Chapter 3
The two bodyguards moved with terrifying, synchronized speed. Before any of the seated capos could even push their chairs back, the men lunged forward. They grabbed Lowen’s upper arms with crushing, bruising force, pinning his powerful shoulders firmly against the padded back of his dining chair.
"Get your hands off me," Lowen snarled, his deep voice vibrating with a sudden, explosive fury. He surged upward, his muscles flexing violently beneath his tailored suit, but the sheer weight and leverage of the two massive men held him in place.
"Hold him steady," Domenica ordered, her eyes gleaming with a manic, victorious thrill.
The fifty guests surrounding the crowded banquet tables stopped eating completely. Forks clattered onto fine porcelain plates. Relatives held their breath, their eyes wide with shock, but nobody intervened. The fear of backing the wrong side in a mafia coup kept them paralyzed in their seats.
Domenica stepped right up to Lowen’s trapped form. She didn't go for his throat or his hands. She looked directly down at his left leg, extended awkwardly under the table.
With a vicious, calculated swiftness, Domenica reached down and grabbed the thick velcro straps of his hinged medical brace.
"No!" Merrin cried out, dropping her silver serving tray. It hit the marble floor with a deafening crash, but the sound was drowned out by the violent tearing of the brace's straps.
Domenica tore the straps open and violently yanked the heavy metal and plastic support structure entirely off Lowen’s injured knee.
"The family needs a leader, not a burden," Domenica smirked, tossing the medical brace carelessly onto the floor.
The sudden removal of the brace was catastrophic. The bodyguards abruptly released their grip, stepping back to let gravity do their dirty work. Without the mechanical support, Lowen’s shattered knee could not bear the sudden shift in his body weight.
His leg buckled instantly with a sickening, unnatural twist.
Lowen let out a sharp, breathless grunt of agony. He pitched forward, falling hard. His reflexes, honed by years of violence, were the only things that saved him from crashing completely to the floor. He threw his arms out, his tattooed hands catching the thick edge of the banquet table. The wood groaned under his weight, crystal glasses rattling wildly as he hung there, his knuckles turning white, his injured leg trembling uncontrollably beneath him.
"Look at him," Domenica announced to the silent room, gesturing grandly to the struggling boss. "Look at your king. He can't even stand on his own two feet."
"I will kill you for this," Lowen gasped, his voice strained through clenched teeth, his forehead shining with a sudden layer of cold sweat.
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"You can't even reach me, Lowen," she laughed cruelly.
Merrin didn't think. She moved on pure, unadulterated instinct. Bypassing the bodyguards, the young housemaid rushed forward into the epicenter of the violence, her black dress and white apron a blur of desperate motion. She ignored the heavily armed men, her expressive eyes focused entirely on the man struggling to hold himself up.
