Chapter 8 - The Unraveling of a Traitor
"No! No, wait! This is a setup!" Isabella shrieked, backing away until her spine hit the grand staircase banister. "Someone planted it to frame me! The maid must have done it! She works for another syndicate!"
"My maid doesn't have access to military-grade demolition charges, Isabella," Damiano said, his voice dropping into a register that made the hair on the back of everyone's neck stand up. "Nor does she have ties to the Russian black-market brokers who distribute that specific firing pin."
Damiano took a slow step toward her. Isabella looked around wildly, but none of her usual bodyguards moved an inch. They were Moretti men first, and they knew treason when they saw it.
"Marco," Damiano said, not breaking eye contact with his trembling fiancée. "Check her evening clutch."
"Don't touch my things!" Isabella screamed, thrashing like a wild animal as two guards grabbed her slender wrists and pinned her against the mahogany rail.
Marco snatched the beaded champagne purse from her grip and dumped its contents onto a silver side table. Out spilled lipstick, a compact mirror, and a secondary encrypted burner phone.
Marco plugged the burner phone into a portable decryption tablet. Within five seconds, the screen flashed bright blue, displaying incoming text messages received less than forty minutes ago.
Marco read the screen aloud for the entire room to hear:
*'Device primed under Moretti's chair. Romano strike team waiting two miles out. Once the blast clears the dons, we move in and take the docks.'*
The silence that followed was suffocating.
Isabella’s glamorous facade completely shattered. The high-society poise, the royal arrogance, the sweet smiles—it all dissolved into raw, ugly panic.
"Damiano, please!" she wept, tears cutting black streaks through her expensive makeup. "My father forced me! He told me he'd kill me if I didn't help them! You know I love you! Please, don't do this to me!"
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👉 *Damiano looked down at her with a look of pure disgust, then turned his gaze back to the terrified maid on the floor.*
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