Emma Moretti was sitting beside her older brother David at the main family table, only for Vincent’s older sister Margaret Moretti to snatch the little girl’s dinner plate away and violently kick the chair out from beneath her

The sound of Margaret’s breath hitching was the only noise in the vast, cavernous ballroom. The diamond and pearl necklaces at her throat trembled against her wrinkled collarbone. She looked at her younger brother’s face—not the boy she had once tried to boss around forty years ago, but the reigning sovereign of the entire eastern seaboard syndicate.

"Vincent..." Margaret stammered, her voice cracking into a high-pitched, pathetic whine. "You... you can't mean that. This is the family banquet. Our father’s tradition—"

"Our father is rotting in the ground, Margaret," Vincent interrupted, his voice extraordinarily low, every word separated by a deliberate, measured pause. "And this is my house. These are my people. My rules."

He turned his head slightly, his cold gaze shifting down to Emma, who was clinging to the hem of his tailored trousers. Her tear-stained face peeked out from behind his leg, her thumb tucked into her mouth, her chest still shuddering with small, exhausted hiccups.

Vincent bent down, his massive frame descending with impossible grace. The tailored fabric of his suit pulled taut across his broad shoulders. He reached out with hands that had broken men’s bones, and gently, with infinite tenderness, wiped a stray tear from the toddler’s flushed cheek.

"Did anyone ever tell you that you don't belong here, Emma?" Vincent asked softly.

Emma sniffled, looking up into his terrifyingly handsome face. "Aunt Margaret said... she said I'm not real."

"She lied," Vincent murmured, his thumb brushing over her soft skin. "You carry the Moretti name. You sit where you want. You eat what you want. And anyone who puts a hand on you answers to me. Do you understand me, little bird?"

Emma gave a small, trembling nod, burying her face into his knee.

Laura stepped up, her eyes blazing as she looked at Margaret pinned against the kitchen doors. "Get her out of here, Vincent. Before I forget my manners and finish what you started."

David stood beside his mother, his fists balled tight. "She shouldn't even be allowed in the house. She's been whispering poison about Emma since the day we brought her home."

Vincent rose to his full, towering height. He adjusted the gold cufflinks on his wrists, his movements fluid and chillingly calm. He looked over the heads of the two bodyguards at Margaret, who was still clutching her bruised arms against the painted wood.

"Santino," Vincent called out without turning around.

A weathered capo with silver hair and a broken nose stepped out from the head table. "Yes, Don Vincent."

"Take my sister to her private suite on the third floor," Vincent commanded, his baritone slicing through the dead silence. "Pack her luggage. Call the private sanitarium in upstate New York. Tell them Mrs. Moretti is experiencing severe cognitive decline and requires immediate, round-the-clock custodial care."

"Vincent, no!" Margaret screamed, her voice piercing the air as she tried to shove past the two bodyguards. "You can't lock me away! I have shares in the freight lines! I have rights in this syndicate!"

"You had rights," Vincent said, turning his back on her with absolute finality. "Until you kicked a three-year-old onto marble. Santino, move her. If she screams again, gag her."

The bodyguards moved in, gripping Margaret by both arms and hoisting her off the floor. Her hysterical shrieks faded down the service corridor as the heavy soundproof doors swung shut behind them.