Chapter 7 - The Confrontation with Vivienne
Three days later, I was stable enough to be transferred out of the ICU into a secure private recovery suite guarded by four of Mateo’s most trusted loyalists. But before I could even ask about my daughter, the door swung open, and Vivienne Cross was pushed unceremoniously into the room by Salvatore. She wasn't wearing her spotless camel-hair coat anymore; she wore a standard orange holding jumpsuit, her hair unbrushed, and her face twisted in hysterical, snarling terror.
""You can't do this to me!"" Vivienne screamed, lunging toward my bed before Salvatore grabbed her by the collar of her jumpsuit and slammed her down into a chair beside the nightstand. ""Mateo! Tell him to let me go! Your wife is lying! She staged the whole thing!"" I sat up slightly against the adjustable mattress, adjusting the supportive pillows behind my back, looking down at the woman who had tried to murder me and my unborn child with cold, clinical detachment.
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""Staged a brake line cut that sent my car flying off the coast road?"" I asked softly, my voice carrying an icy authority that silenced her hysterical screeching instantly. Vivienne paled, her eyes darting nervously toward the doorway where Mateo stepped into the room. He didn't look like a mafia boss negotiating a truce; he looked like an executioner attending an appointment. He walked over to the bed, placed a small, framed photograph on my bedside table, and then turned slowly toward Vivienne.
I looked down at the photograph. It was a polaroid taken in the NICU just an hour earlier: a tiny, beautiful baby girl with a full head of dark hair, resting peacefully inside an incubator, hooked up to miniature sensors. My daughter. A lump formed in my throat, but I forced my tears back. Mateo turned his freezing ice-blue gaze back to Vivienne. ""You thought you could inherit my empire by getting rid of my wife and child,"" Mateo said, his voice dropping into a quiet, terrifying whisper. ""You forgot one fundamental rule about the Greyport waterfront, Vivienne: everything you thought you owned was only ever mine to give. And what you tried to steal belongs to my blood."" He signaled to Salvatore, who dragged a sobbing, screaming Vivienne out of the suite into the dark corridor below, permanently erasing her from our lives.
