Chapter 5 - The Saint Beneath the CityThree stitches had torn.
Mia discovered the damage the moment they reached the Moretti safe house in River North.
She did not ask permission.
She pushed Enzo into a chair, cut his shirt open with trauma scissors, and swore with enough creativity to make Luca step discreetly out of the room.
“You were shot at,” Enzo said.
“I noticed.”
“You’re shaking.”
“I’m angry.”
“You said anger is fear with a backbone.”
“You said that.”
“And you hated it.”
“I still do.”
Mia examined his wound.
The bullet tract remained intact, but the external incision had partially reopened.
“We need to restitch.”
“Fine.”
“No whiskey.”
“That is unreasonable.”
“No whiskey.”
“Mia—”
“No.”
Enzo studied her face.
Then leaned back.
“Fine.”
Matteo stood near the window with the photograph from the basement.
“We need to solve this.”
Mia washed her hands.
“Give me ten minutes.”
“Five,” Enzo said.
She looked down at him.
“You want anesthesia?”
Enzo immediately became silent.
Matteo turned away to hide a smile.
Mia cleaned the wound, injected local anesthetic, then began placing fresh sutures.
The procedure forced Enzo to remain still.
It did not force him to stop staring at her.
“You slapped me.”
“You deserved it.”
“Nobody slaps me.”
“Congratulations. New experience.”
“My men are going to talk.”
“Then perhaps they’ll also tell each other that ignoring medical advice has consequences.”
“You enjoyed it.”
Mia tightened a knot harder than necessary.
Enzo’s jaw flexed.
“Still think that?”
His eyes darkened.
“Yes.”
Heat climbed her neck.
She returned to the wound.
Matteo cleared his throat.
“I remain unfortunately present.”
“Then be useful,” Mia said.
He held up the photograph.
“The saint beneath the city.”
Mia finished the last suture and covered the incision.
“Chicago has hundreds of churches.”
“Maybe not a literal saint,” Matteo said.
Enzo stood.
Mia pushed him back down.
“I’m not finished.”
“You put the bandage on.”
“You have to sit for five minutes.”
“Why?”
“Because I said so.”
Enzo stared at her.
Matteo said, “I recommend surrender.”
Enzo slowly sat again.
Mia smiled for the first time since Evanston.
She looked at the photograph.
Samuel Price and Marcus stood outside an Italian restaurant.
The sign above them read VESUVIO.
Mia frowned.
“I remember this place.”
Enzo looked at her.
“Where?”
“Taylor Street. My dad used to take me there when I was little.”
Matteo typed on his phone.
“Closed in 2012.”
“Building?”
“Still standing. Restaurant became a pharmacy, then storage.”
Mia took the photograph.
Behind Marcus and Samuel, part of another building appeared.
A stone figure stood on its roofline.
She leaned closer.
“Can you enlarge this?”
Matteo scanned the image.
Seconds later it appeared magnified on the tablet.
The stone figure was not on the restaurant.
It belonged to a church across the street.
A robed saint.
Matteo searched.
“Saint Anthony Catholic Church.”
Mia whispered, “The saint beneath the city.”
Enzo stood again.
This time she did not stop him.
“There are tunnels beneath old sections of Chicago,” Matteo said. “Utility routes. Coal tunnels. Prohibition passages.”
“Church basements,” Mia added.
Enzo’s expression hardened.
“Marcus hid something there.”
Matteo nodded.
“Or Samuel did.”
The name made Mia uncomfortable.
“What do we know about Samuel Price?”
“Attorney. Corporate and criminal defense. No criminal convictions. Vanished March 2019.”
“Dead?”
“Assumed.”
“Body?”
“No.”
Enzo and Matteo exchanged a glance.
Mia noticed.
“What?”
Enzo said, “No body means no certainty.”
“You think he’s alive?”
“I think dead men are easy to verify when people actually want them dead.”
Matteo turned the tablet.
“Samuel withdrew $400,000 two days before disappearing.”
Mia stared.
“That doesn’t sound like someone planning to die.”
“No,” Matteo agreed. “It sounds like someone planning to leave.”
Mia felt betrayed by a man she had not thought about in years.
“Then why abandon me?”
Enzo’s eyes softened almost imperceptibly.
“Maybe he didn’t.”
They reached Saint Anthony shortly before midnight.
This time there was no convoy.
Enzo agreed that twelve armed men would draw attention.
Instead, Matteo brought Luca and two others.
The church had been deconsecrated years earlier. Its doors were boarded, stained-glass windows dark.
Mia stepped from the car.
“Breaking into a church feels wrong.”
Enzo adjusted his coat.
“I have done worse.”
“I’m aware.”
Matteo opened a side entrance.
Inside smelled of dust and old incense.
Moonlight filtered through stained glass, painting fractured colors across the empty pews.
Mia walked down the center aisle.
For a moment, the criminal war disappeared.
The place felt haunted by thousands of whispered prayers.
Enzo followed several steps behind.
“You believe in God?” Mia asked.
“Sometimes.”
“When?”
“When bullets miss.”
She looked back.
“That isn’t faith.”
“It is gratitude.”
“Who do you thank?”
“My own aim.”
She rolled her eyes.
Near the altar stood a statue of Saint Anthony.
Mia approached.
At its base was an inscription.
Seek what is lost.
She laughed softly.
“What?”
Enzo came beside her.
“Saint Anthony is the patron saint of lost things.”
His eyes sharpened.
“Marcus wasn’t being poetic.”
“No.”
She looked at the stone floor.
“He was giving directions.”
They searched the altar.
Nothing.
