Chapter 3 - The Price of Silence
At eleven forty-five that night, Dante stood in the darkened garage beneath the mansion and argued with the one person who did not seem impressed by the fact that he was Dante Moretti.
Evelyn Harper blocked the driver’s-side door of his black sedan.
“You are not going alone.”
Dante stared at her.
“Move.”
“No.”
Behind her, Marco looked as though he wanted the floor to open and swallow him.
Dante had ordered everyone not involved in security to remain upstairs. Evelyn had apparently decided that order was optional.
“Salvatore specifically said alone.”
“And men who threaten children are famous for keeping promises?”
Dante’s eyes narrowed.
Evelyn folded her arms.
“You can fire me tomorrow.”
“I can fire you tonight.”
“Then I’ll be unemployed while being right.”
Marco looked away to hide the beginning of a smile.
Dante noticed.
“Do you want to join her?”
“No, boss.”
“Good.”
Dante faced Evelyn again.
“Lily needs you.”
“That’s why I’m standing here.”
The words stopped him.
Evelyn lowered her voice.
“She needs you alive more than she needs me obedient.”
Dante had spent years surrounding himself with people who followed orders quickly. He had forgotten the strange value of someone willing to challenge a bad one.
“I’m not actually going alone,” he said.
Evelyn blinked.
“Marco’s teams will stay three blocks out. I wear a tracker. A second vehicle follows without lights. Happy?”
“No.”
“That is the only answer available.”
She moved aside reluctantly.
“Bring Owen back if you can.”
Dante opened the door.
“And Mr. Moretti?”
He looked at her.
“Do not turn into the kind of man Lily has to be afraid of just because you’re angry at the kind of man Salvatore is.”
For once, Dante had no answer.
The meeting point was an abandoned printing warehouse near the river. Rain had started, making the streets shine beneath orange lamps.
Dante entered through a rolling steel door at midnight exactly.
Salvatore waited inside with two men and Owen Bellamy.
Celeste’s brother looked thinner than Dante remembered. His hands were zip-tied in front, and there was a bruise along his jaw, but he was standing.
“Dante,” Salvatore said warmly. “You always were punctual.”
“You killed my father.”
Salvatore’s smile vanished.
“So the child’s toy worked.”
“You knew about the camera?”
“I knew there might be something.”
Dante kept his hands visible.
“What do you want?”
“The memory card.”
“You think I brought the only copy?”
“No. I think you brought something I can use to keep you from releasing it.”
Salvatore gestured toward Owen.
Dante looked at him.
Owen’s eyes were red.
“Don’t give him anything,” he said.
Salvatore struck him across the shoulder, hard enough to silence him but not drop him.
Dante’s body went rigid.
“I came to talk.”
“You came because your wife still cares whether her brother survives.”
“And you care whether you spend the rest of your life looking over your shoulder.”
Salvatore laughed.
“Police? From you?”
“Yes.”
That surprised him.
Dante continued, “I have an attorney sending copies of that video to law enforcement if I miss a check-in.”
“That would invite questions about your own business.”
“I know.”
“You’d burn your own house down to catch me?”
“No. I’d stop pretending the house is worth saving if keeping it means my daughter lives in fear.”
For the first time, Salvatore looked unsure.
Dante saw it and understood something.
His uncle had planned around the old Dante—the man who protected the Moretti organization above everything else.
He had not planned around a father who had just found smoke curling from his child’s clothes.
Salvatore recovered.
“You’re sentimental tonight.”
“I’m finished tonight.”
“Finished with what?”
“With you.”
A phone rang in Salvatore’s pocket.
He ignored it.
It rang again.
One of his men glanced toward him.
That distraction was enough.
Owen drove his shoulder into the guard beside him and dropped to the floor.
Dante moved.
The next several seconds were fast and ugly without being heroic. A gun came up. Dante struck the shooter’s wrist against a metal support. Marco’s team stormed through the rear entrance. Someone killed the overhead lights. Men shouted. Boots pounded concrete.
When emergency lights flickered on, Salvatore was gone.
Owen was alive.
That mattered.
Back at the mansion, Celeste saw her brother just after two in the morning.
She ran toward him and stopped three feet away, as though she did not believe she had the right to touch anyone.
Owen made the decision for her.
He hugged her.
Celeste broke.
Dante stood at the far end of the hall and watched.
Lily was asleep upstairs with Evelyn nearby. Dr. Hale had returned once, checked her, and assured Dante that the injury remained manageable.
Owen finally pulled back.
“You should have told him,” he said.
Celeste wiped her face.
“I thought Sal would kill you.”
“He almost did anyway.”
“I’m sorry.”
Owen’s expression changed.
“For me?”
Celeste looked toward the stairs.
“For everything.”
Dante approached.
Owen straightened.
“Thank you.”
“You can thank me by answering questions.”
“I will.”
“All of them.”
Owen nodded.
Dante brought him into the library with Marco and the family attorney, Rachel Kim. Celeste remained outside under guard.
Owen talked for nearly two hours.
Salvatore had been building a shadow network inside Moretti businesses for years. Small thefts, false vendors, redirected payments. Antonio Moretti discovered it nine years earlier and planned to remove his brother from the family organization.
He died before he could.
“Sal bragged about it once when he was drunk,” Owen said. “Said Antonio thought family meant mercy.”
Dante’s face hardened.
“What did Sal want with the black book now?”
“He wants to empty six emergency accounts and move on the distribution companies before you can freeze them.”
Rachel Kim looked up sharply.
“Those accounts hold payroll for hundreds of legitimate employees.”
Owen nodded.
“He doesn’t care.”
Dante stood.
“Freeze all six.”
Rachel began typing.
Owen hesitated.
“There’s more.”
Dante looked at him.
“Sal has someone inside the house.”
Marco frowned. “Celeste.”
“No.”
The room went quiet.
“Someone else,” Owen said. “He told me your wife was useful, but unreliable because she loved the kid too much. He said his real insurance was someone Dante would never question.”
Dante’s mind moved through guards, staff, relatives.
“Name.”
“I never heard it.”
“Then how do you know?”
“Because Sal called them Saint.”
Marco went pale.
Dante noticed.
“What?”
Marco said nothing.
“Marco.”
His security chief looked toward the door.
Then back at Dante.
“There’s only one person in this house Salvatore ever called Saint.”
“Who?”
Marco swallowed.
“Father Gabriel.”
Dante stared at him.
Father Gabriel Moretti was Dante’s older cousin.
A priest.
May you like
Lily’s godfather.
And the man scheduled to hear Celeste’s confession the next morning.
