Chapter 1 - The Lion Bides His Time
The crystal chandelier above the dining table cast sparkling reflections across Vivien’s pale green silk dress. She cut her roasted lamb with delicate precision, her diamonds catching the golden light. To anyone looking through the tall arched windows of my Lake Forest estate, we appeared to be the picture of untouchable American royalty. A ruthless king and his elegant queen.
“Lorenzo, darling,” Vivien murmured, lifting her wineglass with a practiced, coquettish smile. “Elena was telling me this afternoon how grateful she is to work for us. She even mentioned that your mother, before she passed away in Italy, always wished you would marry a woman from old money. A woman like me.”
I chewed slowly, letting the silence stretch until her fingers tightened slightly around the crystal stem. “Is that what Elena said?”
“Word for word,” Vivien replied, not a single flicker of hesitation in her striking blue eyes. “She’s a sweet girl, Lorenzo, but she really is getting clumsy. Earlier today, she nearly dropped your mother’s antique porcelain vase. I think having her toddler running around the corridors is distracting her. Perhaps after our wedding next month, we should help her find a placement in the suburbs. Somewhere far away from the city traffic. For the child’s safety, of course.”
My jaw clenched with such force my back teeth ached. For the child’s safety. The very words she had used to terrorize a defenseless woman while Mia stood trembling behind the door.
“We’ll consider it after the wedding, Vivien,” I said smoothly, lifting my glass to clink against hers. “Family stability comes first.”
Her smile widened, triumphant and radiant. She truly believed she had manipulated Lorenzo Duca. She thought that because I was feared across three states for putting rival cartel bosses into unmarked concrete graves, I was blind to the poison blooming in my own dining room.
Later that evening, after Vivien retired to her suite on the third floor, I took off my jacket and walked through the hidden corridor behind the wine cellar. Rocco was waiting in my sub-basement security office, illuminated by the glow of twenty-four surveillance monitors.
“Boss,” Rocco said, standing up immediately. His weathered face was grim, etched with scars earned from twenty years of defending my family’s empire. He dropped a thick leather dossier onto the stainless steel desk.
“What did you find?” I asked, leaning over the papers.
“It’s worse than you thought,” Rocco replied in a low growl. “Vivien isn’t just an ambitious socialite looking to secure her inheritance. Three months ago, her brother, Julian Vance, accrued twelve million dollars in gambling debt to the Moretti family in southern Illinois. If Julian doesn’t pay by the end of this month, they bury him. Vivien didn’t target you out of love, Lorenzo. She needs access to your mother’s offshore trust fund to save her brother’s neck.”
I stared at the surveillance logs, my eyes narrowing into slits. “And Elena? Why has Vivien been terrorizing a maid for ninety days?”
Rocco paused, his heavy brow furrowing. “That’s the part that doesn’t make sense yet. Elena’s late husband, Marco, was your personal driver before he died in that car crash four years ago. Why would Vivien care about Marco’s widow unless Elena knows something that could destroy Vivien’s cover?”
“Find out,” I commanded, my voice dropping to a lethal whisper. “Put two discreet teams on the Vance family. Tap Vivien’s personal satellite phone. And Rocco?”
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“Yes, Boss?”
“Place four armed guards outside Elena and Mia’s quarters tonight. If anyone approaches that door without my direct clearance, shoot to kill.”
