Chapter 1 - THE INHALER
The grand dining hall of the St. Clair estate smelled of expensive roasted duck, vintage champagne, and a cruelty that had been brewing for months.
Outside, rain beat furiously against the floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the Chicago skyline. Inside, forty members of the elite St. Clair family sat along the sixty-foot mahogany table, dressed in velvet and diamonds for the annual family anniversary dinner.
At the head of the table sat seven-year-old Mara, shivering violently. Her knuckles were stark white as she held onto her father’s sleeve, crying between each breath.
“Daddy… I can’t breathe.”
Orson Vance, the cold-eyed, six-foot-two head of the Vance syndicate and Mara’s devoted father, didn't hesitate. He pulled out the blue prescription inhaler from his coat pocket, primed it, and pressed it to his daughter’s mouth.
Mara took three deep, ragged gulps of medicine. Gradually, her breathing steadied.
Orson lifted her tenderly into a velvet-backed chair and firmly placed the inhaler back into her tiny hand.
Every relative at the anniversary dinner turned their attention toward Tamsin.
Tamsin St. Clair, Mara’s stepmother of barely six months, stood at the side of the grand table in her designer silk dress. She didn't look remorseful. She didn't even look concerned.
She only folded her arms across her chest and scoffed.
“She’s just pretending to be helpless.”
The room dropped ten degrees. The quiet clatter of silver forks against porcelain ceased completely.
Orson slowly turned to face her.
His dark eyes were devoid of heat—there was only the pitch-black void of a man who had put half the Midwest underworld in shallow graves.
Tamsin, driven by a strange, frantic desperation, reached for Mara’s inhaler again.
Orson caught her wrist in mid-air. He tore her hand away with terrifying force and delivered one thunderous open-handed slap across her face.
The crack echoed off the marble walls like a gunshot.
Tamsin staggered backward, losing her footing on her red high heels, and crashed violently into the tiers of the four-story dessert table. Crystal plates shattered against the parquet floor, chocolate mousse and whipped cream splattering across her satin dress as she collapsed among the debris.
Two broad-shouldered bodyguards in tailored suits stepped forward, their hands reaching under their suit jackets.
Orson didn't even draw his weapon. He simply moved directly between Tamsin and his daughter, taking up the entire line of sight like a wall of solid iron.
“You need to come outside with me for a little while,” Orson said, his voice dropping into a low, deadly register.
For the first time since she had married into the Vance family, Tamsin looked genuinely frightened.
But she wasn’t looking at Orson’s towering frame. She wasn't looking at the dark gun resting in his shoulder holster.
Her wide, panic-stricken eyes had dropped to the small, embroidered leather inhaler pouch still clenched tightly in Mara’s hand.
And whatever Tamsin saw there—a tiny silver zipper compartment tucked into the leather backing—frightened her far more than the six-foot-tall Mafia boss standing in front of her.
May you like
Orson noticed the direction of her gaze. His brow furrowed slightly as Mara squeezed the pouch tighter against her chest.
“Julian, Marcus,” Orson commanded without looking away from his stepwife. “Seal the doors. Nobody leaves this dining room until I find out what my daughter is carrying.”
