Chapter 102 THE PRICE OF SILENCE.

Chapter 102 THE PRICE OF SILENCE.
DANTE.
Call logs with timestamps displayed my mother’s voice, recorded clearly on the screen. The conversations detailed the planning and payments related to Max's murder. There was also a video. I shut it off after just Forty seconds, managing to keep my expression neutral.
"You understand now." She wasn't gloating.
"If this comes to light," I replied in a similar low voice, "you're implicated. You received payment. You're on that record."
"I am." She didn't flinch. "I told you I have nothing to lose. No family waiting for me. No legacy to protect. No name of significance in the financial press." She slightly moved her head away. "I can withstand a conviction in ways your mother cannot. And your father's name—" she paused, knowing precisely where to strike, "—won't endure what's coming next."
A clean, cold rage coursed through me.
"I can make you disappear tonight," I said, "and that means every issue you've created vanishes with you."
"If I disappear tonight," she responded, completely unfazed, "twenty-seven encrypted emails will automatically send to eleven different recipients." She picked up the wine bottle again. "Among them are two journalists, two federal prosecutors, and someone at the FBI who has had a keen interest in the Ashford case for quite some time. And lastly, one of your business rivals will be so happy to have such materials." She took a sip. "I prepared this before entering here because I knew you'd say exactly that. You’re predictable in your power, Dante. Brilliant men often are."
I had encountered dangerous people before and built what I had partly by recognizing which rooms were perilous and how to navigate them without becoming someone unrecognizable to myself. I had formed certain friendships that polite society would find unsettling and made calls that never left any trace in official records. I wasn't naive about what lay beneath the world’s polished surface.
But this woman was different.
She didn’t fear me.
Not even slightly.
 That, more than the device and with it contained and who could get access to it was the thing that told me exactly who I was dealing with.
"I'll send the money you requested. Just leave us alone."
She set the bottle down, clearly unimpressed.
"The amount has changed." She fixed her gaze on me without blinking. "It's now a hundred million dollars. To show a little generosity, I won't also ask for anything from your mother once this payment is made."
I clenched my teeth, fighting the urge to wrap my hand around her neck and squeeze. Instead, I formed a fist.
"You've lost your mind."
"Possibly." There was no smile on her face. "But consider what you're purchasing. Not just silence but certainty. I'm not coming back. I'm not renegotiating in six months. I'm not greedy by nature, Dante, I'm greedy this once, for reasons I won't bore you with." Something moved briefly behind her eyes, genuine, human, before it was masked again almost instantly. "You made me come find you. You sent someone to look for me. You made this expensive. That's not on me."
I stood in that room and calculated the numbers dispassionately, methodically, without letting my feelings cloud their reality.
A hundred million at the cost of my mother's freedom, my father's reputation being tarnished, Oliver losing me, and Cinnamon's disdain for me.
Eight zeros.
A lifetime of silence purchased in seconds.
I took out the secondary phone, my thumb hovering as I typed. The number stared back at me.
"You keep your word," I stated firmly, not as a question but as a condition. "Don't let me come find you because I'll show no mercy."
"I keep my word." Her tone dropped its facade. "I'm not a monster. I utilized what was available to me. Once it's done, it's done." A pause followed her words. "I genuinely like your mother, by the way. She's an extraordinary woman who made one catastrophic choice in a moment of grief and love, that's more human than most people's worst days."
I didn't respond to that remark.
I transferred the money.
Confirmed.
I turned the phone to show her the confirmation screen. She glanced at it with just resolved and not triumph or satisfaction.
 I looked down at the device in my other hand. Then I let it drop onto the marble floor and stomped on it with all my might. The sound of it shattering filled the room. Fragments skidded across the floor and hit the baseboard. I placed the damaged phone next to it, she had touched it, connected with it, and I refused to carry anything she had breathed on. She watched the destruction with interest.
"Destroying the device, I understand," she said, "but why the phone?"
"Because you touched it."
She made a small sound, almost one of respect. "Smart."
She smoothed her dress and walked over to me, placed her lips briefly against my cheek.
"In about five minutes, there will be a news," she murmured against my jaw. "I'll make it vanish within a month if you don’t do anything reckless." She pulled back slightly to meet my gaze directly. "You're powerful, Dante. Truly powerful. I'm not dismissing who you are." Her gold-brown eyes held mine steadily. "But power has its boundaries. Where yours ends, others' begins. Remember that and let this be over."
She picked up her wine when suddenly the door burst open. Our heads turned to it.
Cinnamon stood in the doorway, her eyes moving quickly between my face, the woman beside me, our close proximity that was hard to justify at a glance, the wine bottle, and the shattered pieces of the device on the floor whose significance she couldn't know.
The woman beside me didn’t step away.
She turned to Cinnamon with a composed smile that was also quite irritating. "Just leaving, Mrs. Moretti." Her voice was still melodic, showing no hint of remorse. She glanced back at me for a brief moment. "Take care of yourself, Dante." Then she walked past my wife and exited the room. The silence that followed felt overwhelming.
Cinnamon stood in the doorway, arms crossed over her chest, her gaze fixed on my face, trying to read it without saying a word, just observing the room and sensing what she couldn't fully grasp.
"Cinnamon—" My voice quivered as if I was guilty. "It's not what—"
"What the hell," she shouted, "do you think I'm thinking right now?"
I opened my mouth but found myself speechless. No words came to me. No way to explain the truth that wouldn't require revealing everything, and sharing everything meant burdening her with something that couldn't be taken back once it was shared.
I stood there in silence, watching her expression. She didn't break, that felt almost worse.
"Cinnamon! Dante!" A frantic scream came from outside, full of urgency and indicating that something was wrong.
Risa rushed in, breathless and visibly distressed. "Dante." Her voice trembled. "Your mom collapsed."
Cinnamon's hand flew to her mouth in shock. "What? She was just—"
I was already in motion.
Through the door, past Risa, I dashed into the corridor toward the staircase.
My phone vibrated in my hand as I ran. I unlocked it, seeing a notification from the legal wire I had subscribed to.
I continued running but my eyes caught the four words of a headline.
"MAX ASHFORD CASE REOPENED."
Everything fell silent as I stopped running.