Chapter 2 - The Bedroom on the Top Floor
The walk up the marble staircase was the longest three minutes of my life.
Two guards flanked me—heavy, muscular men whose boots echoed like cannon fire against the white Italian tile. Dante walked two paces ahead of us. His silver-headed cane tapped a rhythmic, terrifying beat on the floor. He hadn't said a word since the doctor announced Gabriel was awake. He didn't need to. The sharp, tense line of his broad shoulders told me everything.
He was calculating. He was trying to figure out how a twenty-two-year-old maid from the South Side who earned fourteen dollars an hour had just dismantled a months-long assassination plot with a trash bag and a fly excuse.
When we reached the top floor, the air smelled like rubbing alcohol, ozone, and copper.
The heavy mahogany doors to Gabriel’s master suite were thrown wide open. Three doctors stood shivering in the hallway, one of them clutching a bloody towel around his forearm.
"He's crazy," the chief physician whispered, his surgical mask hanging off one ear. "Mr. Costa, he’s lost his mind. His vitals were bottoming out twenty minutes ago, and now he’s—"
"Get out," Dante said smoothly. He didn't raise his voice, but the doctors bolted down the stairs like rats escaping a burning ship.
Dante stepped into the threshold, his eyes scanning the dimly lit room.
Gabriel Costa was sitting upright in the center of the massive canopy bed. He looked like a nightmare summoned from a forgotten vault. His pale skin was tight over his sharp cheekbones, his dark eyes hollowed out by weeks of slow, methodical poisoning. But there was no weakness in the way he held the surgical scalpel in his right hand. The blade was held low, level, and rock-steady, pointed straight at his brother's throat.
"Gabriel," Dante said softly, raising his hands in a gesture of gentle concern. "Brother. Lay down. You're delirious. The toxin in your blood is—"
"Shut your mouth, Dante," Gabriel rasped. His voice sounded like dry leaves scraping across concrete, but the authority behind it was absolute. It was the voice of a man who had built an empire out of gunfire and blood. "Send her in. Clear the rest of the room."
Dante’s eyes narrowed slightly. "Gabriel, she’s a servant. She compromised your medical care—"
"I said clear the room!" Gabriel screamed, a raw, terrifying sound that made the crystal chandelier above the bed vibrate.
Dante stood still for two agonizing seconds. Then, slowly, he turned his head and looked at me. His gaze was cold, sharp, and promising a very slow death.
"Outside," Dante ordered the guards. He took a step back into the corridor, leaning his silver cane against his hip. "I'll be right outside the door, Gabriel. For your safety."
The heavy oak doors clicked shut, leaving me alone in the dim, suffocating silence of the master suite with the most feared mob boss in Chicago.
I stood by the doorway, my fingers digging into the hem of my stained apron, my knees shaking so violently I thought I would collapse onto the rug.
Gabriel didn't move the scalpel. His hollow dark eyes locked onto mine, tracking the frantic rise and fall of my chest.
"What's your name?" he asked low.
"Elena," I choked out, my voice barely a squeak. "Elena Vance, sir."
"Come here, Elena."
I took a tentative step forward. "Mr. Costa... I didn't mean to cause trouble. I was just cleaning—"
"I said come here!" he hissed.
I forced my feet to move, walking until I was standing right beside the edge of the silk sheets. Up close, I could see the sweat glistening on his forehead, the dark purple rings under his eyes, and the faint, unmistakable smell of bitter almond hovering around his skin.
Gabriel slowly lowered the scalpel. He reached out with his left hand, his long, gaunt fingers grabbing my wrist. His grip was surprisingly cold, but his hold was like an iron vice.
He pulled me down until my ear was inches from his lips.
"The spoon," Gabriel whispered into my skin. "Why did you knock it over?"
My breath hitched. "It... it turned dark, sir. At the edges. Like the rat poison my father used to mix with peanut butter in the basement when I was little. Silver turns grey when it touches digitalis and arsenic."
Gabriel went completely motionless. I could feel the violent, irregular hammering of his heart through the thin sleeve of my uniform.
"Who brought the tea?" Gabriel whispered, his voice dropping into a register so dark it made my blood run cold.
"Your brother," I whispered back, tears finally spilling past my lashes. "Mr. Dante brought the tray. He gave it to the nurse."
Gabriel closed his eyes. A single, long shudder passed through his wasted frame, not of fear, but of terrible, catastrophic realization.
When he opened his eyes again, the hollow weakness was gone. In its place was a cold, blinding fury that made me realize why twelve families answered to his name.
"Listen to me very carefully, Elena," Gabriel whispered, squeezing my wrist until my fingers went numb. "You saved my life today. Which means you just made yourself the most dangerous person in this house."
He reached under his silk pillow with his free hand and pulled out a small, heavy silver key, forcing it into the palm of my hand and folding my fingers over it.
"At midnight, Dante will come back to finish what the poison started," Gabriel rasped, his breath hot and ragged against my neck. "He will bring a pillow or a syringe. He cannot let me live through the night."
"Mr. Costa, please," I sobbed, trying to pull my hand back. "Let me leave. I won't say anything! I'll take a bus out of the state—"
"If you walk out those gates, Dante’s men will put a bullet in your head before you reach the corner," Gabriel said coldly. "Your only way out of this house alive... is through me."
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He pressed his thumb against the silver key in my palm.
"This key opens the gun safe in the study behind the bookshelf," Gabriel whispered. "At midnight, when Dante steps into this room... I need you standing behind him."
