Chapter 1 - The Wrong Moretti
Camille Brooks caught Lucian Moretti by the burgundy tie and whispered: “Say please.”
Lucian looked down and noticed the etiquette contract beside her hand.
One sentence had been circled in black ink.
“Client: Lucian Moretti.”
He had hired her for the wrong man.
Nobody moved.
For three long seconds, the dining room seemed to forget how breathing worked.
Camille could feel the warmth of Lucian’s chest beneath her palm. She could also feel every pair of eyes in the room fixed on that hand.
Three security men stood near the walls.
A housekeeper beside the silver cart had frozen with a spoon halfway to a serving bowl.
And Matteo Moretti, Lucian’s twenty-eight-year-old younger brother and the supposed reason Camille had been summoned to the mansion, was fighting so hard not to laugh that his shoulders shook.
Lucian Moretti did not laugh.
He was six-foot-four, broad through the shoulders, dressed in a dark burgundy shirt with the sleeves rolled over tattooed forearms. Dark hair swept back from a face that looked as though smiling had been removed from his schedule years ago.
He lowered his gaze to Camille’s fingers around his tie.
Then he looked into her eyes.
“Excuse me?”
His voice was quiet.
That somehow made everyone more nervous.
Camille released his tie.
“You heard me.”
Matteo lost the battle.
A laugh burst out of him.
Lucian turned his head.
Matteo immediately picked up his water glass and studied it as though it contained the secrets of the universe.
Camille stepped back.
She was accustomed to difficult clients.
Professional athletes whose agents wanted them taught not to insult sponsors.
Newly wealthy executives who confused expensive forks with good manners.
Politicians who could deliver speeches to thousands but treated restaurant staff as furniture.
She had built Brooks Protocol & Etiquette from a rented office and one folding desk into a respected consulting business by refusing to be intimidated by titles, bank accounts, or reputations.
But she had never worked for a man whose assistant had made her sign a confidentiality agreement before telling her the address.
She also had never walked into a dining room containing three armed guards.
That had been new.
“Ms. Brooks,” Lucian said, “I hired you for Matteo.”
“Yes.”
“Then why are you touching my tie?”
“Because it was crooked.”
Matteo made a strangled sound.
Camille continued.
“And because you snapped your fingers at Mrs. Alvarez when you wanted the bread.”
The housekeeper holding the spoon stared at Camille in horror.
Lucian slowly glanced toward her.
Mrs. Alvarez lowered her eyes.
“I did not snap at her.”
“You did.”
“I was getting her attention.”
“You have a voice.”
Lucian’s jaw shifted.
Camille smiled pleasantly.
“The word is please.”
One of the guards coughed into his fist.
Lucian’s eyes moved toward him.
The coughing stopped.
Matteo leaned forward.
“Camille, I would like it officially recorded that this is the best evening I’ve had in months.”
“You’re not innocent either.”
Matteo’s smile vanished.
“You arrived twenty minutes late.”
“I had a thing.”
“You interrupted me four times.”
“I’m conversational.”
“You called the sommelier ‘champ.’”
“He liked it.”
“He did not.”
Matteo looked toward the sommelier.
The man became fascinated by a bottle of wine.
Camille opened the folder she had brought.
“Your brother needs polish. You need control.”
Lucian’s eyes narrowed.
“I have control.”
“You threatened to fire a man because he moved your chair.”
“He moved it without asking.”
“He moved it three inches.”
“It was my chair.”
“That sentence is exactly why we’re having this conversation.”
Matteo bent forward, laughing silently again.
Lucian stared at Camille.
Most people looked away from Lucian Moretti eventually.
Camille didn’t.
She had learned something about powerful men during ten years of consulting.
They were often surrounded by people who had confused obedience with respect.
Lucian seemed to have an entire mansion full of them.
“Sit,” Camille said.
Nobody breathed.
Lucian’s eyebrows rose.
“Was that an order?”
“No. It was an example of bad manners.”
She gestured toward the chair.
“Please sit.”
Something changed in his eyes.
Not anger.
Interest.
Lucian pulled out the chair and sat.
Matteo slapped the table once.
“I’m witnessing history.”
Camille pointed at him.
“Napkin.”
Matteo looked down.
His napkin was tucked into his collar.
“Oh.”
He removed it.
For the next forty minutes, Camille conducted the strangest etiquette lesson of her career.
Matteo deliberately used the wrong fork twice just to irritate his brother.
Lucian corrected him.
Camille corrected Lucian for correcting him while someone else was speaking.
Matteo laughed.
Camille corrected Matteo for laughing with food in his mouth.
By dessert, even Mrs. Alvarez was hiding a smile.
It should have felt ridiculous.
Instead, Camille noticed something.
Matteo was not wild.
Not really.
He was playful, irreverent, occasionally rude, and clearly enjoyed testing boundaries.
