**“DON'T YOU DARE GIVE HER THAT CHAIR, HANNAH! BEING PREGNANT DOESN'T MEAN SHE GETS SPECIAL TREATMENT!” THE MAFIA BOSS'S FIANCÉE HUMILIATED HIS 26-YEAR-OLD MAID FOR HELPING HIS SEVEN-MONTHS-PREGNANT SISTER SIT DOWN—BUT WHEN THE YOUNG WOMAN WHISPERED, “LUCA, I THOUGHT YOU DIDN'T WANT MY BABY IN YOUR FAMILY,” HE SLOWLY PUT DOWN HIS GLASS.**

The cold, heavy metal of the suppressed handgun felt entirely foreign in my palm. I was a housemaid, not a soldier, but as I looked at Elena’s terrified face, my grip tightened on the weapon.

"Ten minutes, Hannah," Luca repeated, his dark eyes boring into mine. "You tell Vanessa exactly what I told you. You make her understand she’s been nothing but a sacrificial lamb for a family that despises her."

He didn't wait for a response. He sprinted out of the dining room toward his private study to retrieve whatever proof he claimed he had. Marco was already barking orders into his radio, rallying the mansion's remaining guards to the front foyer.

"Come on," I said, grabbing Elena’s arm gently but firmly. "We have to move."

We hurried down the grand, carpeted hallway, heading for the servant stairs that led to the sub-basement. The mansion was echoing with the chaotic sounds of a fortress preparing for a siege—heavy boots running, the clacking of assault rifles being loaded, and the distant, muffled shouting from outside the front gates.

Elena was breathing heavily, holding her stomach, moving as fast as she safely could.

"Hannah, what is Luca talking about?" Elena asked, her voice trembling as we descended the narrow concrete steps into the damp, dimly lit basement. "How is Vanessa going to protect us? She hates me!"

"I don't know yet," I answered honestly, keeping the gun pointed toward the shadows. "But Luca doesn't bluff. If he says she’s the key, she’s the key."

We reached the heavy steel door of the interrogation room. It was typically used for 'managing' problematic associates, but tonight, it held the woman who had tried to destroy my life an hour ago.

I took a deep breath, unlocked the deadbolt, and pushed the door open.

The room was stark, illuminated by a single, harsh bulb dangling from the ceiling. Vanessa was sitting in a metal chair in the center of the room, her wrists zip-tied behind her back. Her red satin gown was torn and stained with dust from when Marco’s men had dragged her down here.

When she saw us enter, her panicked expression instantly morphed into a sneer of pure, venomous arrogance.

"Well, well," Vanessa mocked, tilting her head. "The pregnant burden and the little maid. Did Luca send you down here to beg? My father’s men are at the gates. This house belongs to the Volkovs now."

"Your father isn't coming to save you, Vanessa," I said, keeping my voice steady, raising the gun slightly so she could see it.

Vanessa laughed, a harsh, jagged sound. "You wouldn't know how to shoot that if I drew you a diagram, Hannah. My father is coming to claim this empire, and he’s going to reward me for handing it to him on a silver platter."

"He’s not going to reward you," Elena said softly, stepping out from behind me, looking at the woman who had tormented her with profound pity. "He’s going to let you die down here."

Vanessa’s laughter stopped. Her eyes narrowed. "What are you talking about?"

Before I could answer, the heavy steel door slammed open behind us.

I spun around, leveling the gun, my heart leaping into my throat.

It was Luca.

He was breathing hard, a dark, dangerous energy radiating from him. In his left hand, he held a thick, worn leather journal.

He walked past us, stopping directly in front of Vanessa. He tossed the leather journal onto the small metal table in front of her.

"Do you know what this is, Vanessa?" Luca asked, his voice a low, lethal rumble.

Vanessa looked at the journal, feigning boredom. "I don't care about your family’s pathetic history, Luca."

"It’s not my family’s history," Luca said. "It’s a ledger. It belonged to your mother."

Vanessa froze. The arrogance instantly vanished, replaced by a sudden, terrifying vulnerability. "My mother died when I was a baby."

"Your mother didn't die of a sudden illness, Vanessa," Luca corrected softly. "She was murdered."

"You’re lying," Vanessa hissed, but her voice shook. "My father told me she got sick!"

