165.🥂 The Bruised Wrist That Shattered the Mafia Boss’s Engagement

Chapter 04 - The Voice on the Phone

Dante did not ask Carlo where Liam was.

That was the first thing I learned about power that night.

Power did not beg when begging would feed the person holding the knife.

Dante simply listened.

Carlo Russo sounded older than Dante, with a voice softened by expensive cigars and the habit of being obeyed.

“I told Sofia not to frighten the girl during dinner,” Carlo said. “She always was too theatrical.”

Dante’s hand tightened around the phone.

“You moved a patient from a hospital using my signature.”

“I protected family business.”

“You put your hands on her brother.”

“Technically, my driver did.”

Marco’s jaw flexed.

Dante’s voice stayed flat. “If Liam Reed is harmed—”

“Don’t embarrass yourself. The boy is breathing. Comfortable. Better monitored than he was in that charity ward.”

I wanted to scream.

Not because Carlo sounded cruel.

Because he sounded bored.

Dante looked at me once, then away.

Carlo continued. “Send the maid home. Finish your engagement dinner. Marry the Marchetti girl like we agreed. By sunrise, this unpleasant misunderstanding disappears.”

“We agreed to nothing.”

“Oh, nephew.” Carlo laughed softly. “Your father agreed before you ever sat at the head of that table.”

Something moved across Dante’s face.

Not surprise exactly.

Recognition of a door he had not known was still closed.

“My father is dead,” Dante said.

“Yes. And still causing paperwork.”

The line went dead.

The security office was silent except for the monitor fan and my breathing, which had become too shallow to be useful.

Dante turned to Marco. “Find the car that left the ambulance bay.”

“Already working.”

Then he looked at me.

“Emma.”

I hated that my name sounded safe in his mouth.

It had no right to.

“Your brother is leverage,” he said. “That means they need him alive.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I know men like my uncle.”

My laugh broke on the way out. “That isn’t comforting.”

“No.”

He moved closer, careful not to touch my bruised wrist. “But it is true.”

Back at the mansion, Sofia was no longer in the dining room.

For one terrible second, I thought she had escaped.

Then we found her in the library, seated on a cream sofa between two guards, her shoes off, her mascara untouched. She looked less like a criminal than a woman exhausted from carrying a secret she had hoped would kill someone else first.

Dante entered alone.

I stood in the doorway.

Sofia saw me and looked away.

“Carlo called,” Dante said.

Her eyes closed.

That was all the confession he needed.

“You knew he took the brother.”

“No.”

Dante said nothing.

Sofia opened her eyes. “I knew he intended to scare her. I didn’t know he would move him.”

“You bruised her wrist.”

“She heard something she shouldn’t have.”

“So you grabbed her.”

Sofia’s voice sharpened. “Do you think I wanted this? Do you think I wanted any of it?”

“Yes.”

She flinched.

For the first time, I saw the girl under the red satin. Not innocent. Not helpless. But afraid.

“Carlo said if I didn’t keep the engagement on schedule, he would ruin my father.”

Dante’s expression barely changed. “Your father launders money through three restaurants and a wine distributor.”

“And Carlo has proof.”

“So do I.”

Sofia went quiet.

Dante crossed the library slowly. “The dock gift. What is it?”

She stared at the fireplace.

“Sofia.”

“It was a transfer,” she said. “Something Carlo said your father set aside years ago. He told me once we married, I only had to sign as your wife and the funds could be redirected.”

“What funds?”

She looked at me then.

Not at Dante.

At me.

“The Reed compensation trust.”

I did not understand the words.

Dante did.

He turned so slowly the room seemed to hold its breath with him.

“What did you say?”

Sofia’s mouth trembled. “It wasn’t supposed to be active anymore. Carlo said the families were gone.”

“My family isn’t gone,” I said.

Sofia looked at my wrist.