Chapter 10 - FOREVER YOURS
Isabella looked almost exactly as Dante remembered her.
Elegant black coat.
Perfectly styled dark hair.
A diamond necklace resting against her throat.
But her smile had changed.
It no longer carried affection.
It carried victory.
“Hello, Dante.”
He raised his weapon.
“Put your hands where I can see them.”
Isabella laughed.
“Still giving orders. Some things never change.”
Two armed men entered behind her.
Marco's team immediately moved into position.
“Don't do anything stupid,” Dante warned.
Isabella glanced at Sophia.
“So this is the woman who caused all the trouble.”
Sophia remained beside Daniel.
“Who are you?”
“Someone who knew Dante long before he started collecting broken people.”
Dante's expression hardened.
“Why are you here?”
“To finish what my father started.”
Alessandro stepped forward.
“Victor Russo was your father?”
Isabella smiled.
“Now you're catching up.”
The truth came out quickly.
Victor Russo had built the illegal shipping operation decades earlier. Salvatore had managed it, Richard Hale had concealed the financial records, and Isabella had been responsible for monitoring the family's movements.
She had been engaged to Dante not because she loved him, but because marrying him would have given her access to the family's executive accounts.
When Dante discovered irregularities in the shipping company, she had helped Victor arrange the plan to remove him.
Daniel had been an unexpected complication.
The crash was supposed to kill both Daniel and the evidence.
But Daniel survived.
And Victoria, terrified that her son would become the next target, had helped conceal the truth.
“Where is Salvatore?” Dante asked.
Isabella shrugged.
“Gone.”
“Where?”
“Far away.”
“Then you'll tell me.”
She smiled.
“You're still thinking this is about finding one man.”
She glanced toward Alessandro.
“Your father knew. Your mother knew. Your uncle knew. Everyone knew.”
Sophia spoke quietly.
“Except the people whose lives you destroyed.”
Isabella turned toward her.
“Don't pretend you're innocent. Your husband was digging into things he didn't understand.”
“He was trying to protect people.”
“He was trying to become a hero.”
Daniel stepped forward.
“And you were trying to become rich.”
Isabella's smile disappeared.
She raised her weapon.
Dante moved.
The shot struck the wooden pew beside him.
Marco's men rushed the two guards.
Within seconds, the chapel became a blur of movement.
Dante tackled Isabella to the floor and knocked the gun from her hand.
She struggled, scratching his face.
“You should have married me!”
“You should have left my family alone.”
He restrained her until Marco secured her hands.
The remaining guards surrendered.
Outside, police sirens approached.
Dante had already sent the recovered evidence to federal investigators through an attorney who had no connection to the Moretti organization.
The files included the shipping records, forged authorizations, financial transfers, and recordings recovered from Daniel's phone.
For the first time, the people responsible would face consequences beyond family threats and private arrangements.
But the victory came with a price.
Alessandro agreed to cooperate with investigators.
Victoria, after recovering from surgery, did the same.
Dante surrendered several businesses connected to the illegal operation and began restructuring the legitimate companies.
He knew the process would be ugly.
He knew some people would call him weak.
He no longer cared.
Three weeks later, Sophia gave birth to a healthy baby boy.
Daniel stood beside her in the hospital room, crying openly as he held their son.
“What should we name him?” he whispered.
Sophia smiled.
“Michael.”
Daniel kissed the baby's forehead.
“Michael Bennett.”
Dante visited that afternoon.
He stood awkwardly near the doorway, holding a small silver gift box.
Sophia laughed.
“You look more nervous than you did at the warehouse.”
“I've negotiated with men who had armies.”
“And?”
“This is harder.”
He handed her the box.
Inside was a tiny silver bracelet engraved with the words:
You are safe. You are loved.
Sophia looked up.
“Thank you.”
Dante glanced at Daniel.
“I owe both of you an apology.”
Daniel raised an eyebrow.
“For what?”
“For allowing things to happen in my house that should never have happened. For believing that protecting my family meant controlling everyone around me.”
Sophia gently adjusted the baby blanket.
“You can't change what happened.”
“No,” Dante said. “But I can change what happens next.”
He had arranged for Sophia and Daniel to receive a new home, completely separate from the Moretti estate.
There were no obligations.
No conditions.
No employment contracts.
Just a place where they could raise their son without fear.
Daniel initially refused.
Dante insisted.
“Consider it a debt. One I can never fully repay.”
For the first time, Daniel accepted.
Meanwhile, Victoria sent Sophia a handwritten letter.
It was short.
I cannot ask you to forgive me. I know what I did, and I know that saying I was afraid does not make it acceptable. I hope one day my grandson will know that I loved him, even when I failed to protect his mother.
Sophia folded the letter.
She wasn't ready to forgive Victoria.
Perhaps she never would be.
But she decided not to let hatred become another inheritance passed to her child.
Six weeks later, the Moretti estate was quieter.
Dante stood in the garden where Sophia had nearly lost her baby.
The hole had been filled.
The earth had settled.
A small stone bench stood beside the rose bushes.
He had ordered the area restored, but he refused to let anyone plant flowers over the exact spot where the metal box had been found.
Some things deserved to remain visible.
Marco approached.
“Boss.”
Dante turned.
“What is it?”
“The investigators recovered the last files from Daniel's phone.”
“And?”
“They found a second audio recording.”
Dante frowned.
“I thought the forensic team recovered everything.”
“They thought so too. This one was hidden in a corrupted folder.”
Marco handed him a tablet.
Dante pressed play.
At first, there was only static.
Then Alessandro's voice emerged.
“If you're hearing this, then I never made it back.”
A pause.
“I need you to understand something. Salvatore wasn't the one who ordered my disappearance. He was following instructions.”
Dante stopped breathing.
The recording continued.
“The person who gave him those instructions was someone I trusted more than anyone else. Someone who helped raise my son. Someone who knew every secret in this family.”
A second voice appeared.
A woman's voice.
Dante recognized it immediately.
Victoria.
But the words she spoke made his blood run cold.
“Then we have to make sure Dante never learns that the child wasn't Daniel's.”
The recording ended.
Dante stood completely still.
He replayed it.
Once.
Twice.
Then a third time.
The child wasn't Daniel's?
He looked toward the house.
Toward the garden.
Toward the life he thought he finally understood.
His phone vibrated.
An unknown number.
One message.
If you want the truth about Michael Bennett, come alone.
A second message followed.
It contained a photograph.
A hospital document.
The father's name had been blacked out.
But beneath it was a handwritten note.
Ask Alessandro who was in the delivery room six months before Daniel's accident.
Dante slowly lowered the phone.
For the first time in years, he felt the ground shifting beneath his feet.
He had exposed the traitors.
He had saved Daniel.
He had helped Sophia begin a new life.
But someone had just opened another grave.
And this time, the secret buried inside it belonged to a child.
Dante looked toward the dark garden.
May you like
Then he whispered:
“Who is Michael's real father?”
