Chapter 7
Valentina stood in the center of the devastation, her dark-green gown clinging heavily to her frame, dripping water onto the sun-baked tiles. The bright, natural cinematic light illuminated the absolute ruin she had visited upon the Hale family. She rolled her shoulders back, her posture impeccable, radiating an intimidating, terrifying authority.
Slowly, deliberately, Valentina turned her head. Her cold, sharp eyes locked onto the man who had started it all.
Thomas Moretti was standing near the edge of the crowd, his fair face pale and sweating. He looked at the broken bodies of Marcus and Vanessa, and then he looked at the dozens of Moretti capos and bodyguards who were now drawing their weapons, aiming them not at the Hales, but at him. The recording had exposed his treason, and the loyalty of the men belonged to the true head of the family.
"Valentina," Thomas stammered, holding his hands up in a placating gesture. His expensive formal suit suddenly looked two sizes too big for him. "Valentina, you have to understand. It was business. The commission was pressuring me to stabilize the family lines."
Valentina ignored his pathetic excuses. She walked over to the stone coping and retrieved Ethan’s tablet. She pressed a button, silencing the recording, and held the device up in her hand.
Behind her, two massive, loyal bodyguards stepped forward, wrapping a thick, warm towel around Ethan and lifting the shivering three-year-old safely into their arms, creating an impenetrable wall of muscle between the child and the traitors.
Valentina took a slow step toward her father. Water ran from her gown, pooling around her heels.
"You betrayed your own blood," Valentina said. Her voice was dead calm. It was not a shout of anger, but a measured, factual statement of his doom. "You allied with parasites to drown my son."
"I am your father!" Thomas demanded, his voice cracking with fear as he desperately tried to assert a patriarchal authority he no longer possessed. "You cannot touch me! The old families will not stand for patricide!"
Valentina tilted her head slightly, the wet strands of her hair framing her beautiful, lethal face. The bright colors of the day seemed to wash out the old man's legacy entirely.
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"If you like staging things so much," Valentina whispered, her voice echoing clearly across the silent terrace, "tomorrow I’ll stage your disappearance."
Thomas’s face became overwhelmingly frightened. His jaw dropped, and he took a stumbling step backward, realizing the absolute finality of her words.
