On the day of my baby sister's christening, our father carried her out himself to fetch the wine for the table, and on the road they were caught in a chain of cars that folded into one another like crushed tin.

If they had only reached help in time, both of them would have lived.

But my mother, a woman who could buy the loyalty of half the city, pulled away every man who might have saved them. All because her first love had complained that the smell of blood turned his stomach, and she wanted the doctors tending the scrape on his hand instead, a cut less than an inch long.

That night, my father lay outside the emergency corridor with my month-old sister in his arms, waiting from dusk into the dead of night.

My sister's cries grew weaker and weaker. My father begged everyone who passed, and still no help came.

In the end, the two of them died right there, inside the place that was meant to save them.

And I, by a scheme my own mother and her first love put together, was thrown out of the house like something the famiglia was ashamed to claim.

Twenty years later.

I was no longer that helpless little girl.

With the quiet protection my father's sworn brother had given me over the years, and a drive that nearly cost me my own life, I clawed my way to the top of this city's underworld, step by step, until I sat at the head of the Greco Syndicate, an empire worth tens of billions behind its clean and legitimate fronts.

On the day we weighed which of our young associates had earned the right to be brought in close, my consigliere set the files of five of them in front of me.

He opened to the first page, admiration plain in his voice.

"Don Greco, this young one, Marco Rossi, is exceptionally capable. His numbers have stayed near the top, and every capo who watched him scored him close to perfect."

I turned through his file without much thought.

When my eyes landed on the line listing his blood, my hand went still.

Two names were written there.

Two names I will never forget as long as I live.

For a moment the air in the room seemed to freeze.

After a long while, I closed the file and spoke flatly.

"Bring all five of them in."

Soon the five filed into the back room of the social club, one by one.

The pacts went out, one after another, each one binding a man to the Family for life.

Some could hardly contain themselves. Others only looked relieved, the way men do when they realize they will live to see another season.

Until the last one.

I lifted my head and looked at Marco Rossi, standing at the very end.

His expression was easy, even faintly amused, the look of a man who already counted himself among the names on that list.

In the next second, I slid the paper in my hand across the table to him.

It was no pact.

It was a casting out.

Meeting his suddenly rigid stare, I spoke slowly.

"Marco Rossi."

"You don't make the cut."

……

The room went silent at once.

The other four, the fresh oaths still warm in their hands, glanced at one another, none of them daring to make a sound. A glass was set down somewhere too carefully, and the small sound of it filled the room.

Every eye turned to Marco Rossi.

Even my consigliere, at my shoulder, was caught off guard. He clearly hadn't expected this. His mouth opened, then closed, and in the end he only murmured a quiet reminder.

"Don Greco……"

I went on as if I hadn't heard a word, simply watching the young man before me, calm.

I had to admit, he looked a great deal like his father.

The same striking face, the same sharp mind, the same superiority bred into the bone.

As if no matter what room he walked into, it was only natural that everything in it should turn toward him.

But Marco Rossi did not lose his composure the way the others expected.

The first shock stayed on his face for only a heartbeat before he gathered himself again.

He calmly opened the folder he carried and laid out paper after paper, neatly, across the table.

"Don Greco, I've run with this Family for three months and handled four matters that mattered. Two of them I closed entirely on my own."

"In that time, every man I was sent to bring in stayed loyal. I scored top marks in two reviews running, and I've stood first among all the young ones brought up alongside me."

His voice was steady and clear, without a trace of panic.

"Whether you measure by skill, by results, or by the whole of it, I'm the man who best meets the standard to be made."

He paused there, and looked straight at me.

"So I'd like to know why."

"If you mean to cast me out, you owe me a reasonable explanation."

There was no anger in those eyes, no wounded grievance.

Only the restraint and bafflement of a man who believes he's been wronged.

It was the kind of confidence only someone raised on favor could carry.

Men who have never been thrown down hard by the world always believe the code is fair.

I leaned back in my chair and watched him in silence for a few seconds.

Then I spoke, mildly.

"There is no reason."

The air seemed to freeze again.

Marco Rossi was visibly stunned.

