Crescent Star
The night Victor Ferrante, heir to the Ferrante family, brought the management agreement to our house, he didn't speak to my father first. Instead, he smiled at me, over in the corner.
"Don Romano, how nice of you to let your idiot daughter stay and witness this."
I was the youngest daughter of the Romano family, and the most famous good-for-nothing in the mafia world.
I'd been slow ever since I was a kid. You had to call my name three times before I'd look up.
My brother, Adrian Romano, took over the casino at 18. My sister, Valeria Romano, was running our family's foundation by 20.
I couldn't even remember what the different-colored poker chips were worth.
My father tried every doctor and priest he could find. After more than a decade, the whole family finally accepted that I would never get better.
But it wasn't that I couldn't speak. I didn't want to.
In my last life, I reviewed contracts for crime families. Trusts, inheritance, management agreements. I'd seen plenty of takeovers dressed up to look respectable.
In this life, I just wanted to stay quiet.
Until tonight. Our seat on the Committee had been frozen, our casino license suspended. All our banks had pulled their support at once. My brother couldn't find a way out, and Lorenzo Bassi, the advisor we'd trusted for ten years, had already been bought off.
He urged my father to sign, playing the loyal advisor. "Don, sign it. At least the Romano family will still have a seat on the Committee tomorrow."
My father picked up the pen with a shaking hand.
I couldn't stand listening anymore. I was done pretending.
As my family stared in shock, I walked over and turned to page three. "The main agreement says this is temporary. But the attachment gives the Ferrante family a way to take our seat for good. Sign this, and we'll never get it back."
I looked at Lorenzo.
"How much did the Ferrante family pay you to put a takeover agreement in front of my father?"