Chapter 49

Chapter 49
NARRATOR

The phone rang just as Sofía finished tying the cashmere shawl around her shoulders. She answered with the voice she reserved for the most serious business: controlled, firm, without a trace of weakness.
“Yes?”
The voice on the other end was deep—her brother Don Russo’s—hoarse from years of cigars and difficult decisions. Urgency was evident in his few words.
“Sofía, come to the estate now. I have information I need to clarify with you. It’s delicate. Not over the phone.”
She barely sighed, an almost imperceptible sound.
“I’m on my way.”
She hung up and stood for a moment looking at her reflection in the dressing-room mirror. Silver hair gathered into an elegant bun, a fitted black dress outlining curves time had not entirely subdued. She looked impeccable, as always. But inside, the weight of the past few days crushed her.
She had navigated family wars, bloody betrayals, and fragile alliances for decades. But she had never imagined the past would catch up to her like this—through that forbidden flame she had ignited with Sebastián. A fire now threatening to consume her.
She knew it could cost her dearly. Her brother was a man of weapons, of cold-blooded decisions, a patriarch who did not tolerate weakness in the family. And what she had done with Sebastián was exactly that: an unforgivable weakness.
She called the driver, took her purse, and left without haste. Her heels echoed on the marble like verdicts.
On the way to the estate, her mind worked in silence. She had to control the situation, handle her brother carefully. She couldn’t allow this to turn into open war. She couldn’t allow Sebastián to be hurt because of her.
When she arrived at the estate—an austere stone building in the Sicilian hills—her brother was waiting in the main hall. He sat in a worn leather armchair, a glass of grappa in hand and a lit cigar. The fire crackled in the fireplace.
He shook her hand without looking at her much, a firm but distant grip.
“Sit,” he said without preamble.
Sofía obeyed, crossing her legs elegantly.
“I’ve been told Valentina caused a scandal at your house,” her brother said, cigar smoke rising. “What exactly happened?”
Sofía did not lie or embellish the story. She calmly recounted how Valentina had burst in, how she had discovered them in bed, how she had screamed threats of revenge. He listened impassively, without interrupting.
“It has to be contained,” he finally said, extinguishing the cigar in a crystal ashtray. “But not with unnecessary violence, Sofía. If this spills into the public eye, the family falls. And with it, everything we’ve built. The Russians will smell blood.”
Sofía nodded, her jaw tight.
“I know. I’ll fix it.”
“How?” he asked sharply. “Valentina is unpredictable. And if she decides to talk…”
“She won’t,” Sofía cut in. “She has too much to lose. Her children, her position. She won’t risk it.”
Her brother studied her for a long moment.
“You’d better be right. Because if this explodes, I won’t be able to protect you. Not even from Sebastián.”
Sofía held his gaze without blinking.
“I understand.”
She left the estate with her head high, but her hands trembled slightly as she got into the car. Before starting the engine, her phone vibrated. Sebastián.
“I need to see you,” he said without preamble, his voice broken. “Now, Sofía. I can’t stand this shit anymore.”
She closed her eyes for a moment, feeling guilt and desire mix in her chest.
“No,” she replied with a coldness she did not feel. “This isn’t the time. Valentina is out of control. Focus on her, on your children. Take care of your house.”
“But I want to see you,” he insisted, vulnerable for the first time. “I need you.”
“No.” Sofía was firm. “Don’t call me for comfort. Control your house, or you’ll lose much more than an affair. I’ll handle my family. You handle yours.”
She hung up before he could respond, staring at the phone with uneven breathing before slipping it into her purse.
Not because she didn’t want to see him. But because she knew that everything she did from now on had to be done with a cold head, not with her heart.

