Chapter 7 - THE RECKONING IN MARBLE
The air inside the main house was thick with the smell of ozone and damp smoke. The red emergency lights cast long, bloody shadows across the polished marble floors of the grand foyer.
Matteo moved like a phantom through the darkened corridors. The heavy storm shutters kept the howling wind at bay, muffling the outside world into a low, rhythmic drumbeat.
He didn't need to hunt for Damian. The sound of panicked shouting coming from the two-story formal dining room led Matteo straight to his target.
Matteo approached the towering mahogany double doors of the dining room. Peering through the decorative brass latch, he saw the final stand of the conspiracy.
Damian Costa was pacing frantically behind the twenty-seat banquet table, a submachine gun slung across his chest. Camilla sat slumped in an armchair, her expensive robe torn at the shoulder, clutching an ice pack to her bruised cheek. Two remaining private contractors stood near the grand fireplace, their rifles trained nervously on the entrances.
"The doors are four-inch solid steel!" one of the mercenaries yelled, rattling the storm shutters over the terrace exit. "We’re trapped in here, Costa! You said this was a clean takeover!"
"Shut up and watch the hallway!" Damian roared, sweat pouring down his scarred face. "The council’s convoy is outside the main gate! When they see the security lockdown, they’ll breach the estate! We just have to hold out until—"
BOOM.
The heavy double doors blew inward as Matteo fired a slug directly into the latch mechanism.
Before the splintered wood hit the floor, Matteo stepped into the room.
The first mercenary raised his rifle, but Matteo was already moving. A second deafening blast from the combat shotgun caught the man in the shoulder, throwing him violently into the china cabinet, shattering centuries-old crystal into glittering dust.
The second contractor dropped his weapon instantly, throwing his hands in the air and falling to his knees. "I surrender! I was just hired for perimeter security! Don't shoot!"
"Get out," Matteo growled without breaking stride. The mercenary scrambled backward across the broken glass and sprinted into the dark foyer.
Damian brought his submachine gun up, aiming straight at Matteo’s chest.
"Move an inch and I tear you in half, Matteo!" Damian screamed, his finger twitching on the trigger.
Matteo didn't stop. He walked forward, lowering the shotgun to his side, his dark eyes locked onto his former friend.
"Shoot then, Damian," Matteo said, his voice ringing through the cavernous hall like a funeral bell. "Look me in the eye and do what you didn't have the stomach to do in Sicily."
Damian’s hands trembled violently on the grip of the weapon. His breathing came in shallow, ragged gasps. For fifteen years, he had operated in Matteo’s shadow, fed by Matteo’s generosity, protected by Matteo’s ruthless reputation. Facing the living legend in the flesh, stripped of ambushes and car bombs, Damian Costa was just a frightened boy from Hell’s Kitchen.
"You had everything!" Damian yelled, his voice cracking with bitter resentment. "The money, the respect, the name! I bled for you! I took a knife in the lung for you in Chicago, and you still treated me like a subordinate!"
"I made you a caporegime," Matteo said, stopping five feet from the barrel of the gun. "I gave you thirty percent of the port revenues. I made you a wealthy man. But you wanted a crown you never had the spine to wear."
"Matteo, kill him!" Camilla suddenly screamed from the armchair, leaping to her feet. "Shoot him! He forced me to betray you! He threatened my father! I swear on my mother’s soul, Matteo, I never wanted this!"
Matteo slowly turned his head toward the woman he had intended to marry.
The look in his eyes was so profoundly cold, so absolute in its disgust, that Camilla choked on her own words and stepped backward.
"You swore on your mother’s soul when you accepted my ring, Camilla," Matteo said quietly. "Your words are worth less than the broken glass beneath your feet."
"Shut up!" Damian shrieked, swinging the submachine gun toward Camilla in a blind panic. "You scheming snake, you were the one who hired the Sicilian bomb maker!"
That split-second shift in Damian’s focus was the only mistake Matteo needed.
Matteo lunged forward. His left hand seized the barrel of the submachine gun, forcing it upward toward the gilded ceiling as Damian pulled the trigger. A deafening burst of automatic fire tore through the crystal chandelier above, sending shards of glass raining down like hailstones.
With his right fist, Matteo drove a devastating blow into Damian’s jaw, followed by an elbow strike that shattered the man’s nose. Damian groaned, dropping the weapon as he stumbled backward over a dining chair, crashing heavily onto the Persian rug.
Matteo stood over him, his chest heaving, his face splattered with sweat and rain. He didn't pick up the gun. He drew the combat knife from his belt and leaned down, placing the flat of the cold steel against Damian’s scarred cheek.
"I won't give you a quick death, Damian," Matteo whispered. "You are going to explain your treason to the five families. You will watch them strip your name, your money, and your legacy. And then, you will spend the rest of your miserable life in a maximum-security cell, knowing that Luca’s daughter is sleeping in the master bedroom of this house."
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Outside, the heavy blare of multiple car horns echoed through the estate grounds, accompanied by the flashing blue and white strobe lights of a high-level motorcade.
The syndicate council had arrived.
