Chapter 4
The grand salon had been entirely secured by the Mercer syndicate within ten minutes. The wealthy guests had been herded into the adjoining dining room under armed guard, leaving only Damon, his family, Mara, and the captive Cross family in the cavernous, chandelier-lit space.
Damon directed Mara to escort Miriam and Lily to a plush burgundy velvet sofa near the towering Christmas tree. Miriam sat heavily, refusing to let go of her daughter. She looked around the opulent room, her clear eyes wide and haunted, as if the golden lights and crimson ornaments were a hallucination.
Damon approached the sofa slowly, as if approaching a frightened animal. He knelt on the polished marble, his tailored trousers brushing the floor. For the first time in two years, he truly looked at his wife. She was thinner, her fair skin pale from a lack of sunlight, the creased cream dress hanging loosely on her frame. But the old wedding band still gleamed on her finger.
"Miriam," Damon whispered, his voice cracking with a profound, agonizing guilt. He reached out, his tattooed fingers trembling as they hovered near her cheek. "I thought I buried you. I stood at your grave."
Miriam flinched slightly, her watchful expression guarded. "They drugged me, Damon. The night of the crash. The car went off the road, and when I woke up, I was in that room. Selena came to me. She told me the car had burned. She told me my baby girl was gone."
Damon’s jaw clenched so hard the muscle feathered beneath his short stubble. "Why didn't you scream? Why didn't you fight?"
"I did, for the first month," Miriam said, her voice hollow, devoid of the vibrant life he remembered. "But the room is soundproofed. And she told me... she told me that if I ever made a sound when she had the door open, she would have you killed. She said you were grieving, vulnerable. She said her father's men were waiting for the order."
Mara, standing protectively behind the sofa, felt a chill run down her spine. The psychological torture Selena had inflicted was monstrous.
"She brought me videos of Lily," Miriam continued, a fresh tear sliding down her cheek. "She said they were old recordings. She played them through a speaker in the wall to torment me. To remind me of what I lost."
"It was me, Mommy," Lily chirped, patting Miriam’s face with a tiny hand. "I singed you songs."
Damon squeezed his eyes shut, a single tear escaping to track down his angular jaw. When he opened them, the raw vulnerability was gone, replaced entirely by the cold, calculating fury of a mafia king. He stood up, towering over the sofa, his broad shoulders casting a long shadow.
"Mara," Damon said, his tone professional and detached once more. "Do not leave their side. If anyone who is not wearing a Mercer crest approaches this sofa, you take the fire iron from that hearth and you put it through their neck. Do you understand me?"
Mara’s breath hitched. She was a gentle maid, a girl who spent her days polishing silver and folding linens. But looking at the traumatized mother and the innocent toddler, a fierce, protective fire ignited in her chest.
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"I understand, Mr. Mercer," Mara replied, her clear eyes hardening with resolve.
Damon gave her a single, approving nod before turning on his heel. He walked purposefully across the marble floor toward the center of the room, where Selena and her father were kneeling, surrounded by heavily armed men. The reckoning had begun.
