Blood Ledger The Minter's RiseChapter 1
My brother was the kind of man who thought himself above the frost and snow. The eldest daughter of the most powerful Don on the Eastern Seaboard, the woman every made man in the territory would kill to marry? He found the whole thing beneath him.
He ran off with a nightclub singer instead.
Me, though? I was the vulgar one.
After I married Rosalia Castellano in my brother's place, I spent every waking hour crunching numbers and chasing profit.
In just one year, the Castellano family's holdings overflowed with gold and jade, its operations spanning the entire territory.
Even the old man who watched the gate at the compound ate meat three times a month.
Rosalia declared before everyone:
"Meeting Angelo Ferraro was the greatest fortune of my life."
Business was booming. Then my brother came back, alone, with nothing but a worn leather bag on his back.
He jabbed a finger at my face:
"A man who reeks of money like you, and you think you deserve to stand beside the Don's daughter?
"You've turned this entire operation into a den of greed! Have you given a single thought to the family's reputation?"
With that, he dropped to his knees before Rosalia:
"My brother is crude and unworthy. He has tarnished the Castellano name! I am willing to take over the household and restore dignity to this family!"
Rosalia looked at my brother's refined, austere face.
Her cheeks flushed.
"Granted."
Severance papers landed on the table.
I became the laughingstock of Kingsport.
I didn't argue. Didn't make a scene. I packed my things and left like I was told.
So why did they all come begging me to come back?
……
When Rosalia Castellano said "Granted,"
I was caught off guard.
I had rolled up my sleeves and poured myself into running her family's operations for an entire year.
She had praised me more than once in front of others.
She said I was the greatest fortune of her life.
And now, after one look at my brother's face,
she was ready to hand him everything?
Emilio slid me a sidelong glance, dripping with contempt.
It was always like this.
He had been a prodigy with words and letters since childhood, groomed to be a consigliere of the highest order.
All I ever knew was arithmetic, the lowly craft of earners.
Every time he dazzled a room with some effortless quotation from Machiavelli or Dante, he would turn and give me that same look. That quiet, cutting dismissal.