I went on.

"This is my Family."

"Who I keep close and who I send away, I don't owe an explanation to anyone."

As the words fell, the calm on Marco Rossi's face finally cracked.

He stared at me, slowly tightening his grip on the folder. He laughed then, a beat too early, the sound looking for someone to join it and finding no one.

After a long moment, that cold laugh faded on its own.

"Don Greco."

"This is a man being buried for no cause."

His tone had gone fully cold.

"And if word of it gets put on the street, I don't imagine it'll do much for the Greco name."

I laughed at that.

But there was no warmth in it.

"I'm not burying you."

I raised my eyes to meet his and said it slowly, one word at a time.

"If you feel you've been marked, perhaps you should look at yourself first."

"A man who's truly worth something is never in a hurry to lay his failures at another man's feet."

"Only the man with something to hide rushes to find excuses for himself."

The instant the words landed, Marco Rossi's face went completely dark.

He had finally been provoked.

Just then my consigliere stepped quickly to my side, bent low, and dropped his voice.

"Don Greco, might you reconsider?"

"The young one's work these three months really has been something, and the inner circle has looked into his blood as well."

He paused, and his voice fell lower still.

"His mother…… is Vittoria Rossi. The Donna of the Rossi Family."

"We've got more than one arrangement standing between us and the Rossis right now. If we cast him out at this hour, I'm afraid it could stir up trouble we don't need……"

"Vittoria Rossi."

I lifted a hand to cut my consigliere off, my eyes settling on Marco Rossi's face.

"She's your mother, isn't she?"

Marco blinked, caught off guard, then the corner of his mouth lifted and his chin tilted up a few degrees.

He looked like a man who'd finally laid down his trump card.

"So the Don knows my mother."

He spoke slowly, unhurried, and made no effort to hide the superiority in his tone.

"In that case, you should understand. With the Rossi name and everything the Family commands in this city, a made man like me under your roof could open doors. There could well be arrangements between the two houses down the line."

He said it with perfect composure, completely sure of himself.

As if all it took was the Rossi blood in his veins and I'd reconsider.

After all, for all that the Rossi Family had slipped from its glory days, it was still a name men lowered their voices around.

A pity.

He had the wrong man.

I didn't even raise my eyes.

"No need."

The smile froze on Marco's face.

I pushed the cast-out papers across the table to him.

"I have no interest in arrangements with the Rossis."

"Now. You can go."

After a brief dead silence, Marco's expression finally cracked completely.

He'd grown up the favored son, fussed over his whole life like the moon among stars.

At every table, in every back room, one mention of the Rossi name and men gave him his due.

It had never once occurred to him that he could be shamed like this in front of others.

"Fine."

He stared me down, the fury barely held in behind his eyes.

He snatched the papers off the table and let out a cold laugh, a beat too soon, before anyone could match it.

"Don Greco. I hope you remember today."

"Because someday, you'd better not regret it."

With that he turned and slammed the door behind him.

The other four young associates I waved out as well.

The room fell quiet again.

But my consigliere stayed where he was, his face tight with worry.

"Don Greco, why on earth would you do that?"

"The Rossis have been on the decline these past years, sure, but a starving wolf still has teeth. You just cast their heir out in front of everyone. If it sours something we might need from them later—"

"Are you finished?"

My voice wasn't loud, but it dropped the temperature in the room.

He shut his mouth at once.

"Pull copies of every job that boy touched while he was under us."

"Bring them to my office."

"Yes, Don."

That afternoon.

My consigliere had barely set the files down when the office door was shoved open from the outside.

A bang.

Even the frame shuddered.

I lifted my head slowly.

A middle-aged man strode in.

Bespoke suit, a watch worth more than most men earn in their lives, every inch of him reeking of a pampered life.

He tossed a Maybach fob onto the desk with a careless flick, and it landed with a sharp clink. He smoothed his lapel as he did it, rings catching the light, as if terrified anyone might fail to notice what he was worth.

I looked at that face, and my eyes darkened.

Salvatore Bianchi.

Twenty years gone.

The man was thriving.

And I would never forget.

