Chapter 8 - The Desperate Trap
The pieces of the conspiracy came together with nauseating clarity inside the secured bunker beneath the Moretti estate.
Salvatore Moretti, furious that a street girl’s unborn child would usurp his branch of the family from inheriting the syndicate, had reached out to the one man in Chicago who hated me more than anyone: Nathan Cross.
Nathan, completely ruined financially and facing decades in federal prison after his company’s collapse, had become utterly deranged. Salvatore offered Nathan five million dollars and a private jet out of the country if Nathan used his remaining logistics contacts to track my movements and coordinate the ambush. Nathan’s plan wasn't just to kill Adrian; he wanted me captured, stripped of the Moretti heir, and discarded into the lake so he could claim his twisted revenge.
“Nathan is hiding in an abandoned container yard at the Port of Chicago,” Marco reported, slamming a dossier onto the table. “Salvatore gave him twenty men to hold down the sector until a cargo ship leaves for South America at midnight. Salvatore is currently at his private villa in Lake Forest, preparing to declare himself Don once he receives confirmation of your death.”
Adrian sat in a leather armchair under the dim fluorescent lights of the war room, having just been patched up by Dr. Lauren. A long cut across his temple was closed with butterfly stitches, but his face was an unreadable mask of absolute, merciless death.
I stood beside him, wearing an oversized black wool sweater and leggings, my hand resting on his shoulder. I was no longer the frightened girl from the dairy aisle. Seeing Adrian fight for my life, seeing the lengths these monsters would go to slaughter my unborn child, had ignited a fierce, protective fire within me.
“Adrian,” I said, my voice steady, cutting through the silence of the room.
Adrian looked up at me, reaching out to cover my hand with his. “You stay here, Claire. This bunker is impenetrable. Marco will stay with you with twenty guards. I am going to end this tonight.”
“No,” I replied firmly.
Adrian’s brow furrowed. “Claire, this is not a negotiation—”
“Nathan did this because of me,” I said, looking him dead in the eye. “He humiliated me, he tried to starve me, and now he tried to murder our son. Salvatore wants to steal your throne. If you leave me in a bunker while you go to war, the syndicate will say the Don’s woman hides in fear.”
Adrian stared at me, stunned. The men in the room went dead silent.
“I am carrying the future of this family,” I continued, my voice ringing with an authority I hadn’t known I possessed. “I want Nathan Cross to look into my eyes when his world finally ends. I want him to know that the woman he called worthless is the one who sealed his grave.”
A slow, terrifying, and deeply proud smile spread across Adrian’s bruised face. His dark eyes flared with an intense, burning passion.
He stood up, towering over me, and cupped my jaw. “God help anyone who ever crosses you, my queen.”
May you like
He turned to his soldiers, his voice snapping like a whip. “Prep the convoy. Full tactical gear. We take the port first. Then, we pay my uncle a visit.”
***
