Chapter 8 - The Price of Treason
The top-floor penthouse of Moretti Tower in downtown Boston was an altar of glass, polished granite, and cold authority.
Rockford Jones sat in a low leather chair opposite the massive desk, looking twenty years older than he had twenty-four hours ago. His expensive tuxedo from the gala had been swapped for a rumpled, stained suit. His eyes were bloodshot, his hands twitching with an uncontrollable tremor.
Beside him sat Evelyn, her face pale, stripped of all makeup, clutching her designer handbag like a life raft. Chloe stood near the door, biting her nails to the quick, looking like a caged animal.
The double doors opened.
Rockford leaped to his feet. “Mateo! Thank God. Look, this is all a massive mistake. The Russo family—they threatened me! They forced me to move that money through your harbor!”
He stopped dead in his tracks.
Mateo entered, but he didn't take the seat behind the desk. Instead, he stepped aside, holding the door open.
Adelaide walked in.
She was dressed in a razor-sharp charcoal power suit tailored to perfection, an ivory silk blouse underneath, and high black heels that clicked with terrifying authority against the polished granite floor. Her hair was pulled back into a sleek, elegant ponytail, laying bare the full, unhidden length of her scar. She carried a single, slim black folder under her arm.
She walked directly to the head of the table, pulled out the heavy leather executive chair, and sat down.
Mateo casually walked over and leaned against the edge of the desk beside her, crossing his arms over his broad chest. He didn't say a word. He was there as her shadow, her enforcer, her wall of steel.
“Adelaide,” Rockford gasped, his voice cracking with desperate relief. “Sweetheart! Thank God you’re here. Talk to him. Tell him I’m your father! Tell him you can't let him do this to us!”
Adelaide placed the black folder on the glass desk, resting her hands flat on either side of it. She didn't blink.
“Jones Financial has been officially placed into Chapter 7 liquidation,” Adelaide stated, her voice as smooth and emotionless as a judge reading a death sentence. “The Federal Trade Commission seized your personal assets twenty minutes ago. The Beacon Hill townhouse, the summer estate in Nantucket, the vehicles, the offshore trusts. Everything has been confiscated to satisfy the unpaid tax liens and the fifteen-million-dollar fraud claim filed by the Moretti syndicate.”
“You... you can't do that!” Evelyn shrieked, lunging forward toward the desk, but a cold glance from Mateo stopped her dead in her tracks, freezing the breath in her throat. “That’s our home! Where are we supposed to live? What about Chloe’s trust fund?”
Adelaide finally looked at her stepmother. The gaze was so icy, so intensely focused, that Evelyn actually took a step back in terror.
“Chloe’s trust fund was drained at nine this morning to cover the severance packages for the seventy-four administrative clerks you fired without pensions last month,” Adelaide said. “Chloe can get a job. I hear the department stores on Newbury Street are looking for perfume spritzers.”
“You vindictive little bitch!” Chloe screamed, her face contorting with rage. “You think because you spread your legs for a mobster you’re better than us? You’re still an ugly freak! You’ll always be the girl Daddy hid in the basement!”
Mateo moved, his hand dropping toward his waistband, but Adelaide raised one single finger, stopping him instantly.
Mateo froze, obeying her command without question.
Adelaide stood up. She walked around the desk, stopping two feet in front of Chloe. Adelaide was taller in her heels, her posture commanding and regal. Chloe, stripped of her expensive dresses and salon styling, looked small, frail, and pathetic.
“I was in the basement because I was working,” Adelaide whispered softly, leaning in until her hazel eyes locked with Chloe’s terrified gaze. “While you were spending blood money on golden dresses, I was learning how the world actually functions. You called me ugly because my face bore the cost of my mother’s life. But you, Chloe... you are rotten all the way to your soul. And no amount of makeup will ever hide that.”
Chloe began to cry, shrinking back against the wall, utterly broken.
Adelaide turned back to her father. Rockford had sunk back into his chair, weeping silently into his hands.
She dropped the black folder into his lap.
He looked down, his trembling fingers opening it. When he saw the photograph of the sliced brake lines and the copy of the fifty-thousand-dollar check to Paul Russo, the last ounce of color drained from his face. He looked up at Adelaide, his eyes filled with pure, unadulterated horror.
“You... you know,” he choked out.
“I know,” Adelaide said. “The federal prosecutors already have the original file. The state police have reopened the vehicular homicide investigation. You aren't going to a minimum-security white-collar prison, Father. You are going to Walpole. For murder in the first degree.”
Rockford collapsed onto the floor, clutching his chest, sobbing uncontrollably. “Adelaide... please... I’m your father... have mercy!”
Adelaide looked down at the broken man who had destroyed her childhood.
“Mercy is for the innocent, Rockford,” she said quietly. “And you are covered in Eleanor’s blood.”
She turned to Mateo. “Get them out of my sight.”
Mateo nodded once. Four armed guards entered the room, dragging Rockford, Evelyn, and Chloe out into the hallway. Their screams and cries echoed down the corridor until the heavy double doors clicked shut, restoring a profound, pristine silence to the room.
Adelaide stood by the towering glass window, looking out over the city of Boston.
Mateo walked up behind her, placing his hands gently on her waist, pulling her back against his chest.
“It’s done,” he murmured.
May you like
“Not yet,” Adelaide said, leaning back into his warmth. “The Russos are still out there. And they still think they can take what belongs to us.”
***
