Chapter 5 - The Parley
At four in the afternoon, a single black sedan was permitted through the outer perimeter gates. It was not Matteo. Matteo was too terrified to face the guns. It was Arturo Lobo himself.
The patriarch of the Lobo family looked twenty years older than he had at Sunday lunch. His tailored Brioni suit was crumpled, his hair disheveled, and the arrogance that usually defined his posture was replaced by the frantic twitch of a ruined man.
Two of Victoria's guards escorted him into the great conservatory, where Victoria sat behind a massive desk carved from solid mahogany. I sat in a high-backed leather chair beside her, a heavy wool blanket draped across my lap to hide the bruised swell of my stomach.
"Señora Montoya," Arturo gasped, stopping ten paces away as Tomas stepped into his path, one hand resting casually on the butt of a holstered pistol. "Please. There has been a monstrous misunderstanding."
Victoria didn't offer him a seat. She didn't even look up from the leather-bound ledger she was reviewing. "A misunderstanding, Arturo? Did your wife mistake my daughter's womb for a baseball diamond?"
Arturo turned pale gray. "Beatrice is unwell! She has... nervous episodes! She was drinking! We are prepared to offer Lucia an immediate, unconditional settlement. Ten million dollars. A deed to the coastal villa. Full custody of the child with zero visitation rights for Matteo! Just release the freeze on our dealership accounts. The banks are seizing our inventory in two hours!"
"Ten million dollars?" Victoria murmured, finally raising her eyes. Her dark gaze pierced him like an ice pick. "Do you know what my daughter’s afternoon nap is worth to me, Arturo?"
"Señora, please—"
"You came to my city twenty-five years ago with three stolen car titles and grease under your fingernails," Victoria said softly, her voice carrying across the silent glass room. "I allowed you to build your little empire because your lots paid their franchise taxes to my shell companies on time. You thought you were an aristocrat. You allowed your wife to treat my blood like a stray dog brought home from the shelter."
She closed the ledger with a soft, final thud.
"Your company is already bankrupt, Arturo. At two o'clock, the state tax board seized your physical lots for twenty years of fraudulent sales-tax filings. The Special Crimes Unit has issued an arrest warrant for Beatrice for premeditated attempted murder. And as for your son..."
Victoria glanced at me, nodding slightly.
May you like
I looked Arturo directly in the eyes. For two years, this man had ignored me at family dinners, demanding I pour his whiskey and clear his plate while his relatives snickered.
"Tell Matteo," I said, my voice steady and cold, "that if he ever speaks my name again, I will let my mother handle the divorce proceedings personally."
