Chapter 4 - THE GHOST OF NEW YORK
The man standing in the doorway looked like an older, more battered version of Luca. His dark hair was threaded with silver, and a jagged scar ran down the left side of his jaw. He wore a heavy leather trench coat over a dark suit, holding the assault rifle casually, as if it were an umbrella.
“Matteo,” Luca breathed, the name barely escaping his lips.
Teresa let out a blood-curdling scream from the table. “Mio Dio! Matteo!”
I shrank back against the wall, my mind spinning. Matteo Moretti. Luca’s older brother. The man the entire city of Chicago believed had died in a car bombing ten years ago. The tragedy that had forced Luca to drop out of college and take over the family syndicate.
He was alive.
And he was pointing a gun at his own brother.
“It’s been a long time, Mom,” Matteo said, his voice gravelly and devoid of any warmth. He didn’t lower the rifle. “You’re looking old.”
“You’re alive,” Teresa sobbed, trying to stand up, but her legs gave out. She collapsed back into her chair, reaching out toward him with trembling hands. “My son… you’re alive.”
“Stay exactly where you are, Mom,” Matteo snapped. The hostility in his voice made Teresa freeze in terror.
Luca didn’t move. He kept his handgun aimed perfectly at the center of Matteo’s chest, shielding me behind his broad shoulders.
“The car bomb in 2016,” Luca said, his voice remarkably steady despite the shock. “They found your watch in the wreckage. They found teeth. We buried a closed casket.”
Matteo smirked, a cold, empty expression. “You buried a drifter I picked up at a bus station in Gary, Indiana. I pulled his teeth myself before I set the charge. It was sloppy work, but the cops were on Arthur Bellini’s payroll. They signed off on the DNA report without checking it.”
“Why?” Luca demanded, his jaw clenched tight. “Why did you fake your own death?”
“Because Arthur Bellini found out I was skimming from the union pension funds,” Matteo said casually, pacing slowly near the doorway. “He was going to take it to the Commission in New York. They would have killed me, Luca. They would have killed Mom. The only way to survive was to become a ghost.”
Matteo stopped pacing and looked directly at Luca.
“But hiding is expensive,” Matteo continued. “And a man can only live in the shadows for so long before he wants his life back.”
“So you came back to kill me for the throne?” Luca asked coldly.
“Kill you?” Matteo laughed, a harsh, grating sound. “No, little brother. I didn’t come here to kill you. I came here to save you.”
Luca’s eyes narrowed. “Save me from what?”
Matteo reached into the pocket of his leather coat and pulled out a small, folded piece of paper. He tossed it onto the long dining table. It slid across the polished wood and stopped right next to the black velvet ring box.
“Arthur Bellini called me thirty minutes ago,” Matteo said. “He told me you broke the engagement. He told me you humiliated Vanessa in front of the city’s elite.”
“And?”
“And Arthur is mobilizing,” Matteo said, his smile vanishing. “He’s calling in the markers. By sunrise, the Bellini syndicate is going to hit every warehouse, every port, and every legitimate business you own. He’s going to slaughter your captains. He’s going to burn your empire to the ground.”
Teresa whimpered, covering her face.
“Let him try,” Luca growled, refusing to lower his gun.
“You can’t win a war against Arthur, Luca,” Matteo said, shaking his head. “He has the judges. He has the cops. And more importantly, he has the contract Mom signed.”
Matteo pointed at the folded paper on the table.
“Arthur told me about the contract, too. A legally binding document promising your assets to the Bellini family in the event of a breach of marriage. He’s going to take your money legally, and he’s going to take your life violently.”
Luca stared at his older brother. “And how exactly are you going to save me from that?”
Matteo lowered the assault rifle slightly, leaning it against his leg.
“By taking my rightful place,” Matteo said smoothly. “Arthur’s contract was with Teresa Moretti, promising the assets of the head of the Moretti family. For ten years, that was you. But if I’m alive… I am the eldest son. I am the rightful head of this family.”
Matteo stepped closer to the table.
“If I take control of the syndicate tonight, Arthur’s contract is void. He can’t touch the assets. And the Commission in New York will back my claim to the throne.”
I watched Luca’s face. He wasn’t looking at the paper. He was looking at his brother’s eyes, reading the lie beneath the words.
“You didn’t come out of hiding to save me, Matteo,” Luca said softly. “You made a deal with Arthur.”
Matteo froze.
