Chapter 3 – The Box in the Blood

I didn’t think. I just ran.

I banged on the heavy mahogany door of the guest suite, screaming for the guards to open it.

“Let me out! He’s hurt!” I yelled, adrenaline overriding my common sense.

The lock clicked, and one of the guards peered in, looking panicked. Before he could stop me, I shoved past him, sprinting down the grand staircase as fast as my legs could carry me.

By the time I reached the grand foyer, the massive front doors were wide open, rain blowing across the marble floor.

Luca and Marco were hauling Arthur Bellini’s limp body inside, leaving a horrifying trail of crimson on the pristine white stone.

“Get the medic! Now!” Luca roared, his voice echoing off the vaulted ceiling.

I rushed forward as they laid Arthur on the floor. His breathing was shallow, his eyes rolling back in his head. The gunshot wound in his abdomen was bleeding profusely.

“Press down!” Luca ordered me, grabbing my hands and forcing them over the wound.

I didn’t hesitate. I pressed my full weight against Arthur’s stomach, my hands instantly slick with his blood.

Arthur gasped, his eyes focusing wildly on Luca.

“The box,” Arthur choked out, coughing up a spatter of blood. “Take the box.”

Luca pried the small black velvet box from Arthur’s rigid fingers.

“Who shot you, Arthur?” Luca demanded, his face inches from the dying man. “Where is Vanessa?”

Arthur let out a wet, rattling laugh that sounded more like a sob.

“She didn’t know, Luca,” Arthur whispered, tears mixing with the rain on his face. “Vanessa didn’t know what was on the tape. She just wanted the money in the safe to save my company.”

“She stole the evidence of my mother’s murder!” Luca yelled, shaking the older man slightly. “And now you have it! Tell me who shot you!”

Arthur reached up with a trembling hand, grabbing Luca’s collar.

“I tried to get it back from her,” Arthur gasped, his eyes wide with a terrifying realization. “I knew… if she listened to it… she would know the truth.”

Luca froze.

The air in the foyer turned to ice.

“What truth, Arthur?” Luca asked, his voice dropping to a dangerous, vibrating whisper.

Arthur looked past Luca, staring blankly at the crystal chandelier above us.

“It wasn’t me, Luca,” Arthur breathed, his voice barely audible over the storm outside. “I didn’t pay the mechanic to cut the brakes.”

Luca’s hands shook as he held the velvet box. “Then who did?”

Arthur swallowed hard, the light fading rapidly from his eyes.

“The man on the tape,” Arthur whispered. “The man who paid for the hit… was your father.”

The silence in the foyer was absolute, deafening.

I stopped breathing, my hands still pressed against Arthur’s wound.

His father.

Frank Moretti. The frail, seventy-six-year-old man who had just sat at the dining table, weeping over the memory of his dead wife.

“You’re lying,” Luca snarled, backing away from Arthur in pure, unadulterated horror. “My father loved her! He was destroyed when she died!”

“He was destroyed… because he didn’t mean to kill her,” Arthur choked out, closing his eyes. “The hit… wasn’t meant for Elena. It was meant for you, Luca.”

I felt the blood drain entirely from my face.

Luca staggered backward, bumping into the wall, his chest heaving as if he had just been stabbed.

“Me?” Luca gasped, the world shattering around him.

“You were threatening his power,” Arthur explained, his voice growing fainter. “You were taking over the syndicate. He wanted to disable your car… put you in the hospital… remind you who was in charge.”

Arthur opened his eyes one last time, looking at Luca with profound, agonizing pity.

“But your mother took your car that morning, Luca,” Arthur whispered. “She took your car.”

Arthur let out one final, shuddering breath, and his chest stopped moving.

The medic rushed through the front doors a second too late.

Arthur Bellini was dead.

I slowly pulled my bloody hands away from the body, trembling violently. I looked at Luca.

The Don of Chicago was completely broken. He stared at the black velvet box in his hands, his entire reality crumbling into dust. His father—the man he had protected, loved, and respected—had ordered a hit on him, and accidentally murdered the love of his life instead.

“Boss,” Marco said quietly, stepping forward, his gun drawn. “If Frank ordered the hit… we have a massive problem.”

Luca slowly lifted his head. The grief in his eyes was instantly incinerated by a blinding, terrifying rage.

“Where is he?” Luca asked, his voice dead.

“I put him in the east wing guest room after the dinner, sir,” Marco replied.

Luca didn’t say another word. He opened the velvet box.

Inside was the small microcassette tape. The only proof of his father’s monstrous crime.

He shoved it into his pocket, drew his heavy Glock from his shoulder holster, and racked the slide with a sharp, metallic clack.

He marched toward the grand staircase.

“Luca, wait!” I screamed, scrambling to my feet, my uniform soaked in Arthur’s blood. “Don’t do this! He’s your father!”

Luca stopped on the first step. He didn’t turn around.

“He stopped being my father ten years ago,” Luca said coldly.

He disappeared up the stairs, Marco following closely behind.

I stood in the foyer, paralyzed by fear. I couldn’t just stand there and let a son execute his own father, no matter what the old man had done.

I ran up the stairs after them.

When I reached the east wing, the hallway was eerily quiet. The door to Frank’s guest room was wide open.

I crept forward, my heart hammering in my throat.

I peeked inside.

The room was empty.

The bed hadn’t been slept in. The closet doors were open.

Luca stood in the center of the room, his gun lowered, staring at the open window leading out to the balcony.

“He’s gone,” Marco said, checking the bathroom.

Luca walked over to the small writing desk near the window. Resting on top of the blotter was a single piece of heavy parchment paper.

Luca picked it up. He read it silently, his jaw clenching so tightly I thought his teeth might shatter.

“What does it say?” I whispered, stepping into the room.

Luca slowly turned around. His eyes were wide, filled with a terrifying, absolute clarity.

“He knew,” Luca breathed, handing the note to Marco. “He knew I found the tape. He knew Vanessa stole it. He’s been playing me this entire time.”

Marco read the note, his face going pale.

“Boss,” Marco stammered. “If Frank is on the run… and he knows you know…”

“He won’t run,” Luca stated, his voice turning into ice. “He’s going to the Commission. He’s going to tell the other families that I am unfit to rule. He’s going to use his old connections to take back the syndicate.”

Luca looked at the open window, the rain blowing into the luxurious bedroom.

“My father is going to start a war,” Luca whispered.

Before anyone could move, a deafening explosion rocked the mansion.

The shockwave knocked me off my feet, throwing me hard against the wall. The windows in the bedroom shattered inward, showering us in glass.

The blaring wail of the estate’s security alarms instantly filled the air.

Marco scrambled to his feet, grabbing his radio.

“Report!” Marco yelled into the mic. “Where was that blast?!”

Static hissed for a terrifying second before a frantic guard replied.

“It’s the front gates, Boss! They blew the gates!”

Luca helped me off the floor, his grip like iron on my arm.

“Who blew the gates?” Luca demanded into Marco’s radio. “Is it my father’s loyalists?”

The guard’s answer made the blood freeze in my veins.

“No, Boss,” the guard screamed over the sound of incoming gunfire. “It’s Vanessa Bellini. And she brought the Russians with her.”

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