The sacristy.
Nothing.
Finally Mia descended into the basement.
Old metal shelves lined concrete walls.
Matteo found electrical panels.
Luca found a locked maintenance door.
Behind it was a narrow stairway leading down.
Not up.
Down.
“The saint beneath the city,” Mia whispered.
Enzo drew his pistol.
They descended.
The passage opened into an old brick tunnel.
Water dripped from pipes overhead.
Their flashlight beams disappeared into darkness.
Mia’s nerves tightened.
“How far?”
Matteo checked old municipal plans.
“Tunnel intersects with several abandoned utility corridors.”
“Great,” Mia muttered. “Nothing says safe like underground Mafia archaeology.”
Enzo looked amused.
“I like you frightened.”
“Why?”
“You talk more.”
She glared.
They walked approximately two hundred yards before reaching a sealed iron door.
There was no handle.
Only a small metal plate.
Four numbers engraved into it.
Mia stopped.
“My birthday.”
Matteo examined the lock.
“Mechanical.”
He entered 7140.
Click.
The door opened.
Inside was a room no larger than a closet.
There were no millions.
No stacks of cash.
No gold.
Only a desk.
A battery lantern.
And a tape recorder.
Mia approached slowly.
On the desk sat an envelope.
MIA.
Her father’s handwriting.
Her legs nearly failed.
Enzo caught her elbow.
She did not pull away.
Mia opened the envelope.
Inside was one sentence.
Listen before you judge me.
She laughed bitterly.
“That’s convenient.”
Enzo looked toward the recorder.
“Your choice.”
Mia stared at it.
Every terrible year since her father’s death seemed compressed inside that machine.
“Play it.”
Matteo pressed the button.
Static.
Then Marcus Katherine’s voice filled the underground room.
Older.
Tired.
Terrified.
“Mia, if you’re hearing this, then I failed.”
She stopped breathing.
“I need you to know that most of what you were told about me is true. I gambled. I lied. I stole. I hurt your mother. I hurt you. I won’t ask forgiveness for that.”
Mia’s eyes filled.
Enzo stood silently beside her.
“But the three million dollars Lorenzo Moretti believes I stole was never mine.”
Enzo’s expression changed.
Marcus continued.
“I took it because someone inside Moretti’s organization was selling information to Sergei Volkov. Someone close enough to know routes, accounts, names and family addresses. I found proof. When I tried to tell Moretti, the traitor learned what I knew.”
Matteo stiffened.
Enzo went perfectly still.
“I moved the money to make it look like I had betrayed Moretti. I knew Volkov would come to recruit me. I needed him to believe I was willing to switch sides. I was trying to identify the mole.”
Mia wiped tears from her cheeks.
“I failed. They came after your mother. Her cancer was already killing her, and I couldn’t let them touch you too.”
The recording crackled.
“So I made a deal with Samuel. He would hide the evidence. I would disappear.”
Mia whispered, “Disappear?”
The voice continued.
“If they told you I committed suicide, don’t believe them.”
Everyone froze.
“I did not jump from that bridge.”
Mia’s heart stopped.
Enzo looked at Matteo.
Marcus Katherine had been presumed dead for seven years.
“I’m leaving Chicago tonight. If I survive, I’ll contact Samuel. If I don’t, he has everything.”
Mia could barely breathe.
Then Marcus said the words that changed the room.
“The traitor is inside the Moretti family.”
Enzo’s face became stone.
“Not an associate. Not a soldier. Family.”
Static.
“I’m sorry, Mia.”
Click.
The tape ended.
Nobody spoke.
Mia stared at the recorder.
“My father might be alive.”
Matteo’s voice was cautious.
“Might.”
“He said he didn’t die.”
“Seven years ago.”
Mia turned to Enzo.
“You told me the Russians killed him.”
“That was the intelligence I had.”
“You were wrong.”
“Yes.”
The admission came without defense.
That surprised her.
Enzo looked at the recorder.
“If Marcus was telling the truth, someone manipulated both sides.”
Matteo said, “Someone close.”
“Family,” Mia repeated.
Enzo’s expression darkened.
The Moretti empire was built around blood.
Loyalty.
Family.
His uncle Carlo.
His cousins.
His younger half brother Dante.
People who had attended his mother’s funeral.
People who sat at his table.
One of them had been selling him to the Russians for years.
Mia looked around.
“Where’s the evidence?”
Matteo searched the desk.
“No ledger.”
Mia examined the recorder.
Then she saw scratches beneath it.
She lifted the machine.
A small brass key had been taped underneath.
There was an engraving.
GCT-314.
Matteo recognized it.
“Grand Central Terminal?”
“Chicago doesn’t have Grand Central,” Mia said.
Enzo took the key.
“Union Station lockers used coded rental tags years ago. GCT might mean something else.”
A sound echoed down the tunnel.
Metal scraping.
Everyone turned.
Luca raised his weapon.
Another sound.
Footsteps.
Several.
Enzo immediately moved Mia behind him.
“How did they find us?” Matteo whispered.
Enzo looked around the hidden room.
“They didn’t.”
The footsteps grew closer.
“They knew we would come.”
A voice drifted through the darkness.
“Lorenzo.”
Enzo’s face changed.
Not fear.
Recognition.
The man entered the flashlight beam.
Silver hair.
Elegant black coat.
A familiar face Enzo had known since childhood.
His uncle.
Carlo Moretti.
He smiled.
“Put the gun down, nephew.”
Behind him stood six armed men.
Carlo looked at Mia.
May you like
Then at the tape recorder.
“You really should have let Marcus Katherine stay dead.”
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