Chapter 13
Orlando did not run.
He removed his old family ring.
Placed it on the table.
Sebastian stared.
“You met Preston.”
“Yes.”
Lucinda looked wounded.
“Why?”
Orlando’s breathing was slow.
Tired.
“Because I wanted to hear what he was offering.”
Preston laughed.
“Coward.”
Orlando ignored him.
Sebastian’s gaze remained hard.
“And?”
“I listened.”
“That isn't an answer.”
Orlando looked directly at him.
“I considered it.”
Silence.
The honesty mattered.
Sebastian’s jaw tightened.
Orlando continued.
“You have become too central.”
Several capos shifted.
Preston smiled.
“Finally.”
Orlando turned toward him.
“But I never agreed to remove him.”
Preston’s smile disappeared.
“You agreed the family needed change.”
“Yes.”
“I agreed Sebastian needed men who could tell him no.”
Orlando’s eyes moved toward Sebastian.
“Not men who drugged his daughter.”
The room shifted again.
Preston snapped:
“You sanctimonious old bastard.”
Orlando smiled faintly.
“There you are.”
Sebastian watched.
Preston’s arrogance was no longer strategic.
It was becoming panic.
He insulted everyone because insult was the last form of control left.
Orlando admitted he knew Preston was gathering dissatisfied men.
He did not tell Sebastian.
“Why?”
Orlando looked toward him.
“Because twenty years ago I watched Salvatore turn suspicion into executions.”
Sebastian’s face hardened.
“And you thought I would?”
“I didn't know.”
That answer mattered.
The old culture of fear had survived Salvatore.
Different shape.
Same silence.
Sebastian looked toward the capos.
“Anyone else?”
No one spoke.
He waited.
One younger capo finally lifted his eyes.
“I knew Preston was angry.”
Another:
“I knew he was meeting men.”
No one had told Sebastian.
Not because they loved Preston.
Because everyone was afraid that accusing family without certainty would become its own death sentence.
Preston had built his plot inside that silence.
Sebastian looked toward Orlando.
“You should have told me.”
“Yes.”
“You didn't.”
“No.”
“You’re done advising me.”
Orlando nodded.
No fight.
No insult.
He picked up his ring.
Then stopped.
Sebastian’s eyes narrowed.
“Leave it.”
Orlando looked down.
Then placed the ring back.
Preston laughed.
“Beautiful.”
His voice dripped contempt.
“An old dog losing his collar.”
Sebastian turned.
Preston’s smile stayed.
“Who’s next?”
Sebastian looked around the room.
Then toward Lucinda.
She had not moved.
Her face remained hard.
But her eyes no longer carried the same hatred.
Not for Sebastian.
Preston saw it.
That was the real loss.
His wife was slipping outside the story he built for her.
He snapped:
“Don't look at him like that.”
Lucinda turned.
“What?”
His voice became colder.
“I spent twenty years keeping you from crawling back to people who never wanted you.”
Lucinda’s eyes narrowed.
Preston continued.
“You exist in this family because I made them fear losing you.”
She stared.
Then asked:
“What did you tell them?”
Preston stopped.
Too late.
Sebastian heard it.
Lucinda stepped closer.
“What did you tell the capos about me?”
No answer.
One younger capo looked away.
Lucinda saw.
“Say it.”
The man swallowed.
“Preston said if Sebastian fell…”
A pause.
“…you would become head of the family.”
Lucinda’s face went blank.
May you like
Preston had been promising her a throne she had never asked for—
and using her name to recruit the coup.
