Hundreds of powerful people filled Seattle’s Grand Pacific Ballroom, yet the seventeen-year-old daughter of the most feared mafia boss on the West Coast stood against a wall as if she were part of the decoration. Nobody seemed willing to truly speak to her, and when I finally crossed the room and raised my hands to sign, her face lit up just as every conversation behind me suddenly stopped.

The dining room of the Holloway estate looked like something out of a cold, gothic palace.

A thirty-foot black marble table sat beneath a massive chandelier made of jagged, hand-blown black glass. Silver cutlery gleamed against black silk placemats, while three uniformed servers moved silently through the shadows, pouring dark red wine into crystal glasses.

I sat on the left side of the table, wearing my simple black dress, feeling entirely out of place among the iron, glass, and dark mahogany.

Maya sat across from me, her dark eyes fixed on her silver fork, refusing to look up.

At the head of the table sat Graham, flanked by two men I had never seen before.

To his right sat Victor Moretti—a fat, oily man in his late fifties with slicked-back dark hair and diamond rings on three fingers. Victor was the head of the North-End syndicate, a rival organization that had been locked in a cold war with Graham’s family for over a decade.

To his left sat Victor's son, Julian—a handsome, arrogant man in his late twenties with cold blue eyes and a cruel, dismissive smile.

"So, Graham," Victor sneered, cutting into a thick piece of rare prime rib, blood pooling on his white porcelain plate. "This is the famous daughter you keep hidden away from the world. Beautiful girl. Pity about her... condition."

My hand tightened around my napkin under the table.

Maya didn't hear the words, but she felt the vibration of Victor's loud, harsh voice through the heavy marble table. She stiffened, her posture turning into stone.

"Maya is not a topic of discussion, Victor," Graham said calmly, taking a slow sip of his Cabernet. "We are here to settle the Elliott Bay shipping routes."

"Ah, yes! Business!" Victor chuckled, a dark, wet sound. "Julian here was just saying how much easier the shipping logistics would be if our families were truly united. Julian is thirty. Maya is seventeen... eighteen in a few months, yes? A traditional union between our houses would end thirty years of bloodshed along the docks."

My blood went cold.

They were talking about an arranged marriage.

A forced, political union to tie two blood-stained mafia empires together, treating a bright, brilliant seventeen-year-old girl like a piece of disputed real estate.

I looked at Julian. He was staring at Maya with a predatory, calculating gaze, his eyes sliding over her dark hair, her hands, her shoulders, like a man assessing the value of a prize horse.

Do not react, Claire, I told myself, my knuckles white against my thigh. You are just the interpreter. If you jump across this table, Graham's guards will put a bullet through your head before you touch the floor.

Then, Julian spoke up, his voice dripping with condescension.

"She's quiet, at least," Julian smirked, turning to his father. "Won't have to listen to her nagging when I come home late. Can she even understand what's happening right now? Or does she just sit there looking pretty?"

That was it.

My self-preservation instincts snapped like thin glass.

Before Graham or Victor could say another word, I raised my hands into the bright light of the chandelier, my fingers moving with fierce, blazing speed directly in front of Maya's face:

The ugly man with the diamond rings wants his foolish son to buy your father's docks. They think you are a trophy. They are wrong.

Maya's hazel eyes widened in pure, shocked delight. A tiny, muffled gasp escaped her lips, and then—for the first time all evening—she burst into a brilliant, silent laugh, her hand flying up to cover her mouth.

The entire dining room froze.

Julian’s smirk vanished. "What did she just sign to her?"

Victor slammed his fork down onto his plate with a loud CLATTER. "What is this insolence? Who is this woman?"

Graham didn't yell. He didn't slam his glass.

Slowly, deliberately, Graham set his crystal glass down on the marble table. He turned his dark, terrifying eyes toward me.

"Translate what you just signed, Miss Bennett," Graham said, his voice entirely flat, dropping the temperature in the room by twenty degrees. "Word for word."

I looked at Graham. I looked at Victor. I looked at Julian.

I knew that if I told the truth, Julian would demand my blood. But if I lied, Graham—who spoke fluent ASL—would know I was a coward who had compromised my professional integrity to save my own skin.

I lifted my head high, meeting Graham’s dark gaze directly.

"I told Maya that Mr. Moretti’s son lacks the intellect to appreciate her intelligence," I said clearly, my voice ringing off the black marble walls. "And that his offer of marriage was an insult to the Holloway name."

Silence descended upon the dining room like a falling tombstone.

Julian leaped to his feet, his chair screeching violently against the marble floor. "You little bitch—"

BANG.

The sound was so loud, so sudden, that the heavy chandelier rattled overhead.

Graham hadn't drawn a gun. He had simply slammed his heavy leather-bound ledger onto the table with the force of a thunderclap.

"Sit down, Julian," Graham commanded softly.

Julian trembled with rage, his face flushed red, but looking into Graham’s eyes, he slowly sank back into his chair.

Graham slowly turned his attention back to Victor.

"The Elliott Bay deal is off," Graham said smoothly, picking up his linen napkin and wiping his fingers. "My daughter will not be married to your son. Not today. Not in ten years. Not ever. Get out of my house."

Victor stared at Graham in disbelief. "You're tearing up a fifty-million-dollar maritime treaty over a deaf girl and an arrogant interpreter?!"

Graham leaned forward, his storm-gray eyes burning with a dark, lethal fire that made even the hardened mob boss Victor pull back slightly.

"I am tearing up this treaty because my daughter laughed tonight for the first time in five years," Graham whispered. "And because I don't do business with men who mistake my family's quietness for weakness. Marcus! Escort Mr. Moretti and his son to the gates."

Two massive, armed security guards stepped out of the shadows, their hands resting on their sidearms.

Victor spat onto his plate, stood up, and stormed out of the dining room, Julian following close behind, casting a murderous glare at me as he disappeared into the foyer.

The dining room returned to silence.

I sat frozen in my chair, my heart hammering against my ribs, unable to process what had just happened.

Graham Holloway had just destroyed a fifty-million-dollar syndicate alliance to protect his daughter's dignity—and had backed up my translation without a single hesitation.

Graham stood up slowly, smoothing the front of his charcoal jacket. He looked down at Maya, his expression softening by an imperceptible fraction.