I pulled out my phone and called Angelo.
"Get a security detail to the penthouse. Now."
"Boss?"
"Sienna doesn't leave without at least three men accompanying her. Clear?"
"Yes, boss."
I tried Sienna's number next. No answer. I sent a text:Call me. Urgent.The message delivered, but wasn’t marked read.
The knot in my chest tightened. In our world, silence was rarely innocent.
I studied the photograph again, looking for clues. The angle suggested someone had been waiting in the shadows near our building. The timing implied they'd been watching, waiting for that precise moment.
Planned. Calculated. Personal.
Hours blurred together as I reviewed security footage, looking for faces that appeared too often, eyes that lingered too long. Three cups of coffee later, a pattern began to emerge.
A server named Claudia who always seemed to be working when Sienna and I made public appearances. Who always positioned herselfwithin earshot. Whose shifts corresponded with nights when sensitive meetings took place.
I pulled up her employment file. Twenty-six. No criminal record. Hired three years ago, early in my rebuilding efforts. Recommended by...
The name stopped me cold.
Salvatore Ricci.
The same Calabrese underboss who'd been so interested in my marriage. Who'd insisted on meeting Sienna. Who'd made veiled threats disguised as congratulations.
My mind raced through the implications. Ricci had planted Claudia long before my wedding—before I was even out of prison. This wasn't opportunistic blackmail. This was a calculated, long-term operation targeting both me and the Moretti family.
But why? What did Ricci stand to gain from exposing our arrangement?
I leaned back in my chair, everything clicking into place with chilling clarity. Ricci wasn't after money. He wanted chaos.
If our fake marriage was exposed, the fragile peace between the Romano and Moretti families would shatter. The power vacuum would trigger a bloodbath, and the Calabrese family would be perfectly placed to sweep in and claim territory while we slaughtered each other.
Divide and conquer. The oldest strategy in the book.
But there was more. Ricci had been unusually friendly with Giuseppe Moretti at the last summit meeting. The same uncle who stood to inherit if anything happened to Sienna's father.
The picture darkened further. Not just a war between families, but a coordinated coup—eliminate the heads of both dynasties, install puppets loyal to the Calabrese, and control the entire eastern seaboard.
And Sienna and I were the lynchpins that needed to be removed first.
Ricci had miscalculated. He thought our marriage was our weakness when it might be our salvation. Because now I had a reason to protect the Moretti interests as fiercely as my own.
And he'd made it personal by threatening Sienna.
I reached for my phone when a security alert flashed on my screen. Motion detected in the secondary storeroom—the one we'd converted to a temporary holding cell for Tony. I swiped to bring up the feed, but the screen remained black.
Camera disabled.
My office door burst open without warning.
Dante, one of my most trusted security men, stood in the doorway, breathing hard, eyes wide with alarm.
"Boss, we've got a problem," he said, hand already on his weapon. "Tony's dead."
