Chapter 9 - The Stripping of the Treasonous Bloodline
Marco Bellini tapped the master presentation terminal.
The four massive projection screens mounted beneath the frescoes illuminated simultaneously:
The Bribery Ledgers: Wire receipts proving Julian Vance and Beatrice Moretti paid $10 million across two years to five previous matrimonial candidates to stage public rejections and humiliate Luca.
The Port Sabotage: Proof that Julian had siphoned $38 million from the Genoa maritime terminal into an offshore shell entity in Panama.
The Confession Video: 4K surveillance footage from the flour vault at 2:30 AM, capturing Julian’s full sworn confession as he begged for his life under Luca’s hand.
The rotunda erupted into an uproar of absolute, unadulterated revulsion.
Two elderly capos slammed their fists onto the mahogany table, their faces turning crimson with fury.
"Treason!" Uncle Silvio roared, standing up and pointing his cane at Beatrice. "You conspired with foreign contractors to sabotage our ancestral bloodline for personal greed?!"
Beatrice slumped in her velvet chair, hyperventilating in sheer panic: "Silvio! It’s a fabrication! That baker girl engineered this to steal our inheritance!"
"Donna Sophia saved this family’s archives with her own hands last night, Beatrice," Elena declared with razor-sharp contempt. "While you were waiting for her husband to be murdered."
Uncle Silvio brought his heavy iron gavel down with a concussive crack that shook the chamber.
"By unanimous decree of the High Council," Silvio announced, "Julian Vance and Beatrice Moretti are stripped of the Moretti name, their assets are 100% confiscated to satisfy maritime restitution, and they are banished from the territory of Northern Italy under penalty of immediate death."
Two armed council guards seized Beatrice by her arms, dragging her screaming from the rotunda, while Julian was escorted to a federal transport van waiting outside.
The thirty elders rose to their feet in a unanimous, thunderous standing ovation.
Uncle Silvio stepped down from the podium, walking over to Luca and me.
The ancient patriarch bowed his head deeply before me, taking my hand and placing a heavy gold signet ring engraved with the Moretti griffin into my palm.
"Welcome to the head of the table, Donna Sophia," Silvio murmured with profound reverence. "You saw the man beneath the mountain."
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I looked up at Luca, whose gray eyes were shining with tears of pure, unshakeable vindication.
"I always saw him, Uncle Silvio," I smiled softly.
