Chapter 5 - The Traitor Was Sitting at Leo’s TableBy sunrise, the Moretti estate looked normal again.
That was the disturbing part.
The shattered window in the eastern corridor had been boarded.
Blood had been removed from the marble.
The dead guard had disappeared.
Broken furniture had been carried away.
Breakfast was served at eight.
Coffee steamed in silver pots.
The world had nearly ended at two in the morning, and by eight, the Moretti machine had already erased the evidence.
Chloe sat at the breakfast table holding Dominic.
She had not slept.
Neither had Leo.
Vincent entered carrying a folder.
Leo looked up.
“Tell me.”
Vincent glanced at Chloe.
Leo noticed.
“She stays.”
Vincent placed the folder on the table.
“The breach required four pieces of information. Camera rotation. Generator location. Safe-room access route. Guard schedule.”
“How many people knew all four?”
“Seven.”
“Names.”
Vincent listed them.
Chloe recognized five.
The sixth was a security technician.
The seventh made Leo completely still.
“Marco Bellini.”
Chloe knew the name.
Marco was Leo’s cousin.
More importantly, Marco had grown up with him.
There were photographs of them as boys in the hallway downstairs.
Marco had been at Leo’s father’s funeral.
He had attended Christmas dinners.
He had brought Chloe flowers after Dominic was born.
Leo closed the folder.
“Evidence?”
“His access card was used at 1:43 a.m. in the security office.”
“Could be cloned.”
“Yes.”
“Anything else?”
“Three transfers totaling eight hundred thousand dollars into an account connected to his girlfriend’s brother.”
Leo stood.
“Bring him.”
Marco arrived twenty minutes later.
He walked into the library wearing jeans and a sweater.
He looked irritated.
“What the hell is happening?”
Leo stood behind his desk.
Chloe remained near the fireplace with Dominic.
Marco saw her.
Then the baby.
Something flickered across his face.
Too fast for Chloe to identify.
Leo noticed.
Of course he noticed.
“You sold the house,” Leo said.
Marco blinked.
“What?”
“The security layout.”
Marco laughed.
It sounded wrong.
“You dragged me here because somebody used my access card?”
Leo said nothing.
Marco looked toward Vincent.
“This is insane.”
Vincent remained expressionless.
Marco spread his hands.
“Leo, we grew up together.”
“Yes.”
“I was there when your father died.”
“Yes.”
“I carried his coffin.”
“Yes.”
Marco’s voice rose.
“And you think I sold your son?”
Leo walked around the desk.
“Tell me I’m wrong.”
“You’re wrong.”
Leo studied him.
For a long time.
Then Chloe saw it.
Marco looked at Dominic again.
Not with affection.
With calculation.
Chloe tightened her hold.
Leo noticed that too.
“Search his house,” Leo told Vincent.
Marco’s face changed.
Only slightly.
But enough.
Leo saw it.
Vincent saw it.
Chloe saw it.
Marco moved first.
His hand went beneath his sweater.
Leo struck him before the weapon cleared his waistband.
The sound was brutal.
Marco crashed into the desk.
Vincent seized his wrist.
A handgun clattered across the floor.
Dominic began crying.
Chloe stepped backward.
Leo grabbed Marco by the collar.
“You brought a gun into my house.”
Marco spat blood.
“You always were arrogant.”
Leo’s expression became empty.
“Who paid you?”
Marco laughed.
“You think this is about money?”
“Everything is about something.”
“This is about your weakness.”
Leo’s grip tightened.
Marco looked directly at Chloe.
“You.”
The room became silent.
Marco smiled through blood.
“You changed him.”
Chloe stared.
“He used to understand what mattered. Territory. Loyalty. Power. Then you walked in pregnant and suddenly every decision became about keeping you comfortable.”
Leo slammed him against the desk.
“Do not look at her.”
Marco laughed again.
“You see? Exactly.”
Vincent moved toward Chloe.
“Take Dominic upstairs.”
“No.”
Chloe surprised everyone.
Even herself.
Marco looked at her.
“You want to hear this?”
“Yes.”
Leo turned.
“Chloe.”
“No. He tried to take my son. I want to know why.”
Marco smiled.
“Because Dominic is the future.”
The words chilled her.
