Chapter 3 - The Unraveling of Lies and the Secret Dossier
Twenty minutes later, Marcus returned to the ballroom carrying a heavy leather briefcase retrieved from Arthur Sterling’s personal town car. The crowd watched in dead silence as Marcus set the briefcase on the edge of the mahogany banquet table and popped the brass latches.
Inside sat a duplicate of the forged execution contract Isabella had seen in Milwaukee, along with bank transfer receipts routing funds from Sterling Industries directly to a rogue syndicate hit squad.
Arthur Sterling’s face turned the color of ash. “That’s... that’s planted! That’s a forgery!”
“Is it?” Dante asked softly. He opened the file and pulled out a digital flash drive, walking over to the ballroom’s main media console. Within seconds, an audio recording began playing through the crystal-clear surround-sound speakers.
It was Vanessa Sterling’s voice, sharp and cold, speaking to a known assassin: *“Make sure the waitress disappears before Dante signs the merger. I don’t care about the brat she’s carrying; just make sure she never reaches Chicago.”*
The ballroom erupted into gasps. Vanessa shrieked, covering her ears, and lunged toward the doors, but Moretti guards blocked her path instantly.
“You did this,” Dante whispered, turning slowly to face Vanessa. His face was a mask of cold, terrifying wrath. “You tried to murder the woman I loved, and you tried to kill my child.”
“I did it for us!” Vanessa screamed, abandoning all pretense of elegance as tears of rage streamed down her face. “You were supposed to marry me! We belong to the same world! Not some homeless diner girl!”
Isabella watched the drama unfold from the safety of Dante’s arm. The contraction in her lower belly subsided slightly, but the sheer emotional exhaustion was staggering. She looked up at Dante, wondering if all of this wealth and violence was truly a place where she and her unborn daughter could ever belong.
May you like
Dante seemed to read her thoughts. He slipped his arm beneath her knees and lifted her effortlessly into his arms, ignoring the gasps of the high-society guests.
“Marcus, clear the room,” Dante ordered, carrying Isabella toward the private elevator leading to his residential penthouse upstairs. “Throw the Sterlings out, and tell our lawyers to strip every single asset they own by sunrise.”
