Chapter 2 - THE SHADOWS OF THE ESTATE
The grandfather clock in the grand gallery struck eight. Outside, a violent autumn storm had rolled over the Hudson Valley, lashing the French-pane windows of the Moretti estate with relentless sheets of rain.
Dominic had locked Vanessa in the estate’s wine cellar—a reinforced subterranean vault with three-foot-thick stone walls and biometric locks that only opened to his thumbprint. Her screams and curses had echoed through the floorboards for twenty minutes before she finally realized that the reinforced steel wouldn't yield.
Upstairs in the private master suite, the atmosphere was thick with tension.
Hannah sat on the edge of an emerald-velvet armchair, her hands bandaged with clean white gauze that Dominic himself had meticulously applied fifteen minutes earlier. He had refused to let a house doctor touch her, insisting on cleaning the cut with antiseptic himself. His touch had been astonishingly gentle, completely at odds with the violent fury he had displayed toward Vanessa.
“You should drink this,” Dominic said, placing a tumbler of amber bourbon on the side table beside her.
“I don’t drink, sir,” Hannah murmured, her voice still trembling.
“Call me Dominic,” he said, pulling up a leather chair opposite her. He leaned forward, resting his forearms on his knees, staring at her with unblinking scrutiny. “We are past the point of master and servant, Hannah. In the eyes of the law, you currently own forty-nine percent of the foundation that funds every single legitimate business my family operates.”
Hannah swallowed hard. “I don’t want it. I don’t care about money, Dominic. I took this job because my mother was dying of kidney failure in an unlicensed clinic outside Chicago. She needed treatments that cost four thousand dollars a month. When I saw the job opening for a live-in maid at the Moretti estate under a false background check, I took it. I had to know if Elena left anything behind that could clear my mother’s name.”
“Tell me about October 18,” Dominic commanded gently. “Tell me what Margaret told you.”
Hannah took a deep, shuddering breath. Her fingers curled around the hem of her simple grey maid’s uniform.
“My mother was Elena’s private nurse for eight months,” Hannah began, her voice cracking with suppressed emotion. “Elena was recovering from what everyone thought was a mild respiratory illness. But my mother was a certified trauma nurse for twenty years. She noticed that every time Vanessa Sterling brought over Elena’s herbal tea from the Sterling family botanist, Elena’s heart rate spiked, and her blood pressure dropped to dangerous levels.”
Dominic’s jaw muscles tightened until they looked like carved granite. “Vanessa was poisoning her.”
“Slowly,” Hannah nodded, tears spilling onto her cheeks. “Digitalis toxicity. It leaves minimal traces unless you specifically test for cardiac glycosides during an autopsy. Elena began to suspect it herself. That’s why she hid the financial records. She realized the Sterlings weren’t just embezzling—they were preparing to eliminate her so Vanessa could marry you and merge the Sterling bank accounts with the Moretti syndicate’s port authorities.”
Dominic stood up abruptly, turning toward the window. The reflection in the dark glass showed a man caught in a storm of self-hatred.
“Elena tried to warn me,” he whispered, his voice hollow with grief. “Two weeks before she died, she asked me to cancel our business contracts with Richard Sterling. She told me Richard was an extortionist. And what did I do? I told her she was being paranoid. I told her the alliance was necessary to keep the peace between the northern families.”
He closed his fists so tightly his knuckles turned white.
“I put the snake in her bed,” Dominic spat. “I brought Vanessa into this house. I ignored the signs because I was too busy managing the docks and fighting off the Lucchese cartel. And when Elena fell... the coroner, a man appointed by the Sterling judicial committee, ruled it an accidental fall caused by a sudden cardiac arrhythmia. They said her heart gave out at the top of the stairs.”
“It wasn't an accident,” Hannah said softly. “The night Elena died, my mother received a frantic text message from Elena’s private phone at four in the morning. It said: *‘They know. Margaret, run. Richard and Vanessa know about the lockbox.’* My mother drove to this house immediately. But when she reached the perimeter gate, she saw an unmarked black sedan speeding away. And standing at the back entrance, looking down at the gravel driveway where the ambulance was just arriving... was your brother Adrian.”
Dominic froze. He turned around slowly.
“Adrian was standing at the entrance?”
“Yes,” Hannah said. “My mother told me Adrian was holding a burning manila folder over an iron brazier. When he saw her headlights, he pulled out a gun and fired a warning shot into the air. My mother turned her car around and fled into the night. Two days later, our apartment in Brooklyn was ransacked and burned to the ground. That’s when my mother knew she had to disappear.”
A sudden chime echoed from Dominic’s phone on the desk.
He walked over and picked it up. It was a secure feed from the front gate’s thermal imaging camera. A single black Mercedes G-Wagon was parked outside the wrought-iron gates. The driver’s side door opened, and a tall, lean man stepped out into the pouring rain.
He raised his hands toward the camera, holding nothing but a white envelope and a flash drive.
It was Adrian Moretti.
Dominic stared at the screen, his breathing slow and dangerous.
“He came alone,” Dominic muttered.
“Dominic, please,” Hannah said, rising from her chair, her voice laced with panic. “If he’s here with Richard Sterling’s men, they’ll kill you! You saw what Vanessa tried to do!”
Dominic looked at Hannah. For a fraction of a second, the lethal chill in his eyes softened as he looked at her bruised, delicate face.
“Hannah,” he said quietly, walking over to her and gently pressing his hand against the side of her cheek. His touch was warm, steady, and filled with a fierce, protective resolve. “In this house, nobody touches you. Nobody hurts you. You brought my wife’s soul back from the dark, and you gave me the truth. As long as I draw breath, you are under the protection of the Moretti bloodline.”
Hannah’s breath hitched. Looking up into Dominic’s dark, commanding eyes, she didn't see a ruthless mobster. She saw a broken warrior seeking redemption.
He turned toward the heavy mahogany door, drawing a customized matte-black Sig Sauer from his shoulder holster.
May you like
“Stay here. Lock this door from the inside,” Dominic instructed. “I am going to have a conversation with my brother.”
***