Chapter 4 - The Unmarked Van on the CausewayVictoria looked around the grand ballroom in suffocating, frantic despair.
She looked at the Chief Justice of the New Jersey Supreme Court, who had been drinking her father’s vintage scotch fifteen minutes earlier; the judge turned his head sharply to inspect the weave of a velvet drapery. She looked at the regional gaming commissioner; he was staring intently into the ice bucket on his table.
Nobody was coming to save her.
In the underworld of the Eastern Seaboard, political alliances were drafted on paper, but the ledger of Sofia Moretti was written in blood.
Victoria’s knees liquefied.
Her seventy-thousand-dollar velvet gown bunched around her as she sank onto the cold, wet floorboards, her bare knees pressing into the sharp shards of broken crystal and the spilled wine, her manicured fingers clawing at the stone.
She lifted her tear-streaked face toward Laura.
“I am... I am sorry, Laura,” Victoria sobbed, the confession choking her throat like crushed glass. “I was wrong... please, forgive me.”
Laura looked down at the groveling socialite with calm, cold detachment.
“Next time you want to show your power, Miss Moretti,” Laura said quietly, “find someone who can fight back.”
Dominic looked toward his security chief, Marco.
“Marco.”
“Command, Don Dominic.”
“Take Victoria Moretti down to the service loading bay,” Dominic ordered, his baritone booming across the vaulted room. “Let her walk the boardwalk in her wet velvet without her security detail. If she attempts to enter any property bearing the Moretti name, have her removed by the local police.”
He turned his gaze onto Charles Kane, who was shivering against the floor.
“Strip Charles Kane of his credentials. Impound his accounts. By sunrise, his name will be blacklisted from every hotel, resort, and restaurant between New York and Cape May.”
Victoria shrieked as two tactical commandos seized her by the arms, hauling her backward across the marble floor, her ruined gown trailing through the wine until the heavy service doors clicked shut forever.
Charles was hauled away in absolute silence, leaving the ballroom in total, breathless quiet.
Dominic turned back toward the wheelchair.
Without a word, he unbuttoned his heavy tailored midnight-black tuxedo jacket, lifted it from his broad shoulders, and draped it gently around Laura Hayes’s shivering frame.
The cashmere wool was warm, heavy, and smelled of ocean brine, clean cedar, and dark tobacco. It fell past her knees, completely concealing her rented vest and the torn stocking on her shin.
He looked down into Laura’s hazel eyes.
“Laura Hayes,” Dominic said softly, his voice rich with an unshakeable, eternal gravity. “You defended my mother when sixty men with badges looked at their shoes. In this house, courage like yours is not paid with an hourly wage. It is answered with an empire.”
He reached into his breast pocket and produced an antique leather folder stamped with the golden seal of the State of New Jersey.
He laid it flat in her hands.
“What is this, Don Dominic?” Laura whispered, her voice trembling.
“The canceled debt ledger for your sister’s medical care at the hospital,” Dominic answered gently. “Along with the master title deed to the oceanfront villa on the bluffs of Ventnor City, paid in full in perpetuity. And an irrevocable ten-million-dollar trust established under your name.”
Laura’s breath caught in her throat. Her vision blurred with sudden, overwhelming tears.
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“Ten million dollars...? The villa?” she wept, pressing her hands against the heavy wool of his jacket. “Sir, I was only doing what was right!”
“You did what this entire room was too cowardly to do, Laura,” Dominic murmured, his large, calloused thumb rising to gently wipe away a tear from her cheekbone. “Your sister has already been admitted to the private surgical suite at the Moretti Institute. Her care is secured for life. You will never carry another tray as long as my heart beats.”
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