Chapter 3
Clara whimpered as Roman handed her gently to Salvatore’s broad, reliable arms. The old soldier held the little girl against his chest with protective tenderness, stepping backward toward the safety of the perimeter wall.
"Don't let her see," Roman instructed without looking back.
"Understood, Boss," Salvatore murmured, his hand already signaling two armed guards to seal the mahogany double doors behind him.
Free of his daughter, Roman turned back toward the long table. His dark overcoat remained unbuttoned, the heavy gold signet ring flashing as his hand reached out across the linen tablecloth. He intended to take the poisoned wineglass by the stem, lift it to the light, and smell the vintage.
He never touched the crystal.
Marcus surged out of his chair with explosive desperation. His formal chair overturned backward, slamming into the parquet floor with a hollow boom. Marcus crossed the three yards between them, his manicured fingers knotting into the lapels of Roman’s tailored jacket.
With all the leverage of his weight, Marcus violently shoved Roman back from the table, putting his own body between the Don and the incriminating decanter.
"She’s three!" Marcus roared, his voice cracking into a furious, panicked pitch that betrayed him completely. "She doesn’t know what she heard! You're going to tear this whole family apart over a lie?"
Before Roman could regain his footing, Marcus pulled his right arm back and threw a vicious, desperate haymaker aimed squarely at Roman’s jaw.
Roman didn't retreat. He braced his heels against the runner, turning his head just enough so the strike glanced off the thick meat of his left shoulder. The heavy blow tore a button from his waistcoat, the silk lining pulling tight across his chest, but the Don’s neck didn't bend.
Roman absorbed the strike, planting his feet firmly into the floor.
Then, slowly, Roman raised his dark eyes.
There was no fear in them. No surprise. Only the cold, ancient calculation of a man whose ancestors had built their empire on the bodies of ungrateful relatives.
Marcus saw that gaze and shrank back half an inch, the adrenaline draining from his veins to leave pure, unadulterated terror. "Roman, wait—"
Marcus swung a second time, a ragged, terrified hook born of animal instinct.
Roman slipped outside the incoming fist with contemptuous ease, ducking beneath the arc of Marcus’s arm. In the same fluid motion, Roman’s hips coiled and uncoiled like a steel spring. He drove an explosive, bone-shattering counterpunch straight across Marcus’s jaw.
The impact sounded like a baseball bat cracking against wet wood.
Marcus’s head whipped around in a spray of red spit. His legs turned to water as the kinetic force sent him spinning backward across the gallery floor. He stumbled through the narrow aisle between the banquet table and the wall, hurtling directly into the tall, six-foot antique grandfather clock that stood beside the console table.
The collision was catastrophic.
Marcus’s back smashed through the glass-paneled wooden door of the clock casing. The interior brass pendulum snapped off its gears with a deafening twang, the heavy cast-iron weights swinging wildly on their chains before tearing free.
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The shockwave knocked over the silver-framed family portraits on the adjacent console—images of deceased grandfathers and solemn matriarchs crashing face-down onto the marble. A towering basket of decorative Christmas crackers exploded outward, showering red, gold, and green paper cylinders across the runner.
With a final, groaning splinter of antique walnut, the massive clock casing tilted and crashed forward onto the floor, pinning Marcus beneath the ruined wood and shattered glass.
