Old leather and cigar smoke hung over the council hall. Each family had sent its Don. Their guards waited beyond the closed doors.
Dante stood at the head of the mahogany table with my father's empty chair behind him. Chloe sat on his right in a white dress, her hands folded for the family heads to see.
Dante was halfway through his speech. Copies of the command-center report lay at every place. He had stripped out the forged transfer that brought me there.
"The reports show that her recent actions were erratic and emotional. The Peregrine Protocol was the act of a woman scorned. The Rossi empire needs a steady hand and a logical mind. Mine."
Several family heads glanced at one another. Others kept reading, checking the gaps against what their own people had heard.
No one had voted ye