But every time a member of the staff approached, Matteo moved his chair to give them room.
He thanked Mrs. Alvarez without being prompted.
When a young server spilled a drop of sauce beside his plate, Matteo covered the mistake with his napkin before Lucian could notice.
Lucian, meanwhile, controlled everything.
Where people stood.
When dinner began.
Which doors remained open.
Which phone calls could interrupt.
Even the temperature of the room had apparently been adjusted because he had frowned once.
Camille closed her notebook.
“Lesson over.”
Matteo raised both hands.
“Did I pass?”
“No.”
His face fell.
“But you’re not my primary concern.”
His grin returned instantly.
Lucian placed his fork down.
“Explain.”
Camille looked at him.
“Matteo knows the rules.”
“He ignores them.”
“Sometimes.”
“That is why you are here.”
“No. He knows when manners matter.”
She glanced toward the staff.
“He sees people.”
Lucian’s expression hardened.
“And I don’t?”
“You see responsibilities. Risks. Problems. Employees. Enemies.”
She paused.
“I’m not sure you see people anymore.”
Silence.
This time Matteo didn’t laugh.
Camille knew she had crossed an invisible line.
She also knew retreating now would destroy every bit of authority she had established.
Lucian rose.
He walked toward her.
Camille remained where she was.
When he stopped, less than two feet separated them.
“You know very little about me.”
“Then perhaps stop behaving like a man who wants everyone to know very little about him.”
His gaze sharpened.
“Careful.”
“There it is.”
“What?”
“The threat.”
“I didn’t threaten you.”
“You didn’t have to. You expected the word to do the work.”
For the first time, Lucian looked genuinely caught off guard.
Camille picked up her folder.
“You hired an etiquette coach because Matteo embarrassed you at a charity gala.”
“He climbed onto a piano.”
“He was helping an eighty-year-old singer whose microphone stopped working.”
Lucian glanced at Matteo.
Matteo lifted one shoulder.
“She was doing Sinatra. You don’t abandon Sinatra.”
Camille continued.
“You told your assistant he embarrassed the family name.”
“He did.”
“No. He embarrassed you.”
Lucian’s face went still.
There.
Camille had found it.
Not anger.
Fear.
It disappeared almost instantly.
But she had seen it.
Lucian Moretti wasn’t afraid of his brother behaving badly.
He was afraid of losing control.
Camille collected her papers.
“We continue tomorrow at nine.”
“No.”
She looked up.
Lucian stood with both hands in his pockets.
“You’re fired.”
Matteo sat upright.
“Lucian.”
Camille nodded once.
“All right.”
That response clearly wasn’t what Lucian expected.
She reached into her folder.
“Your agreement requires payment for the first week.”
“I’ll pay the full month.”
“I don’t accept money for work I didn’t perform.”
“Take it.”
“No.”
His eyes narrowed.
“You say no frequently.”
“I find it useful.”
She turned toward the door.
“Ms. Brooks.”
Camille stopped.
Lucian had picked up the contract.
He was staring at it.
Then he looked toward his brother.
“Did you alter this?”
Matteo frowned.
“Alter what?”
Lucian turned the document around.
A line near the bottom had been circled.
Camille had noticed it earlier, but assumed Lucian’s assistant had marked it.
CLIENT SUBJECT TO BE EVALUATED: LUCIAN MORETTI.
Matteo stood.
“I’ve never seen that.”
Lucian’s expression changed.
He looked toward his security chief.
“Who prepared this contract?”
“Your office did.”
“Which person?”
The security chief hesitated.
Camille felt the mood of the room transform.
The humor disappeared.
Lucian walked to the table.
“Bring me the original.”
“Boss—”
“Now.”
The man left.
Matteo moved beside Camille.
“You didn’t write that?”
“No.”
Lucian studied her.
“Who sent you?”
“Your assistant contacted my office.”
“Which assistant?”
“Daniel Price.”
Lucian became motionless.
Matteo’s face lost its color.
Camille looked between them.
“What?”
Lucian folded the contract once.
Slowly.
“Daniel Price died eleven months ago.”
A chill moved through Camille.
“That’s impossible.”
“Did you speak to him?”
“Several times.”
“When?”
“Yesterday.”
Nobody spoke.
Camille pulled out her phone.
She found the email chain.
Daniel Price.
The messages were there.
The contract.
The instructions.
The address.
Everything.
Then a new email appeared at the top of her screen.
No subject.
Sent thirty seconds ago.
Camille opened it.
There was only one sentence.
DON’T LET LUCIAN SEND YOU HOME.
She looked up.
At that exact moment, footsteps stopped outside the dining room.
Lucian turned toward the doors.
The handles began to move.
May you like
Someone was coming in.
And whoever it was had used a dead man’s name.
