Chapter 3

At eight in the evening a discreet black armored Bentley stopped in the shadow of the cross-harbor bridge.

I opened the door and got into the back seat.

Beside me sat a man in a perfectly cut suit, his head down over a tablet.

The man was Alessandro Moretti, head of the Moretti Group and the Don feared throughout the East Coast.

He was also my older brother.

Not one person in the entire branch knew who I really was. When I graduated from business school, my brother threw me straight into the Port San Vito branch, the most complicated place he had, to toughen me up, and had me start at the bottom under my mother's surname.

"You've decided?" Alessandro asked in a low voice without looking up.

"Decided." I threw the financial statements and the record of Carlo's extortion down hard on the leather seat. "Not only are we moving, we're moving early. The pull-out was scheduled for two months from now. I want all of it done by the end of this month. And I want the mole found. Carlo knew the exact figure on the budget report I had only just signed off on today!"

Alessandro finally set down the tablet and turned to glance at me. A cold, murderous glint flashed in his deep-set eyes.

"Those petty thugs in Port San Vito have been far too comfortable for too long." He pressed the intercom and ordered Victor, his bodyguard and right-hand man, "Find the mole. I want the name of the informant leaking information inside the branch within twelve hours. Then alert the movers and the security team to back Irene's plan."

"Yes, sir," Victor answered in a low voice.

With my brother's approval, the weight finally lifted from my chest.

I was no longer the junior finance manager forced to tiptoe around Carlo. I was the blade of the Moretti family.

It was eleven at night when I got back to the apartment I rented in Port San Vito.

I had just stepped out of the elevator when I saw my apartment door standing wide open. Loud footsteps and strangers' voices came from inside.

In the living room, Carlo's sister Marianna, the landlord listed on my lease, was showing a young couple around my home.

She wore a cheap leopard-print coat and was even holding the imported coffee beans from my coffee table. Spittle flew as she boasted to the couple, "Look at all this natural light! Every piece of furniture and every appliance is top of the line. The current tenant will be gone soon, and for forty-five hundred dollars a month, you can use all of it."

The sight of my ransacked drawers and the couple sprawled across my two-thousand-dollar leather sofa sent a surge of anger straight through me.

"What do you think you're doing?"

Marianna turned. Upon seeing me, she showed not the slightest guilt for breaking into my home; instead, she laughed spitefully.

"Well, if it isn't our illustrious finance director." She waddled toward me with her arms folded. "Carlo says you're getting out of Port San Vito at the end of the month. Since you're leaving, of course I brought prospective tenants over early. Am I supposed to let my apartment sit empty and lose money?"

"My lease has three months left." I held up my key card and pointed at the door. "Take your guests and get out of my home. Now."

Marianna raised her voice as if she had heard the funniest thing in the world. "Your home? Get this straight: it's my apartment. I can come in whenever I want! And don't try to intimidate me with that superior attitude. You're nothing but hired help. Cross the Rossi family, and you won't even make it through the month!"

The couple hurried to their feet and watched me with open curiosity, eager for the spectacle.

I took out my phone and snapped three photos of the ransacked room, the open door, and Marianna's smug expression.

"Why are you taking pictures?!" Marianna lunged for my phone in a panic.

"I'm documenting your unlawful entry." I slipped the phone back into my pocket and turned to the couple. "I should also warn you: I paid for the sofa, television, refrigerator, and even the curtains myself. At the end of the month, movers will strip this place bare. There won't be so much as a lightbulb left. If you want to pay forty-five hundred dollars for an empty concrete shell, be my guest."

The couple's expressions changed at once. The young man coughed awkwardly. "Uh, ma'am, didn't you say the furniture came with the apartment? We wouldn't rent an empty place even for two thousand dollars. We'll be going."

With that, the couple fled the apartment.

"You little bitch! How dare you ruin my deal?!" Trembling with rage, Marianna jabbed a finger at my face and cursed. "Just wait! If I don't keep every cent of your deposit, my name isn't Rossi!"

"I'll be waiting." I stepped forward and slammed the front door in her face.

Marianna's curses continued outside the door.

Keep my deposit?

We would see whether the Rossis lived long enough to spend it.