Chapter 1 - The Maid Who Interrupted the Wedding
The first gunshot had not even been fired when the maid threw herself across the altar and saved the mafia boss from the man standing beside him.
“Enzo! Arthur is the traitor!”
Isabella Gallagher’s voice tore through the cathedral.
Every head turned.
Lorenzo Bianchi, dressed in a black tuxedo, slowly turned from the altar toward the woman running down the marble aisle. His bride, Camila Russo, stood frozen beneath her lace veil.
Arthur Pendleton did not look surprised.
That was what frightened Isabella most.
For weeks, she had watched the sixty-year-old adviser move through Lorenzo’s household like a man who belonged there. He knew which doors were locked, which guards changed shifts, which servants entered the private rooms, and which conversations Lorenzo considered confidential.
And now Arthur’s hand was disappearing beneath his jacket.
“Shoot him now!” Arthur shouted.
Men disguised as wedding guests stood among the pews.
Black coats opened.
Weapons appeared.
Lorenzo’s expression changed instantly.
“Arthur... what did you do?”
Isabella did not wait for an answer.
She ran.
The first shot cracked through the cathedral.
Camila gasped.
Isabella reached the marble steps and grabbed the front of Lorenzo’s tuxedo.
“I won't let you die!”
She threw all her weight sideways.
Lorenzo stumbled with her.
They crashed behind the stone altar just as another burst of gunfire shattered the silence.
“Isabella—”
“Down!”
Glass from a nearby candle holder exploded across the floor.
For several seconds, neither of them moved.
Then Lorenzo slowly looked at her.
“I told you to believe me,” Isabella whispered.
Lorenzo stared into her frightened but determined eyes.
He had never heard her speak to him that way.
Not as a maid.
Not as an employee.
As someone who had known this was coming.
Across the altar, Arthur was already moving toward a side entrance.
Isabella noticed something lying on the marble step.
A phone.
Black.
Cracked.
And still recording.
She reached for it.
May you like
But before her fingers touched the screen, another gunshot echoed through the cathedral.
And this time, it came from behind them.
