"Seraphina," she whispered urgently, her voice shaking, "do you even know where these kids came from? You're giving them everything. Everything. Can't you keep something, anything, for yourself?"
I gave her a small, reassuring smile, trying to calm her fears.
"It's okay, Mamma," I said softly. "I trust my judgment. Nothing will happen."
The moment the words left my mouth, her composure shattered.
She started crying, the kind of raw, uncontrollable sobs that draw attention from across the room. Then, to my shock, she dropped to her knees right there in front of me, her hands clutching at my clothes as if she could physically stop me. Elisabetta Valente, wife of a Don, a woman who had survived decades of this life without ever bending in public, was on her knees. The soldiers along the walls looked away. Even the capos at the far tables went quiet.
"Please, Seraphina," she begged. "Don't do this. I'm begging you."
Her fingers closed white-knuckled around the crucifix at her neck.
Before I could respond, my father stormed over, his face dark with anger and confusion. Salvatore Valente, former head of the Commission of the Five Families. A man whose name once made other Dons choose their words with surgical care. The moment he saw my mother kneeling and the document in my hand, something inside him snapped.
He didn't hesitate.
His hand came down hard across my face, the sharp sound cutting through the gathering like a gunshot. My head snapped to the side, and for a moment, everything went silent. Not a glass moved. Not a chair shifted. The entire room held its breath because no one had ever seen Don Salvatore strike his own blood heir.
"You're a disgrace to the Valente name!" he roared, his voice filled with fury and disappointment.
Even then, even with the sting on my cheek and the weight of my parents' desperation pressing down on me, I didn't stop.
I signed.
The moment my signature was complete, Nico's grin spread across his face, wide and unmistakably satisfied. And then, right there, in front of everyone, he turned away from me and walked across the room.
He wrapped his arm around another woman.