Chapter 5 - Dante Found His Father Alive, and the Man He Had Hated for Twenty Years Finally Told Him Why He Had Protected Bianca
Dante entered the room alone.
His father stood by the window.
Older.
Gray.
Alive.
“You.”
The older man turned.
“Son.”
Dante's gun shook in his hand.
“You let me believe you were dead.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“To protect you.”
Dante laughed.
“Everyone uses that excuse.”
His father nodded.
“I deserved that.”
Bianca entered.
Dante's father looked at her.
“Your father trusted me.”
Bianca stared.
“Why?”
“Because we loved your mother.”
The sentence shocked both of them.
Dante's father explained.
He and Bianca's father had planned to destroy the trust.
They discovered Victor had corrupted the network.
He was manipulating both families.
Rose was his partner.
The entire Black Rose operation had been designed to force the heirs together.
Then Victor could take control.
Dante's father had faked his death.
Bianca's mother had disappeared.
The children had been separated.
The plan was to keep them safe.
But Victor had followed.
He found Bianca.
He watched her.
He manipulated her life.
Dante stared at his father.
“You should have told me.”
“I was afraid.”
“Of what?”
“That you'd become me.”
Dante looked at Bianca.
“I almost did.”
His father smiled.
“But you didn't.”
Bianca asked:
“Where is my mother?”
“Safe.”
“Where?”
He gave them an address.
An hour later, Bianca saw her mother.
She broke down.
They embraced.
Her mother cried.
“I thought you hated me.”
“I never hated you.”
“You should have.”
“You left me.”
“To save you.”
“I needed you.”
“I know.”
Dante looked away.
His father approached him.
“Your mother loved you.”
“I know.”
“She would have been proud.”
Dante swallowed.
Then his father handed him a final document.
The trust.
The complete version.
At the bottom was one clause:
The trust can only be dissolved by the joint decision of the two heirs.
Dante and Bianca.
They could destroy it.
Together.
That was the one thing Victor had not known.
They returned to Chicago.
Victor was waiting.
“Give me the trust.”
Dante shook his head.
“No.”
“Then I kill her.”
Bianca stepped forward.
“You won't.”
Victor smiled.
“You sound like your mother.”
She looked at him.
“She wasn't afraid of you.”
Neither was she.
Dante stepped beside her.
“Neither are we.”
Victor ordered his men forward.
Gunfire erupted.
Dante and Bianca escaped through the ballroom.
They reached the old vault.
The trust required both signatures.
Bianca looked at him.
“If we destroy it, billions disappear.”
Dante nodded.
“Then we destroy it.”
They signed.
The documents began burning.
Victor screamed.
“No!”
The network collapsed.
Banks froze.
Accounts disappeared.
Every secret became public.
Victor fled.
But his escape wouldn't last.
Police arrived.
The empire was finished.
Dante looked at Bianca.
“You're free.”
She smiled.
“So are you.”
He took her hand.
“Then stay.”
She looked at him.
May you like
“I was planning to.”
---
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