Chapter 4 - The Unraveling Empire
Twelve years ago, I was a different man—or perhaps just a more reckless one.
Back then, my younger sister Clara had defied our father's wishes, marrying a brilliant, gentle university professor who wanted nothing to do with the underworld. When our father died and I inherited the syndicate, I tried to keep them safe, building a wall of ironclad security around Clara, her husband, and their newborn baby girl.
It wasn't enough.
A rival faction, seeking to cripple my reign before it fully began, had targeted them. The official report delivered to my desk by my most trusted advisors—including Lorenzo—was definitive. A car bomb. A fiery plunge off a coastal bridge. No survivors. DNA matches confirmed by local authorities on my payroll.
I had hunted down every last man responsible for that bomb and torn their world apart piece by piece. I became the monster they feared, sealing my heart in ice because I believed my family had been stolen from me.
And yet, here sat a little girl with Clara’s eyes, eating leftover meat in a freezing Chicago shipping container.
A cold sweat broke out across the back of my neck, far colder than the biting winter wind. If Elena was alive... that meant the official report was a lie.
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And if that report was a lie, someone inside my inner circle had orchestrated it. Someone who benefited from making me believe I was completely alone in the world.
Someone like Lorenzo.
