Chương 2 - DANTE DISCOVERED MY FATHER HAD SAVED HIM FROM A FAMILY ASSASSINATION—THEN THE TWO MEN I HAD NURSED THROUGH THE NIGHT REVEALED WHY THEY WERE REALLY SHOT AT THE DOCKS
Dante didn't pull the trigger.
That mattered.
He could have.
Instead, he kept the gun steady.
“Put it down, Celeste.”
Celeste's hand shook.
“I didn't hurt Valentina.”
“You have a syringe.”
“I took it from him.”
“From who?”
A man moved behind the curtain.
I saw him first.
“Dante!”
Gunfire erupted.
Dante dropped.
I dragged Valentina sideways.
Celeste fired toward the curtain.
A man in hospital-style scrubs crashed through the balcony door.
Security swarmed him.
Then silence.
I looked down.
Blood covered my feet.
“Serena.”
Dante was beside me.
“I'm fine.”
“You're standing on glass.”
“Technically kneeling.”
He almost smiled.
Then looked at Celeste.
“Who is he?”
She lowered the gun.
“Graham Voss.”
Dante's face changed.
I knew the name.
Everybody in Chicago construction did.
Victor Voss owned one of the city's largest private development groups.
Graham was his nephew and security chief.
Celeste whispered:
“My father works with Victor.”
Valentina closed her eyes.
Dante stared.
“Richard?”
Celeste nodded.
Richard Bowmont.
Her father.
Banker.
Philanthropist.
One of Dante's oldest business partners.
Celeste began crying.
“I found documents.”
“What documents?”
“Payments.”
“To Victor.”
“From Bowmont accounts.”
“Payments for what?”
“I don't know all of it.”
“Celeste.”
“I think my father helped arrange the attack when you were fifteen.”
Silence.
“And Miguel Cruz found out.”
Every eye turned toward me.
I suddenly hated being important.
Dante looked at my bleeding feet.
Then at his mother.
Then Celeste.
“Marcus.”
His security chief appeared.
“Police.”
Celeste stared.
“You're calling police?”
“Yes.”
“You?”
“Yes.”
Dante looked exhausted.
“I'm getting tired of burying problems.”
That sentence changed more than any bullet could have.
The next morning, my feet were bandaged.
Six stitches.
No permanent damage.
Dante drove me home.
He didn't order me back to the penthouse.
He didn't insist I stay somewhere he controlled.
He asked:
“Where do you want to go?”
“Home.”
So he took me to Little Village.
My apartment looked especially small after the penthouse.
Dante didn't comment.
Good.
I sat on the couch.
He remained standing.
“My mother said Miguel saved me.”
“Yes.”
“You knew for approximately five minutes before the attack?”
“Yes.”
He believed me.
Then:
“Did your father ever talk about my family?”
“No.”
“Nothing?”
“He hated expensive black cars.”
Dante almost laughed.
“Reasonable.”
“He had a scar under his ribs.”
“Gunshot.”
“I know that now.”
I looked at him.
“What happened?”
Dante sat.
“When I was fifteen, somebody arranged an ambush.”
“My father got me out.”
“He disappeared afterward.”
“Your family paid him?”
“My father offered.”
“Miguel refused.”
“That sounds like Dad.”
“He asked for one thing.”
“What?”
“For the Morettis to leave his family alone.”
My throat tightened.
“Why?”
“Because he knew whoever tried to kill me might eventually look for him.”
“And they did.”
Dante nodded.
“How did my father die?”
I already knew the official story.
Robbery at his repair shop.
Nine years earlier.
Dante didn't answer.
That was enough.
“You think he was murdered.”
“Yes.”
“By Victor?”
“Possibly.”
“Richard Bowmont?”
“Possibly.”
“That's not enough.”
“No.”
I stood.
“Then we prove it.”
Dante looked at me.
“We?”
“Yes.”
“You don't have to—”
“Stop.”
He stopped.
“This is my father.”
“Yes.”
“My decision.”
“Yes.”
“Good.”
That afternoon, Mateo came home from Northwestern.
I told him everything.
He paced my tiny living room.
“So Dad worked for the mafia?”
“Technically—”
“Serena.”
“Yes.”
“Great.”
He rubbed his face.
“I have an engineering exam Tuesday.”
“Life has terrible scheduling.”
He laughed despite himself.
Mom knew more than either of us.
When I told her, she sat silently.
Then opened an old closet.
Behind blankets was Dad's metal toolbox.
“I promised him.”
“Promised what?”
“Not to open it unless someone came asking about Dante Moretti.”
My entire body went cold.
Inside was a false bottom.
A key.
An address.
And a cassette tape.
Mateo stared.
“Dad was paranoid in analog.”
Mom slapped his shoulder.
