Chapter 7 - The Trap is Sprung
By four in the morning, the mansion was locked down tighter than a federal penitentiary. The dead assassin had already been identified: a former foreign mercenary on Marco’s private payroll. But Marco had vanished from his penthouse in Manhattan, his private accounts liquidating tens of millions of dollars.
In the medical wing of the estate, Eleanor sat while a doctor stitched the shallow wound on her forearm. Alessandro stood by the window, phone pressed to his ear, issuing cold, ruthless orders to his captains across the Eastern Seaboard.
""Cut off the private airstrips in Teterboro. Freeze the port docks. If a rat so much as twitches in Marco’s warehouse district, put a bullet in it."" He ended the call, shoving the phone into his pocket, and walked over to Eleanor.
""You shouldn't have been in that library,"" he said softly, examining the neat row of stitches on her arm.
""I couldn't sleep,"" she replied, her voice quiet. ""I kept thinking about my mother. Did she fight back like that when the fire started?""
Alessandro’s expression softened into something profound. ""Chiara was the fiercest woman in this family. She fought until her last breath to make sure you got out of that burning house. And you have that same fire in your veins. You didn't cower. You broke his nose with a brass globe before I even pulled the trigger.""
A weak smile crossed Eleanor’s lips, though the fear lingered. ""What happens now? Marco is running.""
""No,"" Isabella’s voice interrupted as she walked into the room, supported by an armed guard. The old woman’s eyes were blazing with cold fury. ""Marco isn't running away from New York. He is running to the one place where he thinks he can bargain for his life. The Valenti family.""
Alessandro stiffened. ""The Valentis wouldn't dare harbor him. We have a ceasefire.""
""Marco orchestrated the hit twenty-four years ago by feeding Chiara’s location to the old Valenti boss,"" Isabella revealed, her voice shaking with righteous rage. ""He has a ledger in the old family vault beneath the abandoned textile mill on the riverfront. It contains the signatures, the wire transfers, and the names of every corrupt official who helped him erase Sophia's existence. He will try to retrieve it before fleeing the country, because without that ledger, he has no leverage to buy the Valenti family's protection.""
Eleanor stood up, wrapping the silver locket tightly around her hand. ""Then we don't let him reach it.""
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Alessandro looked at her, his eyes darkening. ""You aren't coming.""
""I am the reason he's running,"" Eleanor insisted, stepping directly into his personal space, her chin lifted high. ""My mother died for this. I spent twenty-four years eating scraps because of that man. If you're going to face him, you do it with Chiara's daughter standing right behind you.""