“Leo has enemies who can wait. Men who understand that killing Leo creates chaos. But controlling his heir?”
Marco shrugged.
“That creates a dynasty.”
“Who?”
Leo’s voice was almost inaudible.
Marco looked at him.
“Salvatore Ricci.”
Vincent swore quietly.
Chloe knew the name.
Everyone in Leo’s world did.
Ricci controlled operations across northern New Jersey.
He had been Leo’s father’s rival for thirty years.
Leo’s expression did not change.
But Vincent’s did.
“He wants the boy alive?”
Marco nodded.
“Raise him. Shape him. Use him when Leo’s gone.”
Chloe felt physically sick.
Dominic slept against her shoulder, completely unaware that men he had never met were already planning his future.
Leo released Marco.
For one second, Marco appeared surprised.
Then Leo stepped backward.
“Vincent.”
“Yes.”
“Take him downstairs.”
Marco’s confidence disappeared.
“Leo.”
“Downstairs.”
“Leo, wait.”
Vincent seized him.
Marco struggled.
“We’re family.”
Leo looked at him.
“So is my son.”
Marco stopped fighting.
Leo’s voice remained calm.
“You chose which family mattered.”
Vincent dragged him away.
The door closed.
Chloe looked at Leo.
“What happens now?”
“Ricci dies.”
The answer came too quickly.
Too easily.
Chloe stood.
“No.”
Leo looked at her.
“You don’t understand.”
“I understand exactly. He attacks. You attack. His people retaliate. Your people retaliate. How many bodies before Dominic turns one?”
“This is not your concern.”
The words hit her harder than she expected.
Chloe’s face changed.
Leo saw it.
Immediately.
“This is absolutely my concern.”
“Chloe—”
“That man tried to steal my child because of your empire.”
Leo’s jaw hardened.
“Our child.”
“Then stop treating me like I’m furniture whenever business becomes inconvenient.”
Silence.
Vincent had once told her that no one spoke to Leo that way.
Chloe was beginning to understand why.
The room felt dangerous.
But she refused to lower her eyes.
Finally Leo said, “What do you want?”
“I want this to end.”
“It ends when Ricci is dead.”
“No. It ends when Dominic doesn’t inherit it.”
Leo stared at her.
Chloe moved closer.
“You keep saying everything you do is for him.”
“It is.”
“Then give him something better.”
Leo’s expression darkened.
“You think I can walk away?”
“I think you built enough legitimate businesses to start.”
He said nothing.
Chloe knew more than he realized.
Construction.
Shipping.
Real estate.
Restaurants.
Warehouses.
Companies that employed thousands of ordinary people.
“You could change what the Moretti name means.”
Leo gave a humorless laugh.
“You think men like Ricci allow retirement?”
“No.”
Chloe looked at Dominic.
“I think men like Ricci have to be defeated first.”
Leo’s eyes narrowed.
Then he understood.
“You’re telling me to go to war.”
“I’m telling you that if you do, make it the last one.”
The room became completely silent.
Leo looked at her as though seeing her for the first time.
Chloe had once walked into his casino terrified and desperate to save Danny.
She had bargained because she had no power.
That woman was gone.
Motherhood had burned something weak out of her.
Leo stepped close.
“You understand what you’re asking?”
“Yes.”
“If I dismantle Ricci, every alliance changes.”
“Then change them.”
“If I begin removing our illegal operations, some of my own people will turn.”
“Then maybe they were never yours.”
His eyes sharpened.
Chloe continued.
“I will raise Dominic with you. I will live behind your gates. I will accept guards and cameras and whatever ridiculous armored vehicle you insist on.”
His mouth almost moved.
“But I will not raise him to become you.”
That hurt him.
She saw it.
Chloe touched his chest.
“I want him to have your strength.”
Her hand moved over his heart.
“Not your chains.”
Leo looked down at her hand.
For a long time, neither spoke.
Then he covered it with his.
“Ricci first.”
“Yes.”
“And afterward?”
“We build something different.”
Leo looked at Dominic.
His son opened his eyes.
Dark.
Serious.
Moretti eyes.
Leo touched his tiny hand.
“Something different,” he repeated.
May you like
For the first time in his adult life, Leo Moretti began planning not how to expand his empire.
But how to escape it.
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