Chapter 2
David laughed again.
Louder this time.
Too loud.
“You're listening to a child describe a deer.”
He looked around the room as though everyone else were foolish.
“Is this what DeLuca power has become?”
Margaret crossed her arms.
“A frightened little girl says ‘white deer’ and suddenly you all forget how to think.”
Her eyes moved toward Emma.
The contempt in them was open now.
“Maybe if Sarah spent less time teaching the child to spy through doors, she’d learn some manners.”
Sarah’s face tightened.
Vittorio heard Emma inhale.
That was enough.
He looked toward Margaret.
“Speak to her like that again.”
Margaret raised one eyebrow.
“And what?”
Her voice remained perfectly calm.
“You'll slap a sixty-three-year-old woman twice in the same evening?”
She adjusted one sleeve.
“What a powerful man.”
Vittorio did not move.
Margaret’s smile slowly faded under the silence.
Then Vittorio handed the key to his security chief.
“West hall.”
David stepped forward.
“No.”
Vittorio looked at him.
David’s shoulders squared.
“That side of the house belongs to the Mercer family while we’re staying here.”
Vittorio almost smiled.
“My house.”
David’s jaw flexed.
“My marriage.”
Vittorio’s eyes turned colder.
“My daughter.”
David’s voice dropped.
“She chose me.”
Sarah looked at him.
“You stopped letting me choose anything six months ago.”
That landed harder than a shout.
David’s fingers curled.
Sarah continued.
“You chose who I saw.”
A pause.
“When I could leave.”
Her eyes moved toward Margaret.
“What I was allowed to tell my daughter.”
Margaret laughed softly.
“You needed structure.”
Sarah stared at her.
Margaret stepped closer.
“You came into our family with bodyguards, private cars, a father who solved every discomfort before you ever learned how to survive one.”
Her smile became cruel.
“My son tried to make you useful.”
Sarah’s eyes filled.
“And you called it abuse because nobody brought you tea afterward.”
One of the capos looked away in disgust.
Margaret noticed.
Her chin lifted higher.
“Don't look so shocked.”
She pointed toward Sarah.
“She married a capo.”
Then toward Vittorio.
“Not a nursery teacher.”
Vittorio said nothing.
The security chief returned.
The silver key opened the west-hall room.
Inside was no bedroom.
No office.
A private sitting room had been stripped almost bare.
One table.
Two chairs.
A locked wooden cabinet.
A radio receiver.
And a white stag medallion hanging from the lamp.
David’s face did not change.
But his breathing did.
Vittorio watched him.
“Who meets you there?”
David smirked.
“Perhaps I like deer.”
Vittorio’s eyes narrowed.
The security chief continued.
“There’s more.”
He held something behind his back.
Then placed it on the table.
Emma’s pink overnight bag.
Sarah stared at it.
“That was in her closet.”
Vittorio slowly looked at David.
The bag had been packed.
Child’s pajamas.
A cardigan.
Medicine.
Her stuffed rabbit.
Three days of clothes.
Sarah’s face drained.
“I didn't pack that.”
Margaret shrugged.
“Children stay with grandparents all the time.”
Sarah turned toward her.
“You packed my daughter?”
Margaret’s expression remained haughty.
“Somebody had to plan for the possibility that you’d become unreasonable.”
Sarah’s breath broke.
Vittorio looked at Margaret.
“Where was Emma going?”
She smiled.
“You're asking the wrong person.”
The security chief lifted another item from the bag.
A black scarf.
White stag embroidered at one corner.
David’s eyes moved toward it.
Vittorio saw.
“Tomorrow.”
His voice remained low.
“Where?”
David’s smile returned.
“You really think I’m going to answer because you punched me once?”
He stepped closer despite the bodyguards.
“You're old, Vittorio.”
His voice became deliberately insulting.
“Everybody in this room knows it.”
The capos went silent.
David continued.
“You've spent thirty years making people afraid to interrupt you.”
His mouth curved.
“Now you're mistaking silence for loyalty.”
Vittorio did not flinch.
David’s confidence grew.
“Tomorrow comes whether you understand it or not.”
Sarah stared at her husband.
Then at the packed bag.
“What happens tomorrow?”
David looked at her.
His face softened into something crueler than anger.
“You should've stayed out of my room.”
Sarah’s hands curled.
Then Margaret said:
“Don't worry, sweetheart.”
Her tone dripped with mock sympathy.
“Emma was never the important one.”
Sarah froze.
Vittorio’s head turned.
Margaret smiled at the confusion.
And finished:
“She was only the reason you would follow.”
May you like
The child’s bag was bait.
Sarah was the person they intended to move.
