Chapter 6 - The Man With the Wolf Ring
Roman read the message twice.
Then he held out his hand.
"Give me your phone."
"No."
"Norah."
"He's my brother too."
"That is exactly why you're not coming."
I stared at him.
"We are not doing this again."
"This is not a diner. Salvatore wants me in a building he controls."
"And he used Michael to get you there."
"Which means he expects emotion to make me stupid."
"Is it working?"
Roman looked at me.
"No."
"Then stop acting stupid."
Elena Price had retreated to her kitchen.
Luca stood near the window with two other men.
Nobody seemed eager to interrupt.
Roman lowered his voice.
"If Salvatore knows Michael matters to you, he'll use you next."
"He already is."
I held up the phone.
"He sent the message to me."
That landed.
Not to Roman.
To me.
Roman's eyes narrowed.
"Why?"
"Because he knew I'd show you."
"Or because he wants you there."
Luca turned from the window.
"Boss, she's right."
Roman gave him a look.
Luca lifted both hands.
"I hate saying it too."
I almost smiled.
Roman did not.
We left Rockford with a plan Roman hated.
Which meant I liked it.
The old stockyard complex on the South Side had been abandoned for years. Half the buildings were demolished. The rest were brick shells covered in graffiti and broken windows.
Salvatore wanted Roman alone.
Roman arrived alone.
Technically.
Luca's people entered through storm drains twenty minutes earlier.
Two more teams took rooftops.
I remained in an armored vehicle three blocks away.
That was the compromise.
It lasted six minutes.
My phone rang.
Unknown number.
I answered.
"Norah."
Michael.
My whole body tightened.
"Michael?"
His voice was low.
"They moved me."
"Where are you?"
"I don't know. Basement. Concrete walls."
"Are you hurt?"
"Not bad."
A noise sounded behind him.
He whispered faster.
"The stockyard is a trap. Salvatore isn't there."
"How did you get a phone?"
"Guard dropped it. Listen to me. Roman can't go inside."
I grabbed the radio.
"Roman."
Static.
Then Luca.
"We lost his signal."
"Michael says it's a trap."
"We know. Movement on three sides."
"Get him out."
"We're trying."
The line with Michael crackled.
"Norah."
"I'm here."
"There's something else."
"What?"
"The man who took me said Gabriel is alive."
My blood ran cold.
"Michael—"
"I think my father is alive."
Then someone shouted.
The line died.
I opened the SUV door.
Roman's driver caught my arm.
"Miss Hayes."
"Let go."
"Boss said—"
"Roman is inside a trap, Michael is being held somewhere else, and Salvatore has both of them moving exactly where he wants. Let go."
The driver's grip loosened.
Maybe it was my expression.
Maybe he had learned what Luca already knew.
I was going anyway.
I took the spare radio and ran.
The stockyard smelled of rain, rust, and old oil.
Gunfire cracked inside the largest warehouse.
I ducked behind a concrete barrier.
"Roman!"
No answer.
I moved toward a side entrance.
A man appeared in the doorway.
Not Luca.
He raised a gun.
I froze.
Then a shot exploded from somewhere above.
The man dropped.
Luca's voice came through my radio.
"Stay down."
"You shot him?"
"You're welcome."
I ran inside.
The main floor was empty except for metal scaffolding and an old freight elevator.
A speaker crackled.
Salvatore's voice filled the warehouse.
"Roman."
Roman stood twenty yards away behind a steel column.
He looked at me.
The rage on his face could have set the building on fire.
I pointed upward.
Later.
The speaker continued.
"You always were obedient when family was involved."
Roman called out.
"Show yourself."
Laughter.
"Your father said the same thing about you. Loyal. Predictable. So desperate to be the good son."
Roman moved toward the center.
"Where is Michael?"
"Safe, for the moment."
"Gabriel?"
A pause.
Then Salvatore said, "Alive."
Roman's face went still.
I felt the word move through him.
Alive.
"You kept him for eighteen years."
"He kept himself alive. Very stubborn, your brother."
"Why?"
"Because dead men become martyrs. Broken men become useful."
Roman's hands curled.
"What did you do to him?"
"Nothing your father didn't approve."
Silence.
Even the men hidden around the warehouse seemed to stop breathing.
Roman said, "My father knew."
"Carlo knew everything."
The speaker crackled.
"He knew Gabriel found the books. He knew your mother had started asking questions. He knew you were too soft to inherit while she was alive."
I looked at Roman.
His face had become a mask.
"What did you give her?" he asked.
"Medication."
Roman's voice dropped.
"Say it."
"Your mother was going to take you boys and leave Chicago. Carlo could not allow it."
Something in Roman broke.
Not loudly.
That made it worse.
"Carlo let you poison her."
"He ordered it."
A red light blinked above the loading door.
My stomach tightened.
Not a camera.
A timer.
I looked around.
Another red light beneath a support column.
Explosives.
"Roman!"
He saw my face.
I pointed.
His eyes followed.
"Everybody out!" he shouted.
The warehouse erupted.
Luca's men moved.
Roman ran toward me.
The first blast hit the east wall.
Concrete dust exploded across the floor.
