Chapter 12 - Vanessa’s Last Desperate Lie Falls Apart In Front Of The Family
The remaining gunfire subsided within two minutes.
Marco and the strike team had rounded up the surviving five mercenaries, forcing them onto their knees with zip-ties binding their wrists behind their backs.
Antonio Romano had been dragged out from behind the shipping crate by Gianni, who had a blood-soaked bandage wrapped around his shoulder and jaw from the fight at the rose garden.
Romano was trembling, his expensive camel-hair coat ruined with black grease and dirt.
His cigar was gone.
His silver hair was matted with sweat.
Marco walked over to Luca.
“Don Moretti. Romano is secured. What about Don Salvatore Bellini?”
Luca didn't let go of me.
He kept his arm firmly around my waist as he stood.
“Bring Salvatore in,” Luca said.
A side door of the warehouse opened.
Two Moretti soldiers escorted an old man into the hall.
Don Salvatore Bellini.
The patriarch of the Bellini family looked as though he had aged twenty years in a single night.
His hands shook violently as he saw the blood-soaked floor.
Then, his eyes landed on the lifeless body of his daughter Vanessa lying beside the rusted oil drums.
A strangled cry tore from Salvatore’s throat.
He fell to his knees beside Vanessa’s corpse, clutching her cold, limp hand.
“My daughter... my little girl... God in heaven, what happened here?”
Salvatore raised his tear-streaked face toward Luca, his voice shaking with furious grief:
“Luca! You swore she was your fiancée! Did your men slaughter her like a dog?”
“Ask your partner,” Luca said, his voice flat, gesturing toward Romano.
Salvatore turned his head toward Antonio Romano.
Romano spat blood onto the floor and sneered.
“Don't look at me like that, Salvatore,” Romano rasped. “Your daughter was a greedy, treacherous viper. She came to me three years ago with Elena Moretti’s schedule. She offered me Elena’s life if I guaranteed her brother’s safety and gave her a twenty percent cut of the south dock operations.”
Salvatore went completely white.
“No... Vanessa would never... she loved Elena like a sister!”
“She hated Elena,” Romano sneered, enjoying the destruction of the Bellini pride even at the threshold of his own execution. “Elena found out Vanessa was skimming money from the Moretti charity foundations to pay off Mario’s drug debts. Vanessa lured the girl onto Lake Shore Drive so my men could run her into the concrete barrier. Then Vanessa spent three years pretending to be the grieving sister-in-law to crawl into Luca’s bed!”
Salvatore looked back at his daughter’s pale, lifeless face.
The truth shattered the old man’s spine.
Every lie.
Every fake tear.
Every moment Vanessa had spent consoling Luca over his sister’s grave was revealed as cold-blooded, calculated murder.
“And tonight,” Luca added, his voice cold enough to cut through steel, “Vanessa tried to frame Claire. She beat this girl with a blade to cover up a military wiretap. And when Romano didn't need her anymore, he put a bullet through her heart.”
Salvatore buried his face in his hands, weeping bitter, broken sobs.
The Bellini family’s honor was obliterated.
Their name was forever synonymous with treason, murder, and greed.
Luca walked over to Antonio Romano.
He stopped two feet in front of the kneeling cartel boss.
“Any last words for the commission, Antonio?” Luca asked quietly.
Romano looked up, a twisted smile curling his bloody lips.
“The syndicate will never let you keep this city, Luca. You’re a monster.”
“I am the Don of this city,” Luca replied.
He drew his Sig Sauer.
He didn't hesitate.
He didn't give a speech.
A single shot ended Antonio Romano’s reign over the Chicago underworld.
The body slumped forward onto the gravel.
Luca reholstered his weapon without looking down.
He turned back to Salvatore Bellini, who was trembling on the floor.
“Take your daughter’s body, Salvatore,” Luca said softly. “Pack whatever remains of your family. By sunset tomorrow, there will not be a single Bellini within five hundred miles of Chicago. If I ever see your face again, you will join her in the dirt.”
Salvatore could only nod, bowing his head against the cold floor in utter defeat.
“Gianni,” Luca called.
“Yes, Boss?”
May you like
“Burn this warehouse to the ground. Then prepare the car. We are going home.”
================================================================================
