Chapter 7 - The Trial at the Table
Lorenzo stayed frozen on his knee, his father's rough hand against his cheek. For five years, he had believed his father was an empty shell—a tragic casualty kept alive only by machinery and high-priced care. The realization that his father had been fully conscious, watching, feeling, and suffering in silence, struck Lorenzo like a hollow-point bullet to the chest.
When Lorenzo stood up, the vulnerability vanished. What replaced it was a cold, terrifying fury that made even his hardened bodyguards shift uncomfortably.
"Lock the doors," Lorenzo commanded quietly.
Vito, his chief of security, immediately moved to the massive oak doors of the dining hall, turning the heavy iron deadbolts. The sharp clack of the locks sounded like the closing of a tomb.
"Nobody enters. Nobody leaves," Lorenzo said, turning slowly toward the staff lined up against the wall.
Mrs. Gable was still on her knees, her hands clasped against her chest as if in prayer. Her carefully maintained composure was completely destroyed. "Mr. Moretti, listen to me! Your father suffered extensive neurological trauma! The doctors told us he would have hallucinations! He doesn't know what he's saying!"
Giovanni’s left hand rested calmly on the armrest. He didn't yell. A Don never needed to yell.
"Five years, Lorenzo," Giovanni said, his voice gaining strength and clarity with each word, fueled by half a decade of suppressed rage. "For five years, this woman turned off the heat in the east wing during the winter to steal the utility budget. For five years, she fired every nurse you hired, replacing them with terrified girls she could intimidate. She fed me the kitchen garbage while billing you hundreds of thousands for private medical care."
Lorenzo’s gray eyes fixed on Mrs. Gable. "Is this true?"
"No! It's a lie! I dedicated my life to this family!" Gable screamed, her voice shrill and desperate. "Ask the other maids! Clara! Tell him! Tell him how well we cared for him!"
Clara, trembling near the sideboard, dropped her head and burst into terrified sobs, unable to speak.
Giovanni turned his head toward Nora, who was still kneeling beside his chair, clutching her stomach as a wave of Braxton Hicks contractions rippled through her abdomen.
"Three months ago," Giovanni said, his voice softening with deep tenderness, "this child walked into my room. She did not know I was the Don. She did not know my name. She found me sitting in my own filth, shivering under a thin rag, staring at a blank wall."
Giovanni looked directly into his son's eyes.
"She used her own tips to buy me a heated blanket, Lorenzo. She smuggled hot soup from the kitchen when Gable wasn't looking. She washed my body with lavender soap. She sat on the cold floor and talked to me about her baby girl... because she was the only soul in this palace who remembered I was a human being."
Lorenzo stared at Nora.
He looked at her faded, oversized maid uniform, her cracked and raw hands, and the unmistakable dark bruises on her wrists.
Lorenzo walked over to Nora. Towering above her, he extended a broad, tattooed hand.
"Stand up," he said softly.
Nora looked up into his eyes, terrified, but she took his hand. With gentle, surprising care, Lorenzo lifted her to her feet, supporting her weight until she was steady.
Lorenzo turned her wrist over, inspecting the purple fingerprint bruises left by Mrs. Gable.
"Who did this to you?" Lorenzo asked, his voice deathly calm.
Nora swallowed hard, glancing at Mrs. Gable, who was shaking violently on the floor. "Mrs. Gable... she told me to carry the heavy drapes down the stairs. When I said the doctor told me not to lift, she... she grabbed me."
Lorenzo dropped Nora’s hand gently. He turned back toward the table, reached out, and picked up a heavy sterling-silver butter knife. He turned it slowly in his fingers.
"Vito," Lorenzo said.
"Yes, Boss?"
"Bring Mrs. Gable’s personal laptop and financial records from her quarters. Bring them here right now. And bring the head chef."
Within five minutes, Vito returned with a sleek leather briefcase and Mrs. Gable's laptop. Beside him walked the head chef, trembling so violently he could barely hold his apron.
"Open it," Lorenzo commanded.
Mrs. Gable wept openly now. "Mr. Moretti, please... have mercy... I served your mother before she died..."
"Open the accounts," Lorenzo repeated, not blinking.
Vito opened the laptop, bypassing the simple password with a flash drive. Within seconds, the screen displayed offshore bank accounts in the Cayman Islands, property deeds under Mrs. Gable's maiden name in Boca Raton, and detailed spreadsheets showing where the monthly half-million-dollar medical allowance had actually gone.
Lorenzo looked at the screen for less than ten seconds.
"Four point two million dollars," Lorenzo whispered, his voice dangerously low. "You stole four point two million dollars meant for my father's medicine... while you starved him in a freezing cellar."
Lorenzo threw the silver knife onto the table with a deafening crash.
"Take her to the cellar," Lorenzo ordered his men. "The very room where she kept my father. Strip the blankets. Turn off the heat. Let her sit there tonight and see how long her greed keeps her warm."
Two massive guards grabbed Mrs. Gable by the arms, dragging her screaming and thrashing across the polished floor.
"Mercy! Mr. Moretti, mercy! Giovanni, please!" Her cries faded down the long hallway until the heavy iron door slammed shut, cutting off the noise completely.
The dining room fell into absolute stillness once more.
Lorenzo turned back to Nora, who was pale, clutching her lower back, her breathing shallow and ragged.
"You," Lorenzo said, stepping toward her. "What is your name?"
May you like
"Nora, sir," she whispered, her knees shaking. "Nora Vance."
Before she could say another word, a sharp, violent spasm ripped through her abdomen. Nora cried out, her knees giving way completely as she collapsed toward the stone floor.
