She Returns as A Billionairess

Carmela Greco POV:

I tried to make a fist. The thick layers of gauze refused to yield, and beneath the sterile white cotton, fire licked along the delicate network of nerves in my palms. These hands had once authenticated forty million dollars in uncut stones in a single afternoon. Now they were evidence.

The photograph on my phone was my new insurance policy. Gianna's message, glowing in the dark of our bedroom last night: *"The cream worked perfectly. She'll never authenticate again. The Cartelli elders will have no choice but to accept me. You owe me, Vince. Don't forget what the Rossi family knows about 2011."*

I had read it four times while Vince showered. Then I took a photograph. Then I transferred the image to three separate cloud accounts and a physical drive hidden in the lining of my winter coat. Paranoia, in this house, was a survival skill.

Outside the floor-to-ceiling windows, Manhattan glittered in the cold morning light. The alliance ceremony was twelve hours away. Twelve hours until I was supposed to become Carmela Moretti, silent ornament at the head of the most dangerous table in New York.

I wasn't going to make it to the altar.

The front door clicked open. My heart stayed steady. Fear had been replaced by a cold, crystalline focus. I had spent five years in this house learning to read every micro-expression, every shift in body language, every silence. Now I would use those skills as weapons.

Vincenzo Moretti walked in. His enforcer Rocco--a mountain of a man with hands that had broken bones for this family since before I arrived--stood in the hallway behind him. Vince dismissed him with a flick of his fingers.

He saw me on the sofa, gave a curt nod, and walked to the wet bar. The heavy clink of cut-crystal against marble. Two fingers of grappa. Same ritual every night. The predictability of dangerous men was their greatest vulnerability.

"Busy day?" I asked. My voice was soft. Carefully calibrated to sound fragile.

"Hmm." He took a long swallow, his back still to me. "The Cartelli elders are demanding answers. Marco says you haven't returned his calls."

"My hands hurt too much to type." I lifted the bandaged bundles. The gesture was calculated. Remind him I'm wounded. Remind him I'm weak. Let him underestimate me.

He finally turned. His gaze dropped to my hands. "What did the surgeon say?"