Chapter 5 - The Snake Sheds Its Skin
Sofia backed up until her knees hit the sofa, her gaze darting between Adrian’s cold fury and my frozen stare. The pathetic, weeping mistress act vanished in a heartbeat, replaced by a venomous sneer that made my skin crawl.
“You always were a spoiled princess, Claire,” Sofia spat, tossing her damp designer bag onto the carpet. “Daddy went broke, so Adrian bought you like a high-end pet. You lived in luxury while my family scraped for table scraps in Little Italy! Do you have any idea what it’s like to watch the woman you grew up with get handed a billion-dollar empire just because she has pretty green eyes?”
“You sold your soul to Luca Rossi for jealousy?” I demanded, walking toward her without fear. “You threw away our friendship, staged a fake pregnancy, and dragged my name through every gutter in the country just to settle a petty grudge?”
“Rossi offered me fifty million and a luxury villa in Sicily,” Sofia laughed hysterically, tears of pure spite rolling down her cheeks. “All I had to do was plant the fake ultrasound on Adrian’s phone during the steakhouse dinner, leak the story to the press, and trigger a clause in your prenuptial agreement! The moment you file for divorce, Claire, the Moretti holding companies are legally frozen during the asset division! That gives the Rossi syndicate forty-eight hours to execute a hostile takeover of all shipping ports!”
The pieces clicked together with terrifying clarity. The public humiliation, the perfectly timed phone call, the text sent to my phone—it wasn’t a mistress trying to steal a husband. It was a calculated corporate and syndicate coup designed to paralyze Adrian’s empire through our divorce.
“And the baby?” I asked, narrowing my eyes.
“There is no baby!” Sofia shouted, her face twisting with bitter amusement. “Just a clever digital edit and a paid-off doctor! But the public believes it! The media believes it! The Moretti stock dropped fourteen percent this morning! Luca Rossi already owns the distribution docks in northern Chicago! Adrian is finished, and you’re going down with him!”
May you like
Adrian took two deliberate steps forward. The temperature in the room dropped below freezing.
“You made one critical mistake, Sofia,” Adrian murmured, pulling a slim silver recorder from his pocket and pressing the stop button. “You confessed inside a suite that has three active audio streams transmitting directly to the Federal District Attorney and the Chicago Syndicate Council. Luca Rossi won’t be taking over my docks tonight. He’ll be running for his life from the FBI.”
