Chapter 7
7
Victor’s surgery took forty-seven minutes.
The signal from the temporary operating room on the Mediterranean line was unstable. The screen broke into static several times. The lead surgeon’s gloves were covered in blood, but his voice did not dare shake.
“Miss Moretti, his blood pressure is still dropping.”
“Move the pressure point three millimeters left. Don’t touch the pericardium.”
“I can see the bullet.”
“Don’t remove it. Stop the bleeding first. Right now, you need to keep him alive, not fight for a pretty post-op scan.”
No one in the operating room spoke again.
On the other side of the screen, Victor’s chest was pulled back from the edge of death. On my side of the screen, Lorenzo sat beside me and watched me take over a life-or-death call that the Moretti elders should have controlled.
At two sixteen in the morning, Victor’s vital signs stabilized.
I took off the headset.
Lorenzo’s phone rang at the same time.
The video meeting was already connected. Five Moretti elders sat on the screen, each face worse than the last.
Aldo spoke first.
“Aviana, we are grateful Victor survived. But you froze Marcelli the moment you came back. The impact is too big. It will affect the family’s East Coast position.”
I looked at him.
“Three years ago, Marcelli used my medical fund, my cold-chain license, and my anonymous guarantee. Now I’m taking them back myself. I don’t need approval from the elders.”
Aldo’s face turned cold.
“You left for three years. Moretti’s medical network and foundation should no longer be controlled by you alone.”
I pushed a file toward the camera.
“You said that once before, three years ago.”
The main screen lit up.
It was an application to freeze inheritance rights.
The filing date was the seventh day after I disappeared.
The reason was that Aviana Moretti had been missing for a long time and was presumed dead. Her medical network, foundation, and offshore accounts should be placed under temporary control of the elders.
Signed by Aldo Russo.
No one in the hall spoke.
I kept scrolling.
The second page showed his failed attempt to take over my foundation. The third page showed his emails to an offshore lawyer about changing the beneficiary. The fourth page showed a consulting fee he wired to a private Harbor Club account.
Lorenzo’s eyes landed on Aldo.
“Explain.”
Aldo’s lips moved.
I did not give him time to make up a story.
“You’re not afraid that I touched Marcelli,” I said. “You’re afraid that now I’m back, I’ll find out your hands were already in my accounts.”
When the car stopped in front of the Moretti estate, dawn had not come.
Men lined both sides of the iron gate. No one dared call me Ava.
I walked into the hall. My wet clothes had been changed, my knee had been wrapped, and I carried my own surgical case.
In front of the fireplace, Lorenzo placed a black access card on the table.
“Moretti’s medical network, port cold-chain licenses, and foundation will belong to Aviana from this moment on.”
Aldo stood at once.
“She has no right.”
I placed the old pocket watch on the table.
The cover opened. There was no photo inside. There was a microchip.
Three years ago, before I left Moretti, I hid the original medical network key inside it. Dante had seen this watch countless times. He only thought it was old. He never asked why I kept it with me.
I connected it to the main screen.
A row of access rights lit up.
Medical fund. Port cold-chain. Ghost Line Black Level channel.
They all showed the same original holder.
Aviana Moretti.
Aldo’s private accounts lit up one second later.
Every transfer he had tried to move in the past three years, with amounts, dates, and shell companies, was displayed in the center of the hall.
Lorenzo looked at him.
“Take him away.”
When Aldo’s shoulders were seized, he finally lost control.
“She should never have come back. If she hadn’t insisted on leaving the family, Moretti would never have been trapped by Marcelli’s East Coast line.”
I watched him get dragged away.
“That’s why I came back.”
A car sounded outside.
When Dante rushed in, his shirt still held traces of rain and blood. Only Enzo followed him.
He did not look at the elders. He did not look at the accounts on the screen.
His eyes landed on me like I was his last way out.
“Aviana, my father woke up.”
No one in the hall spoke.
Dante took one step forward and lowered his voice.
“He said he only accepts you as the Marcelli daughter-in-law.”