Chapter 4 - THE MATRIARCH’S REVENGE
“Isabella, drop the gun!” Vittorio yelled, instinctively taking a step toward his wife, though the tactical squad’s assault rifles immediately swung in his direction, their red lasers painting his chest.
“Shut up, Vittorio!” Isabella screamed, her finger twitching dangerously close to the trigger. Saliva flecked her lips as she glared at Salvatore with a hatred so pure it felt tangible. “You absolute fool! You think you won? You think this little family reunion is going to save you?”
Salvatore didn't blink. He stood completely relaxed, his hands casually shoved into the pockets of his charcoal coat, looking at Isabella as if she were a minor inconvenience blocking his view of the sunset.
“Isabella,” Salvatore said, his voice dripping with cool mockery. “You always did lack a proper sense of theatrical timing. Shooting me twenty years ago was messy. Doing it in front of federal witnesses and half the Chicago police department’s confidential informants is just poor estate planning.”
“I don't care about the police!” she shrieked, her hand trembling violently as the heavy Glock wavered between my father and me. “You ruined my life, Salvatore! You trapped me in a loveless marriage with a brute while you played king of the city! And now your bastard son waltzes in here and steals my daughter—”
“Mom, stop!” Sophia cried out, lunging forward, but I caught her by the waist and pulled her back behind my shoulder, shielding her from the line of fire.
“Stay back, Sophia,” I warned, my eyes locked on Isabella’s erratic movements.
“She chose the enemy!” Isabella screamed, tears finally spilling over her cheeks. “Just like you chose him over me, Salvatore! This ends tonight!”
She tightened her finger on the trigger.
Time seemed to fracture into excruciatingly slow shards. I saw the white-knuckle pressure of her finger. I saw the dark aperture of the barrel shifting toward my chest.
Crack!
The gunshot sounded like thunder inside the enclosed marble ballroom.
Glass shattered from a nearby chandelier, raining down like crystal dust.
But the bullet didn't hit my father.
Before Isabella could pull the trigger a second time, a second, sharper crack echoed through the room.
Isabella’s hand jerked violently. The Glock slipped from her bloody fingers, clattering against the marble floor. She let out a sharp gasp, clutching her right shoulder where a neat, smoking hole had bloomed through the expensive silk of her emerald dress.
She staggered backward, colliding with the edge of the wedding cake table, before collapsing heavily to the floor.
We all turned.
Standing near the open service doors, lowering a smoking custom-built Sig Sauer pistol, was Matteo. His face was an impassive mask of absolute professional coldness.
“Nobody shoots a Bellandi on my watch,” Matteo said quietly, sliding the pistol back into his shoulder holster.
Vittorio Moretti rushed to his wife’s side, dropping to his knees, pressing his hands against her bleeding shoulder. “Isabella! Isabella, look at me!”
Isabella groaned, her eyes rolling back as blood pooled beneath her designer dress.
Sirens began wailing in the distance—faint at first, but growing rapidly louder, cutting through the damp Chicago night air. Federal sirens. State police. The sound of an empire collapsing under the weight of its own corruption.
“You called the feds,” Vittorio said, looking up from his bleeding wife, his eyes fixed on Salvatore with total, shattered defeat. “You didn't just come to crash a wedding. You brought the Department of Justice with you.”
Salvatore pulled his hands out of his pockets and adjusted the cuffs of his shirt.
“Vittorio, my friend,” Salvatore smiled coldly. “Twenty years ago, you bought off the local police. But times have changed. The federal anti-racketeering task force has been auditing the Moretti shipping ports for six months. And thanks to the digital ledgers Sophia so kindly downloaded from her father’s private server three weeks ago... well, let’s just say your assets are currently being seized across three different continents.”
Vittorio sagged. The Don of Chicago, the man who had ruled the underworld with an iron fist for two decades, suddenly looked like an old, tired man whose house had burned down around him.
“Dad,” Sophia whispered, stepping out from behind me, her voice trembling as she looked at her bleeding mother and her broken father. “It’s over. The violence stops here.”
Vittorio didn't answer. He just pulled his wounded wife closer, burying his face in her hair as the heavy thud of approaching boots echoed outside the ballroom doors.
Federal agents in dark windbreakers poured into the room, their voices barking orders, securing the perimeter, cuffing the stunned security guards, and surrounding the shattered wedding altar.
Amidst the chaos of screaming guests, flashing lights, and federal agents shouting commands, Salvatore turned to me.
He placed a heavy, warm hand on my shoulder.
“You did well, Adrian,” my father said, his voice thick with a pride I had spent my entire life yearning for. “You took their empire. You won the war without firing a single unauthorized shot.”
I looked down at my hand. The silver wolf ring on my little finger was smeared with dust from the shattered champagne glass, but the tiny crack in the black stone still caught the light.
I had spent twenty years plotting revenge. I had married an enemy. I had burned my heart out to become a weapon.
And now that the smoke was clearing, I realized the war was over.
But as the federal agents moved in to cuff Vittorio and lead Isabella away on a stretcher, a federal marshal stepped through the crowd, walked straight up to my father, and tapped Salvatore firmly on the shoulder.
“Salvatore Bellandi,” the marshal said, holding up a pair of steel handcuffs. “You’re under arrest for federal racketeering, tax evasion, and obstruction of justice.”
May you like
My breath caught in my throat. I stared at the marshal, then at my father.
Salvatore didn't look surprised. In fact, he offered the federal agent a calm, knowing smile as he slowly extended his wrists.
