The Mafia Boss’s Fiancée Called Me a Clumsy Fat Maid and Raised Her Hand at His Mother—Then the Blow I Took Turned Their Alliance Into a Reckoning Bianca Moretti’s diamond-ringed hand struck my face instead of the elderly woman standing behind me.

I leaned in close to look at the photo.

It was a picture taken from the treeline outside the estate just ten minutes ago. It captured Dominic and me standing near the glass windows of the ballroom.

On the back of the photograph, written in dark red ink, were four words:

The alliance never dies.

Dominic’s face turned to stone. He turned to Marco. “Lock down the perimeter. Find the messenger.”

“Wait, Dominic,” I said, taking the photo from his hand and examining the handwriting carefully.

“That’s not Bianca’s writing,” I realized, my blood running cold. “And it’s not Vance Moretti’s either.”

Carmela walked over, leaning on her cane. She glanced at the red ink on the back of the photograph, her face suddenly turning pale.

“That symbol,” Carmela whispered, pointing to a small, dark crest stamped in the bottom corner of the photo—a coiled serpent surrounding a broken crown.

“What symbol is that, Mother?” Dominic demanded.

“The DeLuca family,” Carmela breathed, her hand trembling. “The sixth family from Chicago. The ones who backed Vance Moretti from the shadows.”

The room seemed to grow cold.

Dominic looked at the crest, then at me. The war with the Morettis was over, but a far larger, far more dangerous shadow had just cast its veil over our world.