“Respect.”
We found an old cassette player.
Dad's voice filled the room.
Serena. Mateo. Elena.
If you're hearing this, I wasn't paranoid enough.
Mom started crying.
Dad explained.
Twenty-two years earlier, he discovered someone inside the Moretti organization was stealing construction materials from legitimate projects and replacing them with cheaper substitutes.
Money moved through Bowmont Bank.
Victor Voss supplied fraudulent materials.
But the Moretti insider was the worst part.
Dante's uncle.
Lorenzo Moretti.
Valentina's brother-in-law.
He wanted Dante dead.
Dante was Alessandro Moretti's only son and heir.
If Dante died young, Lorenzo would gain control of legitimate holdings and much of the criminal organization.
Miguel discovered the plan.
He saved Dante.
Then collected evidence.
Alessandro confronted Lorenzo.
Lorenzo denied everything.
The family buried the scandal to avoid war.
Miguel left.
Years later, Richard Bowmont and Victor Voss found him.
Dad's final words:
If anything happens to me, don't let my children inherit this.
That broke me.
Because I was already inside it.
Working for Dante.
Caring about Valentina.
Feeling something for the man my father had tried to keep away from me.
The address led to a storage locker.
We went with police.
Empty.
Recently emptied.
Security footage showed two men.
Nico Ferraro.
Luis Vega.
The two men I had nursed after the dock shooting.
Dante stared at the screen.
“No.”
I remembered blood.
Bandages.
Luis joking about whiskey.
Nico thanking me before I left.
Dante called them.
No answer.
Marcus tracked their phones.
Both were at a Moretti warehouse.
We went with police.
Dante hated it.
He still went legally.
Inside, Nico and Luis were waiting.
Alive.
Armed.
They surrendered immediately.
Dante looked betrayed.
“Why?”
Nico answered:
“To protect you.”
Dante laughed bitterly.
“Everyone keeps using that sentence.”
Luis looked at me.
“Your father gave us the evidence.”
I stared.
“What?”
“Not personally.”
“Then?”
“After Miguel died, his attorney sent a package to a retired Moretti captain.”
“He passed it to Nico.”
“We've been investigating for nine years.”
“Why didn't you tell Dante?”
Nico looked at him.
“Because Lorenzo raised him after Alessandro died.”
Dante went completely still.
Lorenzo Moretti wasn't simply an uncle.
After Dante's father died, Lorenzo had become his mentor.
Adviser.
Second father.
Nico continued.
“We needed proof.”
“The dock shooting?”
“Lorenzo's men.”
“He found out we were looking.”
My stomach turned.
I had stayed beside two wounded men because they were hurt.
Those men had spent nine years trying to finish what my father started.
Luis opened a safe.
Inside were records.
Photographs.
Account numbers.
And a photograph of my father taken three days before his death.
Beside him stood Richard Bowmont.
Celeste's father.
On the back, Dad had written:
RICHARD WANTS OUT.
HE SAYS LORENZO WILL KILL US BOTH IF WE TALK.
Celeste wasn't the villain.
Her father might not be either.
Not entirely.
The real enemy had been sitting inside Dante's family for decades.
Then Nico gave Dante one final envelope.
Inside was a recent photograph.
Lorenzo.
Richard.
Victor Voss.
And Valentina.
Taken three weeks earlier.
Dante stared.
“Why was my mother meeting them?”
Nobody answered.
Then my phone rang.
Valentina.
I answered.
“Serena?”
Her voice shook.
“Valentina?”
“I need you to listen.”
“What happened?”
“Lorenzo knows.”
“Knows what?”
“That you found Miguel's recording.”
Dante grabbed his coat.
Valentina continued:
“Do not come to the penthouse.”
A man's voice sounded behind her.
Then the line went dead.
Dante looked at me.
For the first time since I met him, Chicago's most feared man looked terrified.
“My mother.”
I stood.
“We call police.”
He stared.
“You're not going?”
“I am.”
“But we're not charging into a building with guns.”
“Serena—”
“My father died trying to stop these people.”
“I won't honor him by repeating their methods.”
Dante looked at me.
Then slowly nodded.
“Police.”
“Yes.”
“Federal agents too.”
“Better.”
Mateo raised his hand.
“Can the engineering student stay home?”
I looked at him.
“Yes.”
“Thank God.”
He hugged me.
Then whispered:
“Bring Mom's favorite terrifying old lady back.”
I promised to try.
But when we reached the penthouse, Valentina was gone.
On Dante's desk sat one thing.
His untouched morning coffee cup.
Underneath it was a note.
COME TO THE OLD MORETTI HOTEL ALONE OR YOUR MOTHER DIES.
May you like
And below that:
BRING MIGUEL CRUZ'S DAUGHTER.
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