Chapter 10 - A Name Worth Keeping
Three days later,
Rocco Castellano walked into the mahogany-paneled office of his uncle Gino.
He wasn't in a wheelchair.
He wasn't wearing a tattered coat.
He was wearing a black suit that fit him like armor,
and his eyes were as cold as the Atlantic.
Gino looked up,
a glass of scotch in his hand.
"I heard you were playing beggar in the mountains,"
Gino said,
his voice smooth.
"I heard you found something that didn't belong to you."
"I found the truth,
Gino,"
Rocco said,
standing in the center of the room.
"I found out you betrayed the family thirty years ago."
"I found out why Ray Kesler couldn't look you in the eye for the rest of his life."
Gino sighed,
setting the glass down.
"Ray was a sentimental fool."
"He thought loyalty mattered more than survival."
"And what do you think,
Rocco?"
Rocco pulled the ledger from his jacket,
but he didn't hand it over.
He threw it into the fireplace,
where a low fire was burning.
Gino lunged forward,
but Rocco was faster,
pinning his uncle against the desk with a hand at his throat.
"The ledger is gone,"
Rocco said.
"But the copies are with the FBI,
the Commission,
and a girl in West Virginia who will release them if I don't call her every Sunday."
Gino’s eyes widened with genuine fear.
"You're destroying us,"
he wheezed.
"No,"
Rocco said,
releasing him.
"I'm destroying you."
"The Castellano name is done."
"From now on,
the docks are public,
the loan books are burned,
and you're going to retire to a very small house in the country where you will never speak to anyone again."
"If you don't,"
Rocco smiled,
and it was a cold,
terrifying thing,
"I'll tell the other families exactly what was on page forty-two."
Rocco walked out of the office,
past the men with guns who now stepped aside without being asked.
He walked out of the tower,
out of the city,
and into the bright sunlight of a new afternoon.
He didn't have a driver.
He didn't have a phone.
He took a bus,
then a train,
and finally a long,
winding road into the mountains.
He arrived at Cedar Hollow on a Saturday afternoon.
The smell of fresh bread was already in the air.
A new building was rising from the ashes of the old one,
the skeleton of a bakery that would be bigger and stronger than the last.
Elara was there,
standing in the dirt,
wearing a new apron.
She saw him and stopped,
a smile breaking across her face that was worth more than all the gold in Boston.
Rocco walked up to her,
his steps steady.
He didn't need a chair.
He didn't need a title.
"I'm looking for a job,"
he said.
"I'm not much of a baker,
but I'm very good at carrying heavy buckets."
Elara laughed,
and the sound echoed through the valley,
clearing away the last of the shadows.
"Tell me your name again,"
she said,
reaching for his hand.
He squeezed her fingers,
the flour-dusted skin feeling like home.
"Rocco,"
he said.
"Just Rocco."
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And for the first time in his life,
the man who had owned everything finally had something that was actually his.
