Chapter 2 - The Empty Penthouse
The Fifth Avenue penthouse smelled of stale lilies and dead air.
Lucian stood in the center of the vast, two-story living room, surrounded by three million dollars' worth of minimalist Italian furniture, polished marble, and contemporary art that had been curated to project cold, untouchable power.
The glass doors leading out to the wraparound terrace were spotted with dried raindrops. Below, Central Park was a gray smear of sodden autumn trees and crawling yellow taxis.
Sitting on the low glass coffee table was an unopened velvet jeweler’s box from Harry Winston. Inside lay a diamond cuff bracelet featuring seventy-two flawless pavé stones—a sixty-thousand-dollar apology he had purchased at the airport boutique in Rome during a forty-minute refueling layover.
Beside the box was a half-empty glass of Macallan 25, untouched for three hours.
Marco Vitale, Lucian’s underboss and the only man alive permitted to speak to him without using a title, stood near the private elevator vestibule with his hands clasped behind his back.
"The movers were there yesterday morning, Boss," Marco said softly, his gravelly voice carrying an edge of profound discomfort. "Before she even went to the hospital. Two private vans under an unmarked commercial license. They took the nursery furniture. They took her personal wardrobes, her grandmother’s silver, and the paintings her father left her."
Lucian didn't turn around. His hands were shoved deep into his trouser pockets, his shoulders rigid.
"Where is she, Marco?"
"Sterling filed the address under a sealed domestic violence protective umbrella with the surrogate court," Marco replied, stepping forward cautiously. "We can't ping her phone. She discarded the company device at the hospital and purchased a private burner registered to an anonymous trust. If we put eyes on her location, Sterling’s team will file an immediate contempt citation with Judge Vance. You’ll be in a holding cell at the Tombs before the sun goes down."
Lucian turned slowly. The shadows beneath his cheekbones were dark, carved by forty-eight hours without sleep, his white dress shirt crumpled at the collar, the top two buttons torn open.
"I don't give a damn about the Tombs, Marco," Lucian rasped. "My son is out there. In this city. Unprotected."
"She isn't unprotected, Lucian," Marco said, his voice dropping into a dangerous, somber tone. "The Rossi family estate in Oyster Bay. The compound her grandfather built during the bootlegging wars. It hasn't been occupied in twelve years, but our surveillance guys caught activity on the perimeter two hours ago."
Lucian’s eyes narrowed into slits. "The Rossi compound? That place was decommissioned after her father died."
"Apparently not," Marco countered. "The external security grid was upgraded three weeks ago. Infrared cameras, reinforced gate hydraulics, and round-the-clock armed perimeter patrols provided by Aegis Defense—the private firm run by former federal marshals. Serena planned this, Lucian. She didn't react to the photo from Sicily. She was preparing for this exit since her seventh month of pregnancy."
The realization hit Lucian like a physical blow to the sternum.
He staggered back half a step, catching the edge of the granite wet bar with his palm.
She knew.
For two months, while he had been flying across the country, managing territorial disputes, meeting capos in back rooms, and treating their marriage like an administrative chore that could be managed with floral deliveries and credit card authorizations, Serena had been quietly, systematically dismantling the cage he had built around her.
She had sat across from him at the breakfast table, pouring his coffee, listening to him complain about port authorities and concrete contracts, while secretly transferring deeds, retaining New York’s deadliest litigator, and hiring private mercenaries to guard his heir.
Before Lucian could speak, the private elevator chimed with a musical chime.
The brushed-steel doors slid open.
Walking out into the foyer, smelling of vintage champagne, gardenia blossoms, and cold arrogance, was Bianca Romano.
She wore an ivory cashmere wrap coat over an emerald silk slip dress, her dark hair swept into an immaculate chignon, her lips painted the color of fresh cherries. She carried a leather portfolio beneath her arm and looked around the vast, empty penthouse with the smug satisfaction of an invading general touring a conquered city.
"Lucian, darling," Bianca purred, crossing the hardwood with her heels clicking sharply against the timber. "Your building security tried to tell me you weren't accepting visitors. I had to remind them that my father owns forty percent of the concrete that holds this tower up."
Lucian did not move. He stood like an iron pillar beside the bar, his eyes fixed on her face with a lethal, terrifying detachment.
Bianca stopped three feet from him, taking in his rumpled shirt, his bloodshot eyes, and the half-empty glass of scotch. Her lips curled into a sympathetic, theatrical pout.
"I heard the news from the hospital," Bianca murmured, reaching out with one manicured hand to touch his lapel. "The girl left you. How utterly predictable. A weak, provincial little thing from Brooklyn was never going to understand the pressures of your position, Lucian. She had a temper tantrum over a harmless photograph and embarrassed you in front of the entire five families."
Lucian looked down at her hand resting against his chest.
He didn't yell. He didn't raise a weapon.
With a movement so fast it seemed almost casual, his left hand shot out, catching Bianca by the throat.
Bianca gasped, her eyes flying wide in shock as his fingers tightened around her windpipe, lifting her onto the tips of her designer heels, driving her back against the glass dining table until the crystal decanters rattled.
"Lucian!" Marco barked, taking half a step forward, his hands raised. "Boss, don't! Her father—"
"Quiet, Marco," Lucian whispered, never taking his eyes off Bianca’s bulging, panicked face.
Bianca’s hands clawed at his wrist, her perfectly painted mouth opening and closing as she fought for oxygen. The ivory coat slipped from her shoulders, pooling on the floor like spilled milk.
"You took that photograph," Lucian whispered into her ear, his breath cold against her cheek. "You hired the freelance photographer to linger near the terrace in Taormina. You tipped off the luxury lifestyle blog thirty minutes before my plane left the tarmac in Rome."
Bianca managed a strangled, wheezing gasp. "S-she... was... nothing... Lucian..."
"She is my wife," Lucian snarled, his fingers digging deeper into the soft flesh of her throat until her skin turned mottled purple. "She carried the blood of the Moretti name inside her body. And you turned her labor into an open wound because you thought you could slide into her seat at my table."
He shoved her backward.
Bianca collapsed onto the leather sofa, clutching her bruised neck, coughing violently, tears of pure, unadulterated terror ruining her foundation.
"Get out of my city, Bianca," Lucian said, turning his back on her, picking up his scotch glass and draining it in a single swallow. "Take your father’s shipping contracts, take your mercenaries, and get back to Chicago before sunrise. Because if I see your face in Manhattan after midnight, I will not call your father. I will send him your head in a refrigerated crate."
Bianca scrambled to her feet, her hands shaking so violently she could barely gather her coat from the floor. She glared at him through her tears, the veneer of aristocratic poise completely stripped away, leaving only the venomous, cornered animal underneath.
"You're a fool, Lucian Moretti!" she shrieked, backing toward the elevator. "She left you! She hates you! She will teach your son to spit on your grave! And when my father takes the Brooklyn docks from you, you will die alone in this empty glass cage!"
The elevator doors closed, cutting off her screeching voice.
The penthouse fell back into silence.
May you like
Lucian stood alone in the center of the vast, echoing room. He looked at the Harry Winston jewelry box on the table, picked it up, and hurled it through the plate-glass window leading to the terrace.
The sound of shattering crystal echoed across Fifth Avenue like a gunshot into the gathering dark.