“Arthur called you,” Luca continued, his voice dripping with venom. “He told you I broke the engagement. And he offered you the throne. He told you if you came here tonight and took the empire from me, he would forgive your old debts to the Commission. He’s using you to get rid of me without starting a war.”
Matteo’s silence was all the confirmation we needed.
Teresa let out a heartbroken wail. “Matteo! No! You wouldn’t betray your own brother!”
“Shut up, old woman!” Matteo roared, raising the rifle again. “He stole ten years of my life! I’ve been living like a rat in Brooklyn while he plays the billionaire philanthropist in Chicago!”
Matteo aimed the rifle directly at Luca’s head.
“Put the gun down, Luca,” Matteo commanded. “Sign over the offshore accounts, hand over the keys to the legitimate businesses, and I’ll let you and Mom walk out the back door alive. If you don’t, I kill you both right here, and I take it anyway.”
Luca didn’t lower his weapon. He stood perfectly still, shielding me.
“I’m not giving you my empire, Matteo,” Luca said quietly. “And I’m not letting you near our mother.”
“Then you die!” Matteo screamed, his finger tightening on the trigger.
I didn’t think.
I reached blindly behind me, my fingers frantically searching the silver serving tray I had dropped on the sideboard earlier. My hand closed around the heavy, solid silver water pitcher.
Just as Matteo braced to fire, I stepped out from behind Luca and hurled the silver pitcher as hard as I could.
The heavy metal sailed through the air and smashed violently into the crystal chandelier directly above Matteo’s head.
The chandelier shattered.
Thousands of shards of razor-sharp crystal and heavy brass rained down on Matteo. He screamed, throwing his arms up to protect his face as the heavy fixture collapsed onto his shoulders, knocking him to the marble floor.
His assault rifle clattered away.
Luca didn’t hesitate.
He lunged forward, kicking the rifle across the room. He grabbed Matteo by the collar of his leather coat, hauled him halfway off the floor, and slammed a brutal right hook into his older brother’s jaw.
Matteo went limp, unconscious before he hit the marble.
The dining room descended into a ringing silence, broken only by the sound of Teresa’s quiet sobbing and the tinkling of broken crystal settling on the floor.
Luca stood over his brother, his chest heaving. He looked at the blood on his knuckles, then slowly turned to look at me.
I was backed against the wall, shaking violently, my hands clutching my apron.
“You threw a silver pitcher at a man holding an assault rifle,” Luca said, his voice a mixture of absolute shock and profound awe.
“I… I panicked,” I stammered, tears flooding my eyes.
Luca walked over to me. He didn’t say a word. He reached out, wrapped his strong arms around me, and pulled me into a crushing, desperate hug. I buried my face in his chest, weeping as the adrenaline finally crashed.
“You saved my life again,” Luca whispered into my hair.
He pulled back, keeping his hands on my shoulders. His eyes were burning with a fierce, protective fire.
“Hannah, I need you to listen to me carefully,” Luca said, his voice dropping to a rapid, urgent octave. “Arthur Bellini is going to send his men to finish what Matteo failed to do. This house is no longer safe. I need you to take my mother and get out of here.”
“Where do we go?” I asked frantically.
“My private airstrip in Rockford. The jet is fueled. The pilot is loyal only to me. Tell him to fly you to the safe house in Sicily.”
“What about you?” Teresa cried, struggling to stand. “Luca, you must come with us!”
Luca turned to his mother. “I can’t run, Mom. If I run, Arthur takes the city. He takes the legitimate businesses. He takes everything I built. I have to stay and end this tonight.”
He walked over to Matteo’s unconscious body and dragged him into the nearby coat closet, locking the door.
He then picked up the folded piece of paper Matteo had thrown on the table. He unfolded it, his eyes scanning the text.
His face went completely pale.
“Luca?” I asked, terrified by his expression. “What is it?”
Luca looked up at me, his eyes wide with a horrific realization.
“It’s not just a message from Arthur,” Luca whispered, his voice trembling. “It’s a copy of the contract my mother signed twenty years ago.”
“I know,” I said. “The marriage contract.”
“No,” Luca said, shaking his head slowly. “You didn’t read the fine print, Hannah. The collateral wasn’t just me.”
He turned the paper around so we could see the bottom clause, highlighted in thick red ink.
“Arthur didn’t just demand a marriage,” Luca said, the words choking him. “The contract states that if the marriage is broken, the Bellini family claims ownership of the Moretti bloodline. Arthur isn’t coming to the house for me.”
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Luca looked at his mother, absolute terror in his eyes.
“He’s sending his men to the hospital to take my unborn child from the surrogate.”
