Chapter 1 - The Screen That Shook An Empire
The glass screen of Clara’s phone was webbed with fractured lines, smeared with dark droplets of dried blood. My thumbs shook as I pressed the power button, the faint glow casting a sickly blue shadow over my knuckles. Mateo stood beside me, his broad silhouette blocking the harsh corridor light, his face carved from cold stone. Around us, half a dozen armed guards in black tailored suits stood at rigid attention, but not a single piece of firepower could stop the trembling inside my ribs.
On the screen was an unread thread of text messages from an unsaved number, dated just forty-five minutes before the crash.
“If you want Dominic to walk out of that downtown warehouse alive tonight, Mrs. Valente, come alone to 43rd and Racine. We have a wire tapped into his private security detail. Tell a single guard, and he takes a bullet through the skull before he reaches his car.”
Attached to the message was a photograph: me, leaving our downtown club earlier that evening, completely exposed through a sniper’s crosshairs.
A choked, strangled sound tore from my throat. My vision tunneled into white-hot rage and sickening horror. Clara hadn't been driving across town running an errand. She hadn't been shopping or attending a charity gala. She had believed my life was in immediate, mortal danger. Without hesitating, without making a single demand on my time, she had thrown herself straight into the jaws of the wolves on the South Side—all to trade her life for mine.
And where had I been?
I had been sitting in a VIP recovery suite down the hall, spoon-feeding ice chips to a twenty-four-year-old socialite who threw a tantrum over an upset stomach. While Clara was staring down extortionists and begging our driver to speed through rival territory to save my pathetic life, I had been whispering sweet nothings to Serena Hayes, stroking her blonde hair, promising her the world.
“Dom?”
The soft, whining voice made my skin crawl. Serena stepped into the surgical waiting wing, her silk robe billowing around her slender frame, a petulant pout on her painted lips. “The doctor said I can be discharged soon. Aren’t you coming back to my room? It’s freezing in here, and these men are staring at me. It’s creeping me out.”
I turned toward her so slowly my joints popped. In the sterile, clinical light, the illusion shattered into dust. The pout wasn't cute; it was grotesque. The helplessness wasn't charming; it was hollow, parasitic narcissism. For twelve months, I had fed my ego on her worship, convincing myself that Clara’s quiet dignity was coldness, that her lack of demanding drama meant she didn't care.
I looked Serena straight in her wide, blue eyes, my voice dropping to a deathly whisper. “Get out.”
“What?” Her eyes fluttered in theatrical shock. “Dom, what are you saying? I was scared, I had an attack—”
“Mateo,” I said, never taking my eyes off her. “Strip her of the penthouse keys. Cancel the black cards. Have two guards escort her out the service door onto Michigan Avenue. If she ever steps within a hundred feet of any Valente property again, bury her in the harbor.”
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Serena went pale as a ghost, shrieking as Mateo’s men stepped forward with lethal efficiency, taking her by the elbows and dragging her toward the elevators. Her frantic screams echoed down the hallway before being cut short by sliding steel doors.
Silence fell once more, heavy as a burial shroud. I looked back down at Clara’s blood on my fingers, dropped to my knees outside the red surgical doors, and buried my face in my hands. The syndicate king of Chicago was nothing more than a blind fool who had traded a diamond for cheap, painted glass.
