"**“TAKE THOSE SHOES AWAY FROM HER! SHE CAN BARELY WALK, AND I'M NOT HAVING AN OLD WOMAN FALL IN FRONT OF MY DINNER GUESTS!” THE MAFIA BOSS'S FIANCÉE HUMILIATED HIS 25-YEAR-OLD MAID FOR HELPING HIS 78-YEAR-OLD MOTHER PUT ON HER SHOES—BUT WHEN TERESA MORETTI GRABBED THE MAID'S HAND AND WHISPERED, “SHE DOESN'T LET ME WALK ANYMORE,” LUCA SLOWLY PUT DOWN HIS GLASS.**

The visiting room at Metropolitan Correctional Center on South Clark Street was a subterranean chamber of reinforced concrete, bulletproof polycarbonate glass, and buzzing fluorescent tubes that made everyone look like corpses.

Michael Moretti sat on the opposite side of the partition, wearing an orange jumpsuit stamped with Cook County Department of Corrections across the back. His broken knee was bound in a cheap institutional plastic splint, his hands chained to a steel ring welded directly into the stainless-steel counter. His eyes were sunken, dark purple rings circling his sockets, his fingernails chewed down to the quick.

On our side of the glass sat Luca, Teresa, and me.

Luca wore a simple black turtleneck and charcoal wool trousers, his hands resting flat on the counter. Teresa sat between us, wearing her gold wedding band on her left hand and Vittorio’s signet ring on her right thumb. I sat beside her, taking notes in a leather-bound legal journal on behalf of the family trust.

Michael looked through the scratched glass, his mouth twitching into a sick, bitter parody of a grin.

"Look at the holy trinity," Michael rasped through the intercom speaker. "The Don, the Saint, and the Maid. Did you bring the priest to give me my last rites, Luca? Or did you come to gloat before the New York hitters slip a screwdriver between my ribs in the shower?"

"The New York hitters aren't coming, Michael," Luca said, his voice flat, emotionless, and cold.

Michael’s grin froze. "What?"

"Don Falcone met with me yesterday in Milwaukee," Luca continued. "I handed over the Panama banking records showing you stole three million dollars from the New York pension fund to cover your crypto losses. Falcone didn't order a hit on you. He did something much worse."

Michael’s skin drained of all color. "What did he do?"

"He revoked your family status," Teresa said.

The words hung in the sterile air between them like an iron curtain dropping.

"He signed an order of complete excommunication," Teresa explained, her voice steady, stripped of all motherly sorrow. "You are no longer recognized as a Moretti by the Commission. You are no longer recognized as an Italian by the Five Families. To the underworld, Michael, you do not exist. You are simply Federal Inmate Number 84920-024."

Michael slammed his chained fists against the counter, the steel links rattling violently against the partition. "I am Vittorio Moretti's son! You can't strip my blood! My blood is on the foundation of every dock in this city!"

"No," Luca said quietly, leaning forward until his breath fogged the polycarbonate glass. "Your blood is a poison that tried to drown an innocent boy in his own crib. Dad spent thirty years trying to wash it out of the lineage, but you were born rotten, Michael."

Luca reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a small, faded photograph, pressing it flat against the glass.

It was a Polaroid from September 1995.

In the picture, two two-year-old boys sat side by side on the grass of the backyard garden. Julian was smiling, holding a small wooden block, his big brown eyes filled with pure, untainted light. Beside him sat Michael, staring straight into the camera lens with cold, unblinking, predatory stillness.

Michael looked at the photograph, his breathing turning ragged, his chest heaving inside the orange jumpsuit.

"Dad kept this in his Bible," Luca said softly. "On the back, he wrote six words: *'Forgive me, Lord, for I knew.'*"

Tears suddenly spilled from Michael’s eyes—not tears of repentance, but the bitter, toxic weeping of absolute defeat.

"I hated him," Michael choked out, his forehead pressing against the glass until the plastic squeaked. "Every time Dad touched his head... every time Dad smiled when Julian played with those damn wooden trains... I wanted to rip Julian's throat out. Why did he get to be innocent? Why did I have to carry the guns? Why did I have to be the devil while he got to be an angel?"

"Because you chose to be the devil, Michael," Teresa said, rising slowly to her feet, leaning on her walking stick. "Julian didn't choose his mind. God made him gentle. But God gave you a sharp brain, charm, and wealth, and you chose to feed your own brother stale bread in a dark hole."

She looked down at her son through the glass for the very last time.

"Tomorrow morning, you are being transferred to ADX Florence in Colorado," Teresa said. "The federal supermax. Twenty-three hours a day in an eight-by-ten concrete box. No visitors. No phone calls. No television. Only four walls and the memories of what you threw away."

Michael began to scream, thrashing against his chains, his face contorting in pure terror. "MOM! NO! NOT FLORENCE! PLEASE! LUCA, TELL THEM TO KEEP ME IN CHICAGO! DON'T SEND ME TO THE HOLE! MOM! LOOK AT ME!"

Teresa didn't look back. She turned her wheelchair, reached out her hand to me, and said softly, "Take me home, Hannah. It smells like rot in here."

Luca stood up, took the Polaroid of the two boys from the glass, folded it neatly into his breast pocket, and walked out of the visiting room without uttering a single parting word.