Page 5 of Ruthless Silence
The lawyers enter, Anderson and Greco, both sweating despite the air conditioning. They arrange papers nervously, avoiding eye contact with either of us. Smart men. They've heard enough about the Rosetti brothers to know that Marco's command extends to every corner of this city.
"The Moretti representation should arrive within minutes," Anderson says to the table rather than to us.
Marco checks his Rolex. "They'll be precisely on time. The Morettis value punctuality almost as much as they value revenge."
I tap my stylus against the tablet screen, already restless. Ten years since that night in the warehouse. Ten years of silence. And now the last Moretti walks into my cage thinking she knows what kind of monster waits for her.
She has no idea.
At nine exactly, the door opens.
Ana Moretti enters in a simple black dress that she probably bought off a Roman department store rack, not realizing how the severe color makes her skin glow like pearl against onyx. The dress is professional but uninspired, the kind a woman wears when she wants to be taken seriously without being noticed. But on her small frame, with that steel spine and those burning green eyes, she's impossible to ignore. Dark circles lurk beneath carefully applied concealer, her hands show the tremor of someone running on will alone after crossing an ocean. Her shoulders carry tension that speaks of jet lag fought with determination. But her spine stays straight, chin lifted like she's walking to war instead of marriage negotiations.
She's smaller than surveillance suggested. More delicate. It makes the steel in her spine that much more impressive, watching her fight her exhaustion with every step.
Our eyes meet across the conference room, and the world stops.
Christ. The surveillance photos didn't capture this. The way fury makes her eyes burn green fire. I'm supposed to be assessing threat levels, not imagining how that fury would feel underneath me, around me.
Her hands move immediately, the formal signs she must have practiced turning sharp with emotion: "Hello. My name is Ana."
But her eyes say something else entirely. They screammonsterwithout needing signs. The accusation hangs between us, silent to everyone else but deafening to me. My jaw tightens. She came prepared, just as promised.
I sign back, smooth and deliberate: "Welcome to Chicago."
The formality of it seems to catch her off guard. Her fingers twitch like she wants to sign something else, something worse,but she controls herself. The sound of her controlled breathing fills the space between us.
"Interesting," Marco murmurs in Italian beside me. "She came prepared for you, brother."
Marco rises with old-world manners that would make our mother proud. "Miss Moretti. I'm Marco Rosetti."
The way he says our name fills the room, the weight of an empire behind those three syllables. This isn't a man introducing himself. This is Chicago's Don making his presence known.
"Before we begin," Marco continues, his voice carrying absolute authority, "let me be clear about what this marriage represents. It ends a decade of bloodshed between our families. Anyone who disrupts it, from either side, answers to me personally."
I watch Ana process Marco's authority, see her recalculating. Whatever she expected from the Rosetti brothers, it wasn't this level of controlled power. Her fingers drum against her thigh.
"And I am woman of my word, Mr.Rosetti." Her English is textbook formal, learned rather than lived. The accent makes her sound younger than twenty-three, musical and light.
Marco's slight smile could freeze blood. "Don Rosetti. And I know exactly who you are, Miss Moretti. Every debt. Every secret. Every reason you're really here."
Her fingers tremble once before she locks them together. The implied threat lands. Marco knows she's here for revenge, and he's allowing it anyway. The game beneath the game.
Anderson drones through legal terms that make Ana's eyes glaze. She's catching maybe seventy percent of the legal English, fighting through exhaustion and language barriers both. Her eyelids flutter once, twice. The warrior princess is running on fumes, and still she stays upright. Fuck if that doesn't make her more dangerous.
She shifts in her chair, adjusting her position to stay alert.
"I want clause," she interrupts suddenly, her accent thickening with determination. "About… conjugal visits. Cannot be forced."
The room goes silent. Even the lawyers stop shuffling papers.
My fingers tighten on the stylus. Bold of her to demand this, to announce her fear of me so publicly. Or perhaps it's not fear at all. Perhaps she simply wants to control something, anything, in this arrangement. The thought of her in my bed, planning murder while I plan her seduction, makes me adjust my stance.
Marco's voice turns to silk over steel. "We're not animals, Miss Moretti. No one will force you into anything. But the marriage must be… valid."
"An heir within the year," Greco clarifies uncomfortably. "For the contract to remain binding."
Color floods Ana's cheeks, but she doesn't back down despite her exhaustion. "I understand. But not by force."