That night, twenty years ago.

My sister had cried until she had no voice left, and my father was on his knees outside that locked room, begging the men who could have saved them to come back.

And this man, with one light, throwaway sentence, drove me out of that house.

"So you're the one running the Greco outfit?"

Salvatore sank back into the sofa and crossed one leg over the other.

His tone looked down on me from on high.

"Who gave you the nerve to cast out my son?"

I didn't answer.

I unhurriedly lifted the bottle and poured a measure of dark wine into my glass.

The silence stretched between us.

I looked at him, and suddenly I smiled.

"Signor Bianchi still has quite the lungs on him."

"Looks like the years have treated you well."

Salvatore paused, thrown.

His eyes moved over my face, back and forth.

For a good dozen seconds.

In the end he still didn't know me.

Of course not.

I'd been six years old the year he threw me out of that house.

Twenty years had passed.

Who would connect the Don of a Family worth more than this city could count with that thin, wretched little boy.

"Since you know who I am, this is simple."

Salvatore settled back, his manner turning even more arrogant.

"Marco is my son."

"Him coming to stand under your name was a favor to you."

"With what he is, sitting at the bottom of your house is beneath him."

"Here's what you'll do. You make him a capo. You give him men."

He said it like it was the most natural thing in the world.

As if a seat at the table were nothing but a word from his mouth.

I lifted the glass and took a light sip.

Then I raised my eyes to him.

"Is he worthy of it?"

The air went still in an instant.

The expression on Salvatore's face seized up.

"What did you say?"

I set the glass back on the desk.

My gaze was calm, without the slightest ripple.

"I said."

"He isn't worthy."

The word landed like a hammer on stone.

Salvatore shot to his feet.

His face went ashen in a heartbeat.

"Listen here, Greco!"

"Don't throw away a gift when it's handed to you!"

"My son lowering himself to stand in your house is him thinking highly of you!"

"Do you have any idea how many alliances the Rossi name still buys every year? How many men line up just to sit near our table?"

I leaned slowly back into my chair.

Watching him rage and storm.

And suddenly I found it laughable.

Twenty years ago.

He stood on high just like this.

A single word from him decided whether others lived or died.

I only wondered, this time.

When he learned who the man across the desk from him truly was.

Whether he'd still be able to keep up all this swagger.

"One word from my wife, and your Family would have enough soldiers and contracts behind it to set you up for the rest of your life!"

Salvatore Bianchi said it like it was settled fact.

As if a handout from the Rossis was a blessing the whole city should be on its knees begging for.

I watched his face, twisted with rage, and for a moment something blurred in me.

Twenty years ago.

When he forced my father out of his place, had he worn this same look, this same lofty contempt?

Had he believed back then, too, that one word from him could decide another man's fate?

The thought made me smile.

"Sorry."

"A pact with the Rossis is beneath me."

I pressed the intercom on my desk.

"Send my men up."

In under a minute, two enforcers stepped through the door, quiet as held breath.

That was when Salvatore's face finally changed.

He'd probably never imagined that, with the standing he carried now, anyone would dare throw him out in front of witnesses.

"You'd dare lay a hand on me?!"

"Do you know who I am?"

But no one in that room gave his shouting a second of weight.

The two soldiers took him by the arms, one on each side, and hauled him up.

Just then, the office door slammed open again.

A girl in her early twenties came charging in, all fire and fury.

She wore designer silk and heels worth more than a soldier's year, her face full of anger.

The second she crossed the threshold, she jabbed a finger at me and started cursing.

"Who do you think you are?"

"You'd put your hands on my father?"

"You think I'm bluffing when I tell you one word from my mother shuts this whole operation down by tomorrow?"

I lifted my head.

My gaze settled on her face.

And the next second, I froze.

The girl was very pretty.

There was a strong resemblance to Salvatore around the eyes and brows.

But for some reason, looking at how young and alive she was, another image rose in my mind.

A rainy night, twenty years ago.

The lights outside the sickroom, a sickly, glaring white where the help should have come and never did.

My father kneeling in the corridor, holding my sister, only a month old.

