Chapter 4 - The Catskills Ledger
By 11:30 PM, the thirty-five syndicate commanders, port authority commissioners, and real estate directors who had attended the banquet were reconvened in the grand executive library on the ground floor.
Not a single guest had been permitted to leave.
They sat around the thirty-foot mahogany conference table in dead, petrified silence, their hands resting flat against the wood, sensing the absolute annihilation of an entire faction of their world.
At the head of the table sat Don Gabriel Thorne.
He had removed his tuxedo jacket, rolling his white dress shirtsleeves up over his corded, ink-stained forearms, his presence commanding such terrifying, undisputed gravity that no man dared to draw a full breath.
Sitting in the high-backed velvet armchair directly to his right—the seat of the Donna—was me.
Beside my chair sat my sister Chloe, wrapped in an oversized cream cashmere blanket, her bruised cheek treated with cooling herbal compresses by Dr. Vance, holding a warm cup of peppermint tea with both hands.
The heavy double oak doors of the study swung open.
Two armed sentries dragged Camilla Laurent into the room.
Her gold-embroidered silk gown was torn at the hem, her diamond necklace stripped away and sitting in an evidence bag on the table, her blonde hair tangled, her face smeared with tears and running mascara.
Marcus stepped forward, slamming the aluminum dispatch box onto the mahogany table directly before Gabriel.
“We cracked the primary cloud server registered to the Laurent family holding company in Nassau, boss,” Marcus reported, his voice cutting through the silence. “Found her father’s complete extortion records. Along with thirty-two signed contracts with corrupt building inspectors across Queens and Brooklyn.”
Gabriel flipped the lid open with a flick of his finger.
He pulled out a thick, black-bound ledger stamped with the seal of the Laurent Construction Group.
He opened the first page under the chandelier light.
“Read the summary on page one, Camilla,” Gabriel said softly.
Camilla stood shivering between the two guards, her chest heaving, unable to speak.
“I’ll read it for you,” Gabriel murmured, his voice flat as an iron slab.
“‘*Total liabilities cleared through coerced domestic placements: Four million, two hundred thousand dollars. Participating contractors: Arthur Vance, Richard Vale, and Julian Sterling.*’”
A collective, murderous roar rumbled through the thirty-five syndicate captains seated along the table.
In the underworld of New York, territory was fought with lead. Contracts were traded under iron treaties.
That was the life.
That was the code.
But running an internal human trafficking pipeline under the guise of domestic employment, selling the daughters and sisters of honest working families to corporate predators—that was an unforgivable, cowardly atrocity that carried an immediate, permanent death sentence under the council charter.
Don Salvatore Falcone, the oldest and most revered capo in the Five Families, slowly pushed back his heavy armchair.
The seventy-year-old mobster stood tall, leaning on his carved ash walking stick, his face twisted in ancient, merciless wrath.
He stopped two feet in front of Camilla.
“Camilla,” Falcone rasped, his voice vibrating with absolute disgust. “You were brought into this house to be a Donna. You were given the Thorne name to honor the bloodlines of this city.”
Camilla fell to her knees on the Persian rug, clutching the hem of Falcone’s trousers in desperate, groveling supplication.
“Don Salvatore! Listen to me! My father... my father was desperate! The concrete unions were striking across Manhattan! Arthur Vance promised to deliver the cement if we cleared his markers!”
“You don't sell innocent girls to buy cement, Camilla,” Falcone replied with chilling, final condemnation.
He turned toward Gabriel.
May you like
“Don Gabriel. The Commission recognizes the blood debt. The house of Laurent is stripped of all charters, all territories, and all protection.”
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