[Elena's POV]

A collective gasp rippled through the surrounding guests.

The woman in the emerald silk stared at my left hand. Her eyes widened to the size of saucers. She grabbed her companion's arm, her voice trembling.

"The black diamond," she breathed. "The Matriarch's seal. She wears the ring of the Velgrave Donna."

The whispers mutated into a panicked frenzy. The pearls-draped woman, desperate to assert her own fading status, lifted her chin and glared at me.

"La violenza è vietata ai ...