“No,” I said, and I was looking at Vincent now. Fear made my words sharp and clear. “You think I don’t know what this is? You think I haven’t spent my whole life watching men like you decide what my father and I get to keep? You want to gut our block and build condos for people who will never know my mother’s name. You want to use me to push him out. I won’t let you.”
Vincent raised his eyebrows, amused.
“And what will you do, darling? Sew us to death?”
I picked up the copy of the lease. My hands were steady now, with that strange, cold steadiness that comes when you have nothing left to lose.
“I will tell every reporter in this city that Moretti Holdings evicted a twenty-four-year-old woman and her widowed father from a shop her mother built with her own hands to make room for luxury condos,” I said. “I will stand on Fourth Street with a sign and tell them the west-side capo tried to buy me with my own rent. And I will make sure everyone knows it was you, Mr. Vincent Moretti, who ordered it. Not him.”
Silence fell over the restaurant. Even the fire seemed to quiet.
Vincent’s smile finally, slowly, died.
Noah stared at me like he’d never seen me before. Like I was something astonishing and terrifying and his.
“You wouldn’t,” Vincent said softly, but there was an edge now.
“Try me,” I said. “I have nothing. That makes me very dangerous.”
For a heartbeat no one moved.
Then Noah laughed.
It was a short, sharp, shocked sound. He stepped forward and took the lease copy from my hands, folded it once, and slid it into his jacket pocket.
“She’s right, uncle,” he said, his voice calm, deadly calm. “And you made one mistake. You brought family business into a public restaurant where half the clientele has a camera in their pocket. Paulie.”
Paulie, who had been standing behind Vincent, went pale. He looked between the two men, and I understood in that instant — Paulie had been reporting to Vincent all along.
“Boss, I —” Paulie stammered.
“You’re done,” Noah said quietly. “You don’t work for me anymore. You don’t work for this family anymore. You told her father I put a price on his daughter. You told my uncle where to find us tonight. You’re finished in this city. Walk out and don’t come back.”
Paulie’s mouth opened, closed. He looked at Vincent for help. Vincent gave him nothing, just a cold, dismissive flick of his eyes that said the pawn was spent.
Paulie walked out into the rain without looking back. The door shut behind him with a soft click.
Vincent’s face was stone.
“This isn’t over, Noah,” he said.
“It is,” Noah said. “The building is in my name, not the family’s. I paid for it with my own money, not the holdings. Check the filing. You have no claim. And if you try to take west-side from me over a tailor shop, the other families will wonder why Vincent Moretti is so afraid of a girl with a measuring tape.”
Vincent stared at him for a long, long moment. Then, without another word, he turned and left. The doorman didn’t hold the door for him.
The restaurant exhaled.
I sat down hard, my legs suddenly unable to hold me. My hands flew to my face. I was breathing too fast, too shallow.
Noah knelt beside my chair, not touching me, just close enough that I could feel his presence, solid and warm.
“Elena,” he said softly. “Breathe. Look at me. Just breathe.”
I dropped my hands. His face was inches from mine. His eyes were anxious, searching.
“You were magnificent,” he whispered.
“I was terrified,” I whispered back, and a laugh that was half a sob escaped me. Tears spilled over before I could stop them.
