Isabella's perspective
The morning light streaming into the suite was exceptionally soft, a stark contrast to the heavy, suffocating feeling weighing on my heart. I sat before the antique dressing table, Maria standing behind me, gently combing my long hair with a silver-backed comb.
For a long time, the only sound in the room was the rhythmic rustling of a brush through my hair. Then, I saw Maria's hand stop in the mirror. Her gaze lingered on my thin, sunken cheekbones and my pale, fragile skin.
"You have suffered so much, Miss Izzy," she sobbed softly, a tear sliding down her wrinkled cheek.
That simple sentence transformed into a cruel, sharp blade. The gilded mirror vanished before my eyes, replaced by the bloody, horrifying scenes of my past life.
A deafening sniper rifle shot rang out. The air reeked of burning tar. Maria shielded me with her frail body, a bullet piercing her chest. Blood stained my hands as she uttered her last words: "Run, miss."
I gasped. My hands gripped the edge of the dressing table tightly, my knuckles turning white from the force. The air seemed to fill with the suffocating smell of rust and death. I've spent twenty years mourning her, and twenty years sharpening my grief into a blade.
I raised my hand and covered her trembling one. "It's all over now, Maria," I said calmly, though my heart was pounding violently in my chest. "I assure you, no one will ever be able to hurt us again."
In my heart, I made a silent vow to the departed souls of the past. This time, I will be the one holding the gun.
A rapid knocking shattered the silence inside. Maddox, the manor guard, entered. His face was grave as he handed over a heavy parchment envelope sealed with deep red wax.
It bears the Valenti family crest.
I peeled back the seal. Inside was a letter with crude, crooked handwriting, revealing the uncultured arrogance of old Lady Valenti. It was a vulgar and forceful ultimatum, declaring that she would personally visit Moretti Estate the next morning to "drag Valenti's heir back from the ditch."
But what caught my attention wasn't her pathetic threats. Tucked behind her letter was a crisp little piece of paper. Unsigned, it contained only two cold words typed by Damian on his typewriter:
Let her go.
He loosened the rope binding his mother. Damian didn't care about Angelo at all, and didn't bother to fight for him, but his inherent arrogance made him allow his mother to wage this proxy war, just to humiliate me. This was the most extreme and chilling abandonment of his own flesh and blood.
I didn't cry. The innocent girl who would weep for Damian's cruelty was dead. I folded the letter, my mind already calculating the angle at which I should plunge the blade into their perfect life.
Ten minutes later, I entered my grandmother's private study.
This room, the nerve center of Elena Moretti's power structure, was filled with the scents of aged paper and ink, expensive brandy, and the faint metallic odor of a well-maintained firearm in a drawer. Elena Moretti sat by the flickering fireplace, her sharp gaze scrutinizing me as I handed her the letter.
She read it without a word. When she put down the letter, her jaw tightened, and the temperature in the room plummeted. "That street shrew is too audacious," Elena scoffed, referring to Damian's mother. "Does she really think she can just walk into my house and steal my great-grandson?"
"She can't take him away." I sat down calmly across from her. "But we shouldn't see this as a display of the Valenti family's power, Grandmother. It's an admission of their weakness."
Elena raised her silver eyebrows, intrigued. "Explain."
"Damian is a shrewd and calculating godfather. He wouldn't fight a pointless custody battle with crude letters; he relies on lawyers and bullets." I leaned forward, calmly analyzing. "This isn't Damian's game. This is Seraphina's. She needs Angelo to solidify her undisputed position as the Mafia queen, but she clearly couldn't convince Damian to care about the child. So, she manipulated that greedy old woman to do the dirty work for her."
I tapped the armrest. "Seraphina is getting anxious. She doesn't have the absolute control over Damian that she seems to have. And Old Lady Valenti is nothing more than a blunt weapon that we can easily break."
Elena stared at me for a long time. Her initial pity for this down-on-her-luck granddaughter slowly faded, replaced by a deep, admiring respect. She no longer saw an abandoned woman, but a strategist, a woman reborn from the flames ignited by the Valenti family.
"You've grown a body of steel, Isabella," Elena murmured, a dangerous smile playing on her lips. She poured two glasses of amber brandy and pushed one toward me. "Let old lady Valenti come tomorrow. We'll show her what happens when a wild dog breaks into a lion's den."
