Chapter 4
I removed Victoria’s ring permanently.
No pause.
No reconsideration.
She stared at her bare finger.
“Dante, I never asked him to hurt her.”
“I believe you.”
That surprised her.
Then:
“You asked him to make her disappear from my life.”
Silence.
“You intercepted her messages.”
Silence.
“You lied to her about me.”
Silence.
“You heard she might have been injured because of the pressure you created.”
Her face broke.
“And you still let me put a ring on your hand.”
She cried harder.
Love might have existed.
So did ambition.
So did fear.
None canceled the others.
Preston lost every Caradonna role before sunrise.
No meetings.
No shared operations.
No access to my staff.
No ability to say my name in a room as leverage.
He called me from another wing.
“You’re destroying fifteen years.”
“No.”
I looked through the glass wall of the observatory at Chicago lights below us.
“I’m separating what you built from what you borrowed.”
May you like
He had spent fifteen years close enough to Caradonna that even he stopped knowing the difference.
That ended tonight.
