Chapter 4 - THE SHADOWS OF SICILY
The heavy doors of the armored SUV slammed shut, sealing us off from the howling wind and the burning wreckage of the hospital. The vehicle’s engine roared to life, tires spinning against the wet asphalt as Salvatore peeled out of the ambulance bay, weaving through traffic with the reckless precision of a man who had survived a dozen turf wars.
In the back of the spacious vehicle, the atmosphere was thick, suffocating, and heavy with unspoken truths.
Dad was breathing through a portable oxygen mask Michael had snatched from the ICU room. His eyes were closed, his pale face slick with cold sweat, but the steady beep of the mobile heart monitor we had managed to grab was holding firm.
Vincent sat in the corner, his hands trembling as he wiped a smudge of soot from his forehead. He kept looking between Michael and Salvatore, his jaw clenched so tight I thought his teeth might crack.
“Salvatore?” I finally broke the silence, my voice shaking as I clutched my knees to my chest. “I thought you were in Palermo. I thought you retired.”
Salvatore kept his eyes fixed on the rearview mirror, dodging a pair of screaming fire trucks heading toward the hospital. “Retirement in our line of work, little Sophia, is usually spelled with a tombstone. Anthony sent me away twenty years ago. Not because I was old. But because I was the only one who refused to sign the execution order for Michael.”
I turned my head slowly, staring at my uncle.
Michael was sitting beside Dad’s mattress, gently holding his brother’s calloused hand. Despite the chaos, despite the fact that our lives had been entirely upended in the span of three hours, there was a strange, haunting peace in Michael’s expression.
“You knew,” I whispered, looking at Michael. “You knew Frank was a traitor all along.”
“I knew the Syndicate had infected the upper echelons of the Moretti family,” Michael corrected me, his voice low and steady. “Frank wasn't just a security guard. He was hand-picked by the board of directors thirty years ago to watch your father. Every move Anthony made, every territory he claimed, every dollar he laundered—Frank reported it directly to the shadow board.”
Vincent let out a harsh, bitter laugh, burying his face in his hands. “And Dad thought he was the king. He thought he was running Chicago, while he was just a dancing monkey for a board of faceless billionaires.”
“Anthony tried to break away,” Salvatore chimed in from the front seat, his voice grave. “That’s why your mother had to die, Sophia.”
The air in the SUV dropped another twenty degrees.
I leaned forward, my heart stopping. “Tell me. Right now. You tell me everything about my mother.”
Michael looked up from Dad’s hand. He met my eyes, and for the first time, I saw the full weight of the tragedy he and Dad had carried in secret for nearly two decades.
“Your mother, Elena, was a brilliant accountant before she married your father,” Michael began, his voice soft, recalling a memory long buried. “When she took over auditing the family’s shipping accounts to help Anthony legitimize the business, she found discrepancies. Millions of dollars vanishing into shell companies that didn't belong to the Moretti family.”
“She found the Syndicate’s funding pipeline,” Vincent murmured, connecting the dots.
“Exactly,” Michael nodded. “She confronted Anthony with the ledgers. She told him she was taking you kids and going to the federal authorities if he didn't cut ties with the board immediately. Anthony panicked. He came to me in the middle of the night, begging for a way to save her without the board finding out.”
I stared at Dad. He opened his eyes slowly, looking at me with a plea so desperate, so agonizing, it made my chest ache.
“We staged her death,” Michael whispered. “We faked the car accident. We put an empty casket in the ground so the board would think the loose end was tied up. We smuggled Elena out of the country in the trunk of a car, hiding her in a safe house off the coast of Sicily under Salvatore’s watch.”
The world stopped spinning.
My mother wasn't dead.
She hadn't died in that fiery car crash seventeen years ago.
“She’s… she’s alive?” I choked out, tears bursting from my eyes, hot and fast. “My mother is alive?!”
“She was,” Salvatore said grimly, slowing the vehicle down as we approached the heavy iron gates of an abandoned rail yard on the outskirts of the city. “Until three days ago.”
Answer One: Our mother hadn't died in the car crash; she had been hidden in Sicily to protect her from the board.
Open Two: What happened three days ago? And why did Salvatore say she was alive?
Michael’s face hardened into stone. He pulled a silver locket from beneath his shirt, opening it to reveal a tiny, faded photograph of a smiling woman with dark hair and bright, intelligent eyes.
“Three days ago, the safe house in Sicily was breached,” Michael said, his voice dropping to a dangerous whisper. “The same men who ambushed Anthony tonight. They didn't come to start a war. They came to finish the one Elena started twenty years ago.”
Vincent slammed his fist against the SUV door. “Then the ambush on Dad wasn't random! It was retaliation because they found out Mom was still breathing!”
“And now,” Salvatore added, cutting the engine as we rolled into a massive, dark industrial warehouse, “they know Michael is back. Which means we are standing in the middle of a crossfire with no exits left.”
Salvatore killed the headlights.
May you like
The warehouse was pitch black, save for a single shaft of moonlight cutting through the rusted skylight overhead.
“Get your weapons,” Salvatore ordered, opening his door. “We have visitors.”
