The teapot hit the marble floor without breaking, but the maid’s scream split my dining room apart. By the time I looked from the burn spreading across Elena’s arm to the woman wearing my engagement ring, I already knew Camille had just shown me exactly who she was—and she had done it in front of everyone.

Standing in the arched threshold of the dining room was a woman who looked as though she had walked out of a forgotten era of the Moretti dynasty. She wore a tailored black coat, rain clinging to the shoulders, her dark hair pulled back into a silver-pinned knot. Her face bore the sharp, uncompromising angles of my late father’s side of the family—a face that knew every dark corner of the empire I now commanded.

It was my aunt, Victoria Moretti. Behind her stood two men in gray suits, carrying steel-bound leather cases.

Victoria didn't glance at the spilled tea, the shattered crystal, or Elena, who was already being gently ushered out the side doors by two attentive housekeepers under Marco’s watchful eye. Her gaze swept over Camille, taking in the trembling champagne silk dress, the flushed skin, and the titanium band sitting silently on the white tablecloth between us.

“You always did have questionable taste in company, Gabriel,” Victoria said softly, her voice carrying the dry, rasping quality of dry autumn leaves scraping across slate. “Though I see you’ve finally remembered who you are before signing the contracts.”

Camille’s hands trembled against the edge of her chair. She looked between Victoria and me, her composure fraying at the edges. “Gabriel… who is this? Tell her to leave! This is our house!”

“This is my house,” I corrected, my tone low, cold, and utterly flat. “And Victoria is my father’s sister. Which means she holds twenty percent of the voting stock in the holdings you were so eager to host dinners for.”

Camille swallowed hard, her mouth opening and closing like a landed fish. The arrogance that had sustained her through three months of engagement evaporated, replaced by the sheer, cold realization that she had miscalculated the room, the house, and the man holding the ring.

Victoria stepped forward, her heels clicking rhythmically on the polished marble. She stopped across from Camille, reaching out with one gloved hand to gently pick up the black titanium band I had left beside my cufflinks.

“Titanium,” Victoria murmured, rolling the ring between her thumb and forefinger with open disdain. “Modern. Cheap under the surface. A metallic facade meant to imitate weight without carrying any real history. Just like you, my dear.”

“Gabriel, please!” Camille turned to me, tears finally brimming in her eyes—not tears of remorse, but of humiliated panic. “I lost my temper! She was disrespectful! She spilled tea on a four-thousand-dollar dress that you bought me! I was defending your standards!”

“Elena has worked for my family since I was twelve years old,” I replied, leaning back against the edge of the dining table, resting my hands in my pockets. “She was here when my father died. She held my mother’s hand when the fever took her. You are a guest who was given a key. You mistook hospitality for ownership.”

“I am your fiancée!” she cried out.

“You were my fiancée,” I said. “Marco.”

Marco stepped into the dining room, his heavy frame casting a long shadow across the marble floor. “Sir?”

“Walk Miss Vance to her quarters. Have the staff pack every item she brought into this house. She has thirty minutes to leave the property. If she is on Moretti land when the clock strikes eight, consider her a trespasser.”

“Gabriel, you can’t do this!” Camille’s voice rose to a shriek as Marco took a polite, unyielding step toward her. “My father is on your corporate board! My family has investments in the docks! You cut me off, and you lose the North End alignment!”

I looked at her, letting the silence stretch between us until her scream died down into a desperate breath.

“Your father’s firm was audited two weeks ago, Camille,” I said quietly. “He owes my holding company twelve million dollars in unsecured loans. The only reason I haven't foreclosed on his estate in Boston is because I thought I was marrying his daughter. Now? I suggest you tell him to call his lawyers.”

Camille went dead pale. She looked at Victoria, whose sharp lips curled into a cold, satisfied smile, and then back at me. Realizing that no tears, no threats, and no appeals to pride would move the stone of the Moretti legacy, she turned on her heel, her silk dress rustling loudly, and rushed out of the room under Marco’s firm guidance.

When the heavy double doors clicked shut behind them, the dining room fell quiet again.

Victoria tossed the titanium ring onto the table, where it bounced twice before settling against silver cutlery.

“You cut it close, nephew,” Victoria said, taking a seat at the head of the table—the seat my father used to occupy. “The papers were scheduled to be finalized on Friday. If you had married that girl, her father’s creditors would have picked at our logistics contracts like vultures.”

“I don't make mistakes twice,” I said, walking over to the sideboard and pouring two fingers of rye into a crystal glass. “Why are you here, Aunt Victoria? You haven't crossed the threshold of the estate since my father’s funeral.”

Victoria reached into her coat, pulling out an antique silver cigarette case. She didn't light one—she simply held it, her thumb running over the worn engraving of the Moretti crest.

“I didn't come for your romantic drama, Gabriel,” she said, her eyes darkening. “I came because the docks in Gloucester were raided two hours ago. Federal agents. And they didn't have a warrant from Massachusetts.”