Her cries growing weaker and weaker.

And me, watching them taken from us with nothing I could do.

If my sister had lived.

She'd be about this age now.

Something tightened in my throat.

"She's your daughter?"

When the words came out, even I could hear the faint tremor I couldn't quite hide.

Salvatore lifted his chin at once. He smoothed his lapel, his rings catching the light.

His whole expression was a boast.

"Of course."

"Gianna Rossi. The only daughter Vittoria and I have."

The only daughter.

Those four words drove into my heart like a thorn.

I found myself smiling.

A cold smile.

A bitter one.

So the three of them had lived all these years that happy.

While my father and my sister stayed frozen forever in that rainy night.

"Good for you."

I rose slowly to my feet.

My eyes stayed on Gianna's face.

"Go back and tell your mother."

"I'd like to see exactly how she plans to deal with me."

Father and daughter still had more to say, but the soldiers had already dragged them out.

The office went quiet again.

I sat back down.

I picked up the glass on my desk, the water long gone cold, and drank it all in one go.

The icy liquid slid down my throat.

But it couldn't hold down what was churning in my chest.

I knew it well enough.

Everything that had happened today was only the beginning.

The account still to come.

I would settle it with them, one item at a time.

After a long silence, I buzzed the intercom.

"Come in for a moment."

My consigliere pushed the door open soon after.

"Don Greco."

"I need you to look into someone."

I handed over the file on my desk.

"Gianna Rossi."

"Everything since childhood. Her history, where she was schooled, who she runs with, where she's placed now. Get me all of it."

"The more detail, the better."

"Understood."

In under two hours, a complete dossier sat on my desk.

Gianna Rossi.

Twenty-one.

A senior in the journalism program at a top university.

Currently placed at the city television station.

The station that ran the city's airwaves?

My finger paused for a moment at those words.

After a long silence, I still picked up my phone and dialed the familiar number.

She answered almost instantly.

"Dominic?"

A woman's gentle voice came through the receiver.

"Why are you calling me so early today? Didn't you say you were buried in the Family's books, sorting who stays and who goes?"

Hearing Isabella Conti's voice, I suddenly hesitated.

She was my woman.

And the one who controlled the city's channels and the staging of every public sit-down, unaligned and respected by all sides.

For years, I'd deliberately kept the past buried.

Because I didn't want her to know those filthy, ugly things that had happened.

But now.

She was the only one who could help me.

"Is there a girl placed at your station named Gianna Rossi?"

There was a pause on the other end.

"There is."

"Word on the street says she's Rossi blood. Plenty of muscle standing behind her."

"Why the sudden interest in her?"

I was silent for a few seconds.

In the end I spoke.

"I don't want to see her around."

"Can you have her cast out?"

The line went quiet.

Isabella knew me too well.

She knew I never moved against anyone without a reason.

"Dominic."

Her voice turned more serious.

"What's really going on?"

I looked out the window at the sky going dark over the territory.

A long while passed before I said it softly.

"It's nothing."

"I just don't like that Rossi family."

The other end was silent for a few seconds.

She didn't push.

She didn't doubt me either.

She just answered, clean and simple.

"Okay."

"Leave it to me."

In that moment, a warmth rose in my chest.

All these years.

No matter what happened, she always stood on my side without holding anything back.

"Don't leave when you're done tonight."

I said it low.

"I'll come for you."

Evening.

I drove to the foot of the television station building, two of my soldiers trailing in the car behind.

The car had barely stopped when I heard a shrill argument not far off.

I looked up.

At the station entrance, two of the house men were holding Gianna back.

She was red in the face with anger, her voice nearly carrying across half the street. She tossed her hair and tipped her chin a fraction higher.

"On what grounds are you throwing me out?"

"So I cursed a few people out, big deal!"

"Let me tell you. My mother is Vittoria Rossi!"

"Cross me, and you cross the whole Rossi Family!"

She kept up the cursing, struggling to push her way back inside.

Beside her stood a man somewhere around thirty.

His face was all helplessness, cold sweat nearly beading on his forehead, and still he kept trying to talk her down.