I was thrown sideways.
Roman caught me before my head hit steel.
"Move!"
We ran.
A second explosion tore through the loading bay.
The roof groaned.
Someone screamed.
Roman dragged me beneath a collapsing beam, shoving me ahead of him.
We reached the side door as the main floor disappeared behind smoke.
Outside, men poured into the rain.
Luca counted.
"Two injured. Nobody missing."
Roman grabbed his shirt.
"Trace the call."
"We are."
"Find Michael."
"We will."
Roman released him.
Then he turned to me.
His face was covered in dust.
Blood ran from a cut above his eyebrow.
"You disobeyed me."
"You were standing in a building full of bombs."
"I told you to stay in the car."
"And if I had?"
He opened his mouth.
Nothing came out.
I stepped closer.
"You don't get to protect people by deciding they don't get a choice."
His expression changed.
"I watched my mother die without knowing she was being murdered," he said.
The anger in my chest disappeared.
"I buried my brother while he was alive somewhere. I spent years hunting your father because mine lied to me. So forgive me if choice is not the first thing on my mind when someone puts a target on you."
Rain ran down both our faces.
I touched the blood above his eyebrow.
Roman went still.
"So learn," I said softly.
His eyes met mine.
"I am not your mother. I am not Gabriel. I am not someone you already lost."
His hand closed gently around my wrist.
"No."
"Then don't treat me like a ghost."
For one second, the stockyard disappeared.
There was only his hand.
My pulse.
His eyes.
Then Luca shouted.
"We got something."
Roman released me.
Luca held up a tablet.
"The burner bounced through four towers, but the image metadata from Norah's text had a location tag before they stripped it."
"Where?"
"Old private clinic in Cicero. Bellucci Development owned it through a shell company until six months ago."
Roman's face hardened.
"Salvatore."
"Looks like it."
We were in the vehicles within two minutes.
The clinic looked abandoned.
It wasn't.
The first floor had fresh locks.
Cameras.
Generator power.
Roman's men entered from three sides.
I stayed behind Luca this time.
Mostly.
We found Michael in the basement.
He was tied to a chair.
Bruised.
Angry.
Alive.
I cut the tape around his wrists.
He stared at me.
"You came?"
"Obviously."
Then he looked past me.
Roman stood in the doorway.
Uncle and nephew saw each other for the first time.
Neither spoke.
Michael stood slowly.
Roman looked at his face.
Gabriel's eyes.
Gabriel's jaw.
Twenty-nine years stolen from both of them.
"You look like him," Roman said.
Michael's expression tightened.
"So do you."
It was not affectionate.
It was not hostile.
It was something more painful.
Recognition without relationship.
Then a sound came from the room next door.
A metal tray fell.
Roman turned.
We entered together.
The room held one hospital bed.
One monitor.
One thin man with silver threaded through dark hair.
A scar ran through his left eyebrow.
Roman stopped in the doorway.
The man looked up.
For a moment, he seemed confused.
Then his eyes widened.
"Roman?"
Roman did not breathe.
Gabriel Bellucci began to cry.
Roman crossed the room in three steps.
He dropped to his knees beside the bed.
His brother raised one trembling hand and touched Roman's face.
"You got old."
Roman laughed.
It broke into something that sounded almost like a sob.
"So did you."
Gabriel smiled weakly.
"I was starting to think you'd never find me."
Roman gripped his hand.
"Why didn't you come home?"
Gabriel's smile disappeared.
"Because home was where the monsters were."
Michael stood behind us.
His face had gone white.
"Dad?"
Gabriel looked past Roman.
His entire expression changed.
"Michael."
Michael staggered forward.
"I buried you."
"I know."
"You let me."
"No."
Gabriel shook his head.
"Salvatore sent you ashes. I was already here."
Michael sat on the edge of the bed.
"You were alive."
"Every day."
Michael's anger collapsed into grief.
He bent over his father.
Gabriel held him.
I looked away.
Roman found my hand.
His fingers closed around mine.
Not possession.
Not command.
Gratitude.
Then Gabriel looked at me.
For a long moment, he stared.
"Thomas's girl."
I nodded.
"Norah."
He smiled.
"He said you'd grow up stubborn."
"He was right."
"He usually was."
My throat tightened.
"Did my father die because of you?"
Gabriel's face changed.
"No."
"Because of Salvatore?"
"Yes."
The room went silent.
Gabriel closed his eyes.
"Thomas was getting ready to bring everything to federal prosecutors. Salvatore had his car sabotaged."
My knees nearly gave out.
For six years, I had believed my father's death was an accident.
Roman's hand tightened around mine.
Gabriel opened his eyes again.
"Thomas saved my son. Saved me more than once. I couldn't save him."
I swallowed hard.
"Where is Salvatore?"
Gabriel looked toward the door.
"He'll come for the ledger."
"What ledger?" Roman asked.
Gabriel smiled faintly.
"The real one."
He pointed toward his hospital bed.
"Your uncle has spent eighteen years looking in safes."
Roman frowned.
May you like
Gabriel tapped his chest.
"Never once thought to look under the man he kept prisoner."
