Chapter 32 Cortez
Chapter thirty-two
Cortez
I love you.
Those were the words I’d wanted to say to her when I held her in my arms yesterday. Hell, I’d wanted to tell her the moment I locked eyes with her on the battlefield.
They say you don’t know the value of what you have till you lose it. I always thought that was sentimental bullshit. Only now do I truly understand that saying.
I almost lost her. The mere thought of it sends a wave of agony through my being.
I thought I wouldn’t see her again. I felt so much anger when the guard we caught revealed Ramirez’s emergency plan of driving to Mexico. But it all vanished when I saw her. I held her and didn’t want to let her go.
It made me feel feelings I have avoided for years: love—I think—and peace. For the first time in years, I feel at peace. Well, as much at peace as a man like me can find in this world.
“We’ve checked the chip. The tech team is doing their best to hack it and trace the signal to its source. The men will find an answer in no time.” Alej taps the desk as he sits upright. His brows are furrowed in deep thought. I’m sure mine are no different.
Wheels turn in my head. Yesterday, I took another look at the box Nero had sent through the teen boy and found an RFID chip embedded inside it.
My best guess is that Nero left it there to track the package…
or to intentionally bait me. Either way, the faster my men can trace the location, the sooner we find Nero and end all this.
Still, that one damn phrase lingers in my mind. Just a knight in the way of a checkmate. Yet no other mafia is bigger than the Marino Mafia. We’re logically the only ones worth whatever goal it is they have.
“Cosa è più grande della Mafia Marino (What is bigger than the Marino Mafia), Alej?” My fingers join his on the desk, tapping irregular rhythms.
His fingers still. “Nothing. No other cartel, Capo.”
So what could they possibly want to get at? My mind spins, thoughts circling my brain, grazing endless scenarios. Power. Revenge. Leverage.
Nero is somehow connected to all of this. But nothing adds up.
I bring my attention to my laptop, the dormant screen lights up as I hover the cursor over our profits report. It’s plunging. More warehouses are shutting down. Factories have stopped producing.
How one little strategy is making the whole mafia bleed. Hold on!
My eyes widen, thoughts now circling back to the question I asked Alej. “Maybe not one thing.”
Alej’s eyes narrow on mine. He looks puzzled.
I rise, now beginning to pace the length of my office. “We’ve been thinking too small...too narrow. No mafia is above us in ranks, Alej. Ma se fossero tutti loro (But what if it’s all of them)?”
His brows furrow. “All? Quindi non siamo noi l’obiettivo…ma tutte le mafie più piccole? (So we’re not the target…But all the smaller mafias?)”
It sounds weird, stupid even, but that’s the only logical reason. The mental haze begins to clear as I see things from this new perspective. “Perhaps they want to control them and want me out of the way.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know…yet.” Familiar anger forces my hand into a fist. I walk to the desk, almost sending the things on the surface crashing down. Can’t the fucking men work faster?
The door suddenly flings open, and Selene rushes in, fisting Maria’s phone. “Luca.”
I still, my breath hitching. Her brother. The twin she’d told me all about in tears last night. The one she’d begged me to save.
She’s panting harshly when she reaches me, her hair messy and skin as pale as snow. Her eyes are watery, and my heart quakes at the sight. “He mentioned a name. Julio. He’s one of them.”
I nod, glancing at Alej, who is now standing alert, poised for orders.
“Tall, African American, has a twelve-year-old daughter—Amalia—who attends a catholic school in the Bronx. He said he’s en route to a warehouse on Calle Roja. Black SUV, fully armed guards.”
Shit!
“We have to go, now!”
Alej springs forth, already out before the orders fully leave my lips. Grabbing my guns from the drawer, I head out when she calls.
“Cortez.”
I turn to her.
“Please be careful,” she calls out softly. My heart yearns to pull her into my arms and kiss her. But that’s a distraction I need to avoid for the mission.
With a nod, I leave. As I walk through the hallway, men file out, and thoughts of what happened the last time I left her in my office flash through my head. But it’s different this time.
She’s done fighting. It’s time to take control.
***
The warehouse is similar to the other facilities I’ve seen. Old buildings with rusted signs, proof that Vasquez intentionally purchased older buildings to avoid suspicion.
It’s wedged between a row of other seemingly legitimate businesses. Shipping companies, factories…
“I can barely count the guards. Most are obscured by containers.” Alej lowers the binoculars in front of him.
I nod, signaling for him and the rest of the men to follow my lead. I crouch, following the trail of the rusted fence until it leads to a main entrance. But it’s locked.
Turning back, I quickly signal to them to reroute. We slip to the side and find a tiny opening that leads inside the compound. My steps are light on the grass as we pass by a window coated with dust.
I signal the men to take ready positions. They split themselves into groups. Some round the back of the facility, while others crouch in a ready stance by the front door.
Swiftly, I break the glass with my elbow and pull the pin on the smoke grenade Alej gives me, throwing it through the glass.
Men roar and immediately start barking orders in Spanish, but my men are already bursting through the thick smoke that fills the warehouse.
Without wasting time, I fire at anything that comes my way, taking down men when I catch a glimpse of a figure running up the stairs.
“Son of a bitch!” My pulse races as my feet pump behind him, up the metal stairs. He almost falls, but I remain steady, aiming and firing one clean shot at his leg.
He groans but doesn’t stop until he reaches the rooftop, then he turns around and aims his gun at me. He’s dark skinned. Julio. Before any threat leaves his lips, I fire another round at his hand. The gun clatters from his bloodied hand.
“Your head is next,” I growl.
He holds his hand and quickly darts his eyes towards the ledge. I sense what he wants to do before he does it and break into a run just as he does.
He doesn’t get to jump over the ledge as I fist his collar, shoving him roughly to the ground. These people don’t have issues wasting their own lives. That, I’ve learned over time.
“The syndicate. What do they hope to achieve?” My voice comes out rough as I fist his neck tightly. The veins in his forehead pop, sweat beading his temples, but all he releases is a fucking smile.
“Fuck you,” he spits. There’s resolve in his eyes to die with whatever information he has. And I’m not ready to play that game.
“If I were you, I’d start talking.” I slam him harder into the ground. “…Or your daughter dies.”
His eyes widen. There’s a flicker of panic colliding against his bravado. Touché. Luca knew what he was doing when he gave the daughter’s name.
“Y-You-You’re bluffing,” he stammers, the cocky smile fading off his face. I slide my eyes to the ring on his finger.
“Amalia, Catholic school, the Bronx.” I press harder on his neck. “I won’t ask again. What does the syndicate hope to achieve? Start with the real fucking names.”
He hesitates, and I grit, “Lord knows what fate would befall your daughter. Maybe my men would even have fun with he—”
“Enough!” he yells, nostrils flaring with contempt. “Alessio Romano. Diego Salazar. Victor Holloway. They are a few of the many people who run the show. The list is fucking endless,” he breathes harshly. “Don’t you dare lay a finger on my daughter.”
I frown. Different cultural identities. “Alessio Romano.” I pick a random name. “Give me what can’t be hidden about him.”
His eyes widen. “I-I don’t know, I swear. I only work as—”
“I don’t give a fuck what you work as. You try to play smart, I’ll kill you, and your daughter will be left at our mercy.”
He clenches his teeth hard. “A fucking laundromat in Queens