Chapter 1 - The Midnight Condemnation
The brass doors of the private elevator sealed shut with a deafening click at twenty minutes to midnight.
Across the marble foyer, a razor-thin beam of light cut across the dark hardwood from beneath Dominic’s study door.
He was on the other side of that heavy oak panel.
My trench coat was inside that room.
My identification, my wedding ring, and the man I had spent three years defending were behind that deadbolt.
I raised my trembling hand and pressed the polished intercom button.
Static hissed through the brass speaker embedded in the wall.
I pressed it a second time, my heart hammering against my ribs.
Dominic’s voice came through the small brass grille, cold as January frost.
"When you remember which family you belong to, Madeline, we will talk."
"Dominic, please open the door and listen to me."
"You have nothing left to say to me."
"Salvatore is moving his men to the docks tonight."
The speaker hummed with empty air for five excruciating seconds.
I could envision him standing beside the mahogany bar, holding a heavy crystal glass of untouched scotch.
He was debating whether a woman he considered a traitor deserved another breath of his time.
"You kept a disposable phone hidden inside our dressing room vanity," Dominic said, each syllable measured and merciless.
"I can explain why it was there."
"You dialed Lorenzo Castiglione three times before dinner."
"Yes, Dominic, because Lorenzo’s men control the access corridors."
"Go to him, then."
"Dominic, wait!"
The intercom line went completely dead with a sharp, electronic snap.
A heartbeat later, the heavy brass deadbolt engaged from within the penthouse.
One hour ago, my life had been whole and intact.
Dominic had walked into the dressing room unannounced, his tailored charcoal suit smelling of damp wool and cigar smoke.
Matteo, his underboss and oldest childhood friend, had remained near the hallway threshold with his eyes fixed on the floor.
I had been sitting at the vanity with the cheap plastic burner phone clutched in my palm.
I was trying to scrub the call log before the clock struck eleven.
Dominic had reached over my shoulder, taken the plastic device from my fingers, and read the Brooklyn area code on the glowing screen.
There was no simple explanation for why the wife of the Moretti syndicate boss was contacting Lorenzo Castiglione.
Lorenzo ruled northern Brooklyn with an iron grip.
The blood feud between the Morettis and the Castigliones was older than the marriage certificate filed in our municipal hall.
To Dominic, holding that phone was the equivalent of holding a loaded weapon to his chest.
Yet the message I had risked everything to send was meant to stop an execution at the Brooklyn Navy Yard before daybreak.
Every second we wasted arguing was another second Salvatore tightened his noose.
"Ask Matteo where the Pier Fourteen transport was relocated," I had pleaded while standing beside our bed.
Dominic had turned his gaze toward his underboss.
"Why would my wife know the location of a tactical transport?"
"Because I was in the library when Salvatore arranged it," I insisted.
Dominic’s jaw had hardened until the tendons in his neck flared.
Salvatore was the uncle who had pulled Dominic out of the wreckage when his father’s car was bombed twenty years ago.
Salvatore was the patriarch who had placed the Moretti signet ring onto Dominic’s finger when he turned twenty-five.
For three months, Dominic had been tearing his inner circle apart trying to locate the mole leaking his supply routes.
Now his wife was standing under the chandelier holding a burner phone with his fiercest rival’s private number glowing on the screen.
He trusted the cold glass in his hand far more than the woman who shared his bed.
The elevator descent was silent and agonizingly smooth.
Forty floors of reinforced concrete fell away beneath my bare feet.
When the elevator opened onto the grand lobby, the night concierge looked up from behind the polished marble desk.
He saw my bare shoulders shivering beneath my silk blouse.
He saw my ruined mascara and the absence of shoes on my feet.
He had the authority to call the penthouse suite.
I watched his hand hover near the black telephone receiver before he pulled it away and looked down at his ledger.
No one in this city crossed Dominic Moretti when his temper flared.
Outside the revolving glass doors, the November gale drove rain against the pavement in blinding sheets.
The wet granite stones of the sidewalk sliced against the arches of my bare feet.
I stopped beneath the hotel awning two doors down, clutching my heels by their thin satin straps.
The icy rain soaked through my trousers within seconds, plastering the thin fabric to my skin.
My handbag, my wallet, and my vehicle keys were forty stories above my head in Dominic’s locked sanctuary.
I had nothing except the clothes on my back and the terrifying knowledge of what was scheduled to happen before dawn.
Salvatore had planned the entire operation down to the caliber of the spent casings.
His private crew would intercept Dominic’s three armored trucks at Pier Fourteen.
They would slaughter Dominic the moment he stepped out to inspect the cargo.
Then Salvatore would lay Lorenzo Castiglione’s signature silver medallions beside the corpses to ignite a citywide war.
My desperate phone call to Lorenzo had been my only desperate gambit to prevent a massacre.
If Lorenzo believed my warning, his scouts might intercede at the docks and save Dominic’s life.
If Lorenzo betrayed me, I had handed our family’s throat to our worst enemy.
The rumble of a heavy engine cut through the roar of the downpour.
A black Cadillac Escalade with tinted windows rolled slowly past the hotel entrance and stopped at the curb.
I pressed my spine against the damp brickwork of a closed boutique.
The passenger window rolled down four inches into the darkness.
"Madeline," a voice called over the rush of the storm.
Lorenzo Castiglione peered through the narrow opening, his dark eyes sharp beneath his soaked trench coat collar.
"Step into the vehicle before Salvatore’s cleanup crew finishes you on the sidewalk."
I tightened my grip on the satin straps of my shoes until my knuckles turned white.
"How do you know where I am?"
"Because the man following you has been across the street since you left the lobby."
I glanced toward the corner pharmacy across the avenue.
Beneath the flicker of a green neon sign, a tall man in a leather jacket folded his umbrella.
He stepped off the curb and began crossing the street directly toward my awning.
I did not wait another second.
I opened the heavy passenger door of the SUV and lunged onto the leather seat.
The door slammed shut with a heavy vacuum seal, cutting off the howl of the wind.
Hot air immediately rushed from the vents across my frozen legs.
I pressed myself against the far door, cradling my wet shoes against my chest like a shield.
May you like
Lorenzo stared through the side mirror as the man in the leather jacket halted on the opposite pavement.
The vehicle accelerated into the Manhattan night, leaving Dominic’s tower lost in the rain.
