiff crinoline crunching awkwardly against the plush black leather. Marco slid in beside me, closing the door with a dull, hermetic thud that instantly killed the roar of the city outside. The glass was thick, bullet-resistant, and heavily tinted. The driver hit the gas, the car gliding into the rain-drowned avenue without a squeal of tires.
I stared down at my hands. Thomas’s blood had dried under my fingernails and across my palms, cracking in the creases of my skin.
""Is the hospital briefed?"" I demanded, my voice shaking with a sudden, vicious tremor. The shock was starting to wear off, leaving behind a sharp, burning fury that tasted like copper in my mouth. ""You shot him. On the altar. In front of three hundred people.""
Marco glanced at his phone, his thumb flicking across an encrypted screen before sliding the device into his breast pocket. ""I did not shoot him. My sniper aimed for the right shoulder, missing the clavicle and the subclavian artery by an inch and a half. If I had ordered him killed, he would not have made a sound before his heart ceased beating.""
""You expect me to thank you for your surgical precision?"" I spat, turning my head to glare at him.
Up close, the harsh line of his jaw showed a faint, jagged scar running from beneath his left ear down into his crisp collar. His eyes were not black, as they had seemed in the gloom of the church, but a pale, slate grey—the color of ocean water before a hurricane.
""I expect you to breathe, Ms. Vance,"" Marco replied calmly. ""You have been operating on adrenaline for the past four minutes. If you pass out, my seats are leather, but your head hitting the console will give you a concussion.""
""My father will hunt you down,"" I whispered, though the words sounded empty even in my own ears. I remembered my father’s face. The dull, resigned cowardice in his posture.
Marco let out a soft, humorless sound that was barely a laugh. ""Your father hasn't hunted anything in twenty years. Roland Vance trades in other men's lives and hides behind private security paid for with laundered narcotics money. He will not hunt me. He will spend the next twelve hours destroying hard drives and booking private charters to non-extradition countries.""
""He wouldn't abandon me,"" I lied.
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Marco didn't bother arguing. Instead, he reached into a small console drawer, pulled out a pack of antiseptic wipes and a clean hand towel, and placed them gently on the leather between us.
""Clean your hands, Isabel,"" he said softly, turning his gaze out the darkened window toward the Brooklyn Bridge. ""The blood on them belongs to a man who knew exactly who your father was, and chose to marry you anyway for a seat at the table.""