The presidential suite was dim when Damián arrived. Valentina had been there for days, planning every detail of her revenge. The ashtray overflowed with cigarette butts, the air thick with smoke and expensive perfume.
She had paid for the private jet that brought him from Mexico. She had used contacts even Sebastián didn’t know about. She had moved pieces in silence, as she had been taught all those years in the family.
When Damián entered, she studied him carefully. He had that raw air of the slums, the hardened gaze of someone who had seen too much. A tense body beneath a fitted T-shirt, hands marked by old scars.
“I wasn’t expecting someone like you,” he said without courtesy, dropping his suitcase on the floor.
Valentina offered him a cold, feline smile.
“Don’t trust appearances, Damián. Did you bring what I asked for?”
He stepped to the table and opened the suitcase. Inside were documents, photographs, an encrypted USB drive.
“I have everything. Evidence, contacts, a plan to leak information. Do you have your part?”
Valentina laid a folder on the glass table. Photos of Mateo in his cassock, of Lucía with the twins, bank documents, smuggling routes. Names of police contacts, controlled ports, upcoming shipments.
Damián reviewed everything carefully, his eyes gleaming with each page he turned. When he reached the photos of Lucía, he paused. His fingers brushed the image almost reverently.
“So the saint of Chiapas belongs to the Sicilian mafia,” he murmured, a crooked smile on his lips. “That’s why it was impossible to track her. That’s why she vanished without a trace.”
“He protects them all,” Valentina said, pouring herself a glass of red wine. “He’s the family’s moral shield. If he falls, everything collapses. Reputation, alliances—everything.”
Damián looked at her with something like admiration.
“Then we make him fall.”
“Exactly,” she replied. “I want Sebastián to feel what it’s like to lose everything. I want my mother to pay for betraying me. I want this family to burn.”
Damián nodded, closing the folder.
“I want Lucía. And I want to see that priest bastard suffer. If I have to burn everything in my path to get it, I will.”
Valentina raised her glass.
“Then we have a deal.”
He took the other glass and they clinked them together. The sound of crystal meeting crystal echoed in the silence of the suite like an oath.
For the next hours, they worked nonstop. They spread digital maps across the laptop, reviewed contact lists, offshore account numbers. Damián had connections in hacking and tabloid journalism. Valentina had privileged information from years inside the family.
“First we attack his credibility,” Valentina said, pointing to documents. “We leak more information about Mateo. Photos of Lucía in Sicily, of the girls. Proof that the family is protecting him. Let the international press do the rest.”
“Then we go after the business,” Damián continued. “The Russians are already waiting for my call. With the information you give them about the shipping routes, the family will lose millions in a matter of weeks.”
“And finally,” Valentina smiled coldly, “when they’re weak and bleeding, I finish them. Sebastián, my mother, everyone who humiliated me.”
Damián watched her silently.
“You’re more dangerous than I thought.”
“I learned from the best,” she replied. “I’ve spent years watching how they operate, how they manipulate, how they destroy their enemies. Now I’ll use everything I know against them.”
They kept working, refining every detail. Names of scandal-hungry journalists, exact timing for leaks, anonymous accounts to send information. Everything had to be precise, calculated.
“And if they suspect you?” Damián asked at one point.
Valentina lit another cigarette, smoke rising slowly.
“Let them suspect. By the time they realize, it’ll be too late. And even if they discover me, they won’t be able to do anything. I have copies of everything stored in safe places. If they touch me, it all comes out anyway.”
“Smart.”
“Necessary.”
When dawn began to filter through the suite’s windows, both were still awake. Surrounded by papers, computers, empty coffee cups.
Valentina stood and walked to the window. Palermo was slowly waking under the gray sky.
“Tomorrow we begin,” she said without turning around.
“Tomorrow,” Damián repeated, stepping closer. “And this time I won’t fail. Not like before.”
She turned to look at him. Two broken people, destroyed by the same family, united by hatred.
“We won’t fail,” she corrected. “Because this time we’re not alone.”
They held each other’s gaze in silence. No more words were needed. The pact was sealed.
Outside, the city began its daily routine, unaware of the storm brewing in that suite. A storm that, within weeks, would destroy everything the De Luca family had built for generations.
And at the center of that storm, Valentina and Damián, ready to watch it burn.