Chapter 14 - The Betrayal at the Center
Marco survived.
Barely.
Police found him inside an abandoned building near the Hudson.
He had been shot through the shoulder.
No major artery.
No organ damage.
When I visited the hospital, he looked angry to be alive.
“That’s reassuring,” I said.
“What?”
“You look disappointed.”
He almost smiled.
Vincent stood at the foot of the bed.
“You disobeyed me.”
Marco stared.
“I work for you.”
“I am aware.”
“You do not get to give me that speech after disappearing alone.”
Marco looked at me.
“She’s changing you.”
“I can hear you.”
“That was intentional.”
Then Mara entered.
She had questions.
So did we.
Marco finally explained.
His real surname was not Hayes.
It was Moretti.
Vincent stared.
“What?”
Marco’s grandfather had been Salvatore’s half brother.
A branch excluded from the family business.
His father had spent his life resentful.
Renato recruited him.
Marco entered Vincent’s security operation years later on Salvatore’s recommendation.
Initially, he was supposed to report on Vincent.
“Did you?”
“Yes.”
Vincent’s face hardened.
“For how long?”
“Eight months.”
“And then?”
“I stopped.”
“Why?”
Marco looked embarrassed.
“You were less terrible than expected.”
I laughed.
Vincent did not.
“I’m touched.”
Marco became loyal to Vincent.
Renato never forgave him.
That was why Renato feared him.
Not because Marco was stronger.
Because he knew how Renato’s network worked.
“Where is he?”
Mara asked.
“Moving.”
“Where?”
“I don’t know anymore.”
“What happened last night?”
“I met Paolo Santoro.”
Luca went pale.
“My father?”
“Alive.”
Luca sat.
Marco continued.
Paolo had spent twenty-eight years working for Renato.
He wanted out.
Not from remorse.
From fear.
Renato was eliminating everyone connected to the old crimes.
Paolo offered information in exchange for protection.
Then the meeting was attacked.
“By Renato?”
“Yes.”
“Where is Paolo?”
“Gone.”
“Dead?”
Marco looked at Luca.
“I don’t know.”
Luca closed his eyes.
I suddenly understood how families like this survived.
Nobody ever received a clean answer.
Only an answer contaminated by another secret.
Mara opened a folder.
“We have another problem.”
Federal investigators had executed warrants on three Belladonna subsidiaries.
Vincent stared at her.
“For what?”
“Racketeering.”
The word sat heavily in the room.
I looked at him.
He did not appear surprised enough.
That told me everything.
“You knew.”
“Nora.”
“How much?”
“This isn’t the place.”
“Wrong.”
I stepped closer.
“Apparently every place becomes the place eventually.”
Vincent said nothing.
“Your sister warned me not to confuse who you were at twelve with who you became.”
His expression tightened.
“What did you do?”
He looked around the hospital room.
Then at me.
“I inherited businesses that were not legitimate.”
“And?”
“I shut many down.”
“Many.”
“Yes.”
“Not all.”
“No.”
There it was.
The truth I had avoided.
Vincent Moretti had not earned the name people whispered by being misunderstood.
He had done things.
Maybe not everything rumored.
But enough.
“You told me Belladonna Holdings was legitimate.”
“It is.”
“You aren’t.”
Silence.
Vincent accepted the sentence.
“Yes.”
I stepped back.
He looked older.
“I spent fifteen years trying to separate the legal companies from the organization my father left.”
“Trying?”
“Every time I cut one piece away, another person depended on it.”
“So you kept it.”
“Parts.”
“Why?”
“Power.”
At least he did not lie.
“Because I believed if I gave up power, men like Renato would take it.”
“And did that stop him?”
“No.”
“Did it bring my mother home?”
“No.”
“Did it keep Vivian from beating an employee in your ballroom?”
His eyes dropped.
“No.”
I nodded.
“Then maybe your throne isn’t protecting anyone.”
Nobody spoke.
Mara broke the silence.
“The federal warrant names Vincent personally.”
“When?”
“Arrest could come within forty-eight hours.”
Vincent almost smiled.
“Thank you for the warning.”
“It isn’t a favor.”
“I know.”
I left the hospital alone.
Outside, reporters waited.
Someone shouted:
“Ms. Rossi, are you taking control of the Moretti empire?”
I stopped.
Looked at the cameras.
And said the sentence that would be played on television for the next two days.
“There shouldn’t be an empire.”
Then I walked away.
That night, Eleanor called.
Renato had scheduled the final emergency board vote.
Forty-eight hours.
If Vincent was arrested first, several directors intended to abandon us.
“If we lose?”
I asked.
“Renato controls Belladonna.”
“And the archives?”
“He can order them moved.”
“Destroyed?”
Eleanor paused.
“He could try.”
My phone buzzed.
A message from an unknown number.
Not Renato.
One photograph.
My mother.
Me.
Age three.
We were sleeping on a couch.
The photograph had been taken from inside our apartment.
Beneath it:
ELENA TRUSTED THE WRONG MAN TOO.
Then a name.
LUCA.
I looked up.
May you like
Luca Santoro stood across the hospital corridor.
Watching me.
