Chapter 2

I obediently sat down beside him. Around me, eyes appraised me without shame while teasing laughter filled the air.

"Not bad at all! I haven't seen you in a while, but damn, you must be packing a D cup now!"

Vittorio pulled me close and brought his wine glass to my lips. I drank from his hand. The others around us grew even more boisterous.

"Wow, you really know how to show respect!"

Gaspare swallowed the wine that a beautiful lady beside him had fed him mouth to mouth. Sitting across from us, he smiled at me with satisfaction, like he was silently praising an obedient pet.

I nestled docilely in Vittorio's arms and leaned intimately close to his ear. "The Cutton supplier accepted your terms."

Vittorio blocked my face from view amidst the others' jeering and pretended to kiss me.

"Gaspare's already reached an agreement with the seller. Once he secures control of the East District port, it'll become the distribution channel for their new drugs."

"That's the Romano family's territory. His reach is getting too long."

Vittorio specifically requesting me had been planned from the start.

Three years ago, I attended my first "business dinner" like this. Gaspare made me keep company with a pot-bellied banker. I cried and screamed, fighting him off with everything I had. I smashed a wine bottle over the man's head and nearly killed him.

I held the broken bottle in front of me, wary of everyone in the room. The people on the couches looked completely unsurprised by the scene.

Gaspare spoke unhurriedly, his words sliding out like a serpent's tongue.

"It's just a drink. You don't like it?"

He walked toward me with measured steps and held up his phone. On the screen was a photo of Vera.

She wore the exact same white dress she had on the day she died, surrounded by a crowd forcing alcohol down her throat. Those animals had their hands on her legs, on her chest. Empty bottles littered the ground around her, along with some unknown powder.

Gaspare casually swiped through his phone. "Such a shame. Such a beautiful girl. But accidents happen everywhere, don't they?"

His tone was light, yet those words struck my heart like a hammer.

I stared at him in shock, finally understanding why Vera, who never drank, had been in a state of alcohol poisoning when she died, and why drugs were found in her system when she had always kept herself clean. The autopsy even found residue from five different men inside her body.

I had suspected Gaspare was involved in Vera's death, but I never imagined he could be this monstrous.

Gaspare continued watching me with that same half-smile.

The broken glass cut into my palm. The blood flowing from my hand pulled my crumbling sanity back from the edge.

I dropped the bottle. Gaspare nodded with satisfaction.

"I knew you'd be more sensible than she was."

…

After that day, I stopped resisting. I accepted every arrangement Gaspare made for me.

I was just a fake heiress with a borrowed name in the Toscano family, so trying to take down Gaspare on my own was impossible. I had no power, no resources.

I had to wait until I found evidence of Vera's murder, and until I had a weapon sharp enough to use against him.

Then I would strike and kill him, and make sure he had nothing left.

Gaspare's public identity was that of a young entrepreneur. His ambition was to become the boss who united all the mafia families in Damerelli.

However, his insatiable expansion had violated the ancient rule of non-aggression among the five major families. Vittorio, the Commission's chief arbiter, had already noticed his rule-breaking tendencies.

Therefore, I used an "evidence map" to ally myself with Vittorio.

It revealed the truth hidden behind Gaspare's charitable foundation. It was a silver bullet that could kill him.

The schools established by the Volpe family's charitable foundation were actually procurement fronts for sexual bribery transactions. Among the pieces of evidence I gave Vittorio was a photograph of one recipient's face.

It was the current Don, the Volpe family's greatest shield.

At gatherings after that, Vittorio always specifically requested that I sit beside him. Gaspare took the opportunity to gain many benefits from this arrangement.

My compliant performance at the dinner pleased Gaspare, but the moment we returned home, he backhanded me across the face.

"When did you and Vittorio start the affair? You used to throw a fit over a couple sips of wine, but suddenly you're so obedient when he's around?”

"You two seem awfully familiar for people who have just met."

He pressed a gun to my temple.

I covered my face and laughed softly. "Weren't you the one who offered me to him?"

Gaspare regained his composure quickly. After lowering the gun, he resumed his usual air of refinement, though his gaze remained cold and menacing.

"Don't think I don't know what you're planning! Don't even dream of using him to escape!

"Otherwise, I'll break your legs."

Just like before, Gaspare locked me in the bedroom and confiscated my phone. But this time, I did not just sit there waiting for my fate.

Vittorio's appearance was a signal.

Gaspare wanted to be a successful entrepreneur, so Vittorio and I joined forces to monopolize his source factories. He wanted to stand at the top, so I would ensure that he and his family fell into disgrace.

He monopolized drug distribution across the entire state and yet was still not satisfied. He stretched his hands into other people's territories.

I was not the only one who wanted to devour him piece by piece.

Perhaps because I had always been so docile, Gaspare never bothered posting guards. I tore the bedsheets into strips, tied them together, and climbed down from the second-floor window.