Chapter 5 5

Seraphina POV

The silence in the Grand Salon stretched, thick and suffocating. Giovanni's eyes gleamed with a greedy, desperate hunger, waiting for me to confirm his connection to the most feared man in the underworld.

I didn't blink. I didn't flinch. I simply stared into his calculating eyes, letting the silence stretch until his confident facade began to crack.

"Why do you ask, Mr. Russo?" I asked, my voice perfectly level.

His face stiffened, caught off guard by the cold deflection. He straightened his posture, trying to summon the authority of a Don and a father. "You just need to answer my question."

"I have nothing to say" (*Niente da dire*), I replied, effectively severing the thread of his interrogation.

Giovanni's jaw clenched. The disappointment and irritation were palpable. He was already comparing me to the obedient, polished daughter he had raised in my place.

"How dare you speak to him that way?" Caterina snapped, stepping forward. Her initial shock had morphed into a venomous indignation. "You have no manners. You come into our home, and you show absolutely no respect for your elders."

I shifted my gaze to her. I didn't raise my voice, but I let the invisible leash on my instincts slip just a fraction. The temperature in the room seemed to plummet. I let the aura of 'Nine'-the Syndicate's top *Enforcer*, a girl who had survived the Cistern and the Culling-bleed into the space between us.

"Mr. Russo. Mrs. Russo," I said, tasting the sterile, distant titles on my tongue. "What makes you think you have the right to interrogate me?"

Caterina shrank back. The color drained from her face as genuine, primal fear flashed in her eyes. She opened her mouth to speak, but the words died in her throat.

*The last person who told me I was rude... their grave is already overgrown with weeds.*

Giovanni, sensing his wife's sudden terror and feeling the oppressive weight of my stare, tried to regain control. "You will learn respect," he demanded, though he kept a careful distance. "You should look to Bianca as an example. She knows how a true lady of this family behaves."

"Exactly," Caterina chimed in, finding a sliver of courage behind her husband's words. "Bianca is elegant. She has flawless etiquette, she plays the piano, she knows how to host. She is everything a Russo daughter should be."

I cut her off, my voice slicing through her desperate bragging like a scalpel. "She is not of your blood. She is an outsider."

In the Mafia world, blood was the only currency that truly mattered. The words hit them both like a physical blow.

"We raised her! She is our daughter in every way that counts!" Caterina shrieked, her hands trembling. "You are just jealous of her grace!"

"To me, she is worthless" (*un valore nullo*), I stated coldly.

Caterina shook with rage. She looked at me with such profound disgust that I knew she was mentally dialing Dr. Bianchi to demand a second DNA test. She couldn't fathom that her 'noble' bloodline had produced something as feral and unyielding as me. But beneath her fury, the fear remained. She didn't dare scream at me again.

The tense standoff finally broke when the grandfather clock chimed the hour. Night had fallen.

Caterina, having lost the verbal war, decided to pivot to a pettier battlefield. She waved over a terrified maid hovering near the archway and whispered sharp instructions into her ear.

"Show her to her quarters," Caterina ordered, refusing to look at me.

I followed the maid up the grand staircase, past the opulent master suites, and down a narrow, uncarpeted corridor on the second floor. She stopped in front of a plain wooden door near the service stairs and pushed it open.

The room was cramped. A single, low-quality bed sat next to a dark grey wardrobe. The air smelled faintly of mildew and neglect. It was a maid's quarters. A blatant, pathetic declaration of war from a woman trying to assert her dominance.

I stood in the doorway, my expression unreadable. "Is the Russo family going bankrupt?"

The maid flinched, clutching her apron. "N-no, Miss. Mrs. Russo instructed me to bring you here."

"And where does the adopted girl sleep?" I asked.

"Miss Bianca has the grand suite down the main hall," she whispered, her eyes darting nervously. "It's the best room in the estate."

I looked at the damp brick wall visible through the tiny window, then turned my gaze back to the trembling servant.

"Take me to her room. Now."

"But Miss, Mrs. Russo said-"

"Take me to her room. Now."