"Your father lied to you about everything," Luca stated, leaning closer to her. "Including his own name."

He opened the journal to a marked page and turned it toward her.

"Read it," Luca commanded.

Vanessa stared at the aged, handwritten pages. I watched her eyes dart back and forth across the ink. As she read, the color completely drained from her face, leaving her looking like a porcelain doll.

"No," Vanessa whispered, shaking her head in violent denial. "No, this is a forgery. You made this to trick me!"

"It’s not a forgery," Luca said, his voice completely devoid of pity. "Your mother wasn't just a random woman Dmitri Volkov had an affair with. She was an undercover FBI informant. She was building a RICO case against the entire Volkov syndicate."

My jaw dropped. The Volkov boss had unknowingly slept with a federal informant.

"Dmitri found out," Luca continued, the brutal truth hanging heavy in the small room. "He found out she was a rat. And he found out she was pregnant with you. He didn't want a bastard child born to a traitor carrying his bloodline."

Vanessa was trembling uncontrollably now, staring at the journal as if it were a bomb about to detonate.

"He ordered a hit on your mother," Luca said softly. "But she gave birth to you a month early, in hiding. Before the hitmen found her, she gave you to a corrupt judge named Bellini—a man she had blackmailed into protecting you."

"She protected me," Vanessa choked out, tears finally spilling over her eyelashes.

"Yes," Luca nodded. "But Dmitri Volkov didn't know you survived. Not for twenty years. When he finally found out, he didn't welcome you back into the family. He saw an opportunity."

Luca reached into his pocket and pulled out a small, folded piece of paper. He dropped it onto the journal.

"This is a copy of a bank transfer," Luca said. "From Dmitri Volkov’s personal account to the hitman I supposedly hired to kill David."

Vanessa looked up, her eyes wide with confusion. "I don't understand."

"Dmitri didn't want to save David," Luca explained, the sheer, staggering evil of the Russian boss finally exposed. "Dmitri arranged for the hitman to kidnap David and frame me. He used David’s disappearance to justify a war against the Morettis. And he sent you here to open the gates from the inside."

"But... he promised me a place in the family," Vanessa wept, the reality of her betrayal shattering her worldview. "He said if I helped him destroy you, I would be recognized as a true Volkov!"

"He lied to you," Luca said coldly. "Look at the date on the bank transfer, Vanessa. He paid the hitman to kidnap David three days before he ever contacted you to infiltrate my house."

Vanessa stared at the date.

"He was always going to attack me," Luca said. "You were just a convenient, disposable pawn. He sent you into my house knowing that when his army breached the gates tonight... they were going to kill everyone inside. Including you."

"No," Vanessa whispered, shaking her head. "He’s my father!"

"He murdered your mother because she was a rat," Luca reminded her brutally. "Do you really think he’s going to let the bastard daughter of an FBI informant sit at his dining table?"

A heavy, suffocating silence filled the interrogation room.

The distant, muffled sound of gunfire suddenly echoed through the concrete ceiling.

The Volkovs had breached the perimeter. The assault had begun.

Vanessa looked up at the ceiling, then at Luca. The arrogant, cruel socialite was gone. In her place was a woman who had just realized she had spent her entire life serving the man who murdered her mother.

"What do you want from me?" Vanessa asked, her voice hollow and dead.

Luca didn't smile. He drew a combat knife from his boot and stepped behind her. With one quick motion, he sliced through the zip-ties binding her wrists.

"I want you to show your father what happens when he underestimates a bastard daughter," Luca said, handing her a loaded, suppressed pistol from his waistband.

Vanessa took the gun. She didn't point it at Luca. She didn't point it at me or Elena.

She looked at the weapon in her hand, her eyes burning with a sudden, absolute, suicidal vengeance.

"They’re coming down the main stairwell," Luca told her, stepping back. "There’s a choke point at the bottom of the steps. You have ten seconds."

Vanessa didn't say a word. She stood up, her red satin gown whispering against the concrete floor, and walked out of the interrogation room toward the stairwell.

Luca immediately grabbed the heavy steel door and slammed it shut, throwing the deadbolt, locking us inside the reinforced room.

"Will she really fight them?" Elena asked, her hands shaking as she clutched my arm.