Chapter 3 - The Blood and the Reckoning
The master suite of the Rossi mansion had been converted into an emergency medical center within twenty minutes.
Dr. Joseph Valenti—Leo’s private family physician—set down his stethoscope, pulled off his rubber gloves, and turned to Leo, who stood by the window with his arms crossed over his chest.
“She’s stabilized, Leo,” Dr. Valenti said softly, pointing to the bed where Lily lay fast asleep under three heavy goose-down blankets, an oxygen cannula resting gently beneath her nose. “Her lungs were severely inflamed, but the CPR and airway massage Miss Miller performed kept her from brain hypoxia. Another two minutes in that cold room, and her heart would have stopped.”
Leo slowly turned his head toward the far corner of the room.
Sitting in a plush velvet armchair, looking tiny despite her broad frame, was Beatrice.
A female paramedic was finishing stitching the deep laceration on her cheekbone. Beatrice’s right hand was wrapped in thick white bandages where her knuckles had been split open from pounding on the iron door. She wore a soft, oversized cashmere sweater that belonged to Leo, draped over her shoulders to keep her from shivering.
She was watching Lily’s chest rise and fall, completely unconcerned with the needle passing through her own skin.
“How is Miss Miller?” Leo asked the paramedic, his voice low and dangerous.
“Three broken bones in her right hand, deep contusions along her left shoulder and ribs, and twelve stitches on her cheek,” the paramedic reported. “She needs rest and pain medication.”
“Give her whatever she needs,” Leo said.
He walked over to Beatrice’s chair.
As he approached, Beatrice instinctively shrank back slightly, her old habit of submission asserting itself. But Leo did not allow her to look away. He reached down, took her uninjured left hand in his, and brought her knuckles gently to his lips.
Beatrice froze, her breath catching in her throat.
The most feared man in the Midwest was kissing her calloused, work-worn hand with gentle, reverent care.
“Thank you, Beatrice,” Leo murmured against her skin, his dark eyes looking directly into hers. “You saved my life tonight. Because if my daughter had died in that cellar, there would be nothing left of me worth saving.”
“She’s... she’s a good little girl, Mr. Rossi,” Beatrice whispered, her cheeks flushing warm beneath the bandage. “She didn't deserve any of this.”
“No,” Leo agreed, his face darkening into terrible iron. “She didn't.”
He released her hand, turned on his heel, and looked at Dante, who stood waiting by the door.
“Is she in the library?” Leo asked.
“Yes, boss,” Dante replied. “We tied her to the chair. Her father’s attorneys have been calling every three minutes.”
“Let them call,” Leo said quietly.
He walked out of the room, down the grand staircase, and opened the heavy brass doors of the library.
Victoria Kensington sat bound to a heavy mahogany armchair in the center of the room. Her hair was disheveled, her silk gown stained with dirt, her face red from crying.
Sitting across from her on the leather sofa was a thin man in a grey suit holding a high-end laptop—Leo’s chief intelligence technician.
“Leo!” Victoria shrieked the moment the door opened. “This is kidnapping! This is assault! My father will destroy your shipping lines! He will pull every union contract on the Eastern Seaboard!”
Leo walked over to the desk, poured himself two fingers of scotch from a crystal carafe, and took a slow sip.
“Your father isn't going to pull any contracts, Victoria,” Leo said calmly, leaning back against the edge of the mahogany desk.
“He will!” she screamed. “When he finds out how your thugs treated me—”
“Show her, Marcus,” Leo interrupted softly.
The technician turned the laptop screen toward Victoria and pressed play.
On the screen was high-definition, audio-enabled video footage taken from the hidden security cameras installed throughout the mansion’s ground floor—cameras Victoria had never known existed.
The audio played with crystal clarity through the library speakers:
“Did the furniture just speak?”
The loud THWACK of Victoria slapping Beatrice.
The crunch of the inhaler beneath Victoria’s heel.
The terrified screaming of six-year-old Lily as Victoria dragged her by her hair toward the cellar.
Victoria’s sweet, chilling laugh as she tossed the key into the heating vent: “Who do you think he’ll believe? A port heiress... or an ugly, fat servant girl with blood on her face?”
Victoria’s voice cut off instantly. Her face turned from red to a ghostly, horrifying white.
“I... I...” she stammered, her eyes darting frantically around the room. “Leo... I was just trying to discipline the child... she was being disrespectful... and the maid attacked me first—”
“That video,” Leo said, setting his glass down with a soft clink, “was transmitted to your father’s private server fifteen minutes ago.”
Victoria blinked. “What?”
“I spoke to Jonathan Kensington five minutes before I stepped into this room,” Leo continued, his voice cold as liquid nitrogen. “When he watched his daughter torture a motherless six-year-old child and smash her medical equipment, he realized something very important.”
Leo leaned forward, pressing his hands against the arms of Victoria’s chair, bringing his face inches from hers.
“He realized that if he attempted to protect you, I wouldn't just take his port contracts,” Leo whispered. “I would erase his entire family name from the East Coast before the sun came up tomorrow. Do you know what your father told me, Victoria?”
Victoria shook her head, tears of pure horror spilling down her cheeks.
“He told me,” Leo said softly, “to do whatever I felt was necessary to protect my daughter.”
Victoria let out a thin, terrified squeal.
“Dante,” Leo commanded, standing up straight.
“Boss?”
“Take Miss Kensington to our private facility in Gary, Indiana. Put her in an unheated room. Give her water, bread, and a pencil. She will write a complete, handwritten confession of attempted murder and child abuse.”
“And after she writes it?” Dante asked.
“After she writes it,” Leo said, turning his back on her, “she will be handed over to the Federal Bureau of Investigation alongside twenty years of her father’s illegal offshore banking records. Let her see how long her designer dresses last in a federal penitentiary.”
“No! Leo! Please!” Victoria screamed as Dante untied her from the chair, dragging her backward toward the service exit. “I’m sorry! Leo! Please!”
The doors clicked shut.
The silence returned to the mansion.
May you like
Leo stood alone in the library for a long moment, looking down at his desk. He reached into his pocket, pulled out his handkerchief, and wiped a small smudge of Beatrice’s dried blood from his cufflink.
Then he turned and walked back upstairs to the woman who had bled to save his child.
