Chapter 2 - The Name Behind the Ebony Beads
The hallway was so silent you could hear the bitter draft rattling the stained-glass panes at the far end of the gallery.
Camilla backed against the carved wood wainscoting, her breath hitching in her throat. Her emerald bracelet clicked sharply against the wall.
“Matteo, you’re losing your mind!” she stammered, her voice shrill, cracking with sudden panic. “She’s an illiterate scullery worker who stole an antique off an estate tray! You cannot build a murder indictment out of a servant’s thievery!”
Matteo didn't shout. He didn't blink.
He held the silver crucifix between two fingers, his thumb brushing the engraved letters.
Maria.
His younger sister. Born in the bitter winter of 1994, taken from her cradle by their mother’s private nurse during the bloody chaos of the North Side rebellion, and declared dead from exposure in a municipal ward three days later.
A tragedy that had broken his mother’s heart, driving Donna Isabella into seclusion until the digitalis finished her off six months later.
Matteo looked down at Elena.
He looked at the delicate arch of her brow, the striking almond shape of her hazel eyes, and the faint, curved birthmark above her left collarbone—the exact mark his mother had drawn in the margin of her prayer book before she died.
“Her name is not Elena Ward,” Matteo murmured. His voice had the cold, terrifying weight of granite settling over an open tomb. “Her name is Maria Rossi.”
Elena gasped, clutching her belly as another sharp cramp rolled through her abdomen. “No... sir, my papers say Ward... my foster mother was Beatrice Ward...”
“Beatrice Ward was my mother’s head nurse at Mercy Hospital,” Matteo said softly, kneeling back down beside the velvet armchair. His massive, scarred hand gently cupped Elena’s trembling fingers. “She took you into the night with this rosary sewn into your blanket because she knew that whoever poisoned my mother was coming to silence the cradle next.”
Camilla lunged forward, her painted red lips curling in desperation. “Matteo! My father is inside that salon with thirty district capos! We are supposed to sign the joint maritime charter in twenty minutes! You cannot derail our future over an impostor carrying stolen jewelry!”
Matteo rose to his full height. He looked at Dante, his chief enforcer, who had stepped out from the security vestibule with a suppressed tactical pistol at his hip.
“Dante.”
“Yes, Don Matteo.”
“Lock down the dining salon. Nobody leaves their seat. Cut the cell repeaters across the compound.”
“And Miss Vance?” Dante asked, his cold gaze shifting to the trembling heiress.
“Take her into the library,” Matteo ordered, his voice devoid of human pity. “Strip her of her phone, her purse, and her jewels. If she attempts to step past the threshold before I call her, put a bullet through her foot.”
Camilla shrieked as Dante caught her wrist, twisting her arm behind her back with mechanical efficiency, hauling her down the hall while her designer heels skidded across the stone.
Matteo turned back to Elena.
Without hesitation, he reached down, gathered her gently into his arms, and lifted her from the armchair.
“Mr. Rossi... please,” Elena pleaded weakly, her face pale, pressing her cheek against the fine wool of his tuxedo jacket. “I’m soaked in lye water... my clothes are filthy...”
“You are carrying my bloodline’s future, Maria,” Matteo whispered into her hair, his deep baritone rumbling with fierce, protective devotion. “You will never touch lye water again.”
He carried her down the hall, kicking open the double doors of his private master suite, laying her gently onto the king-sized bed draped in goose down and heated silk.
He dialed his private physician on his cell phone.
May you like
“Dr. Aris. Bring a mobile ultrasound unit and an obstetric kit to the master suite. Now. If you take longer than eight minutes, do not bother arriving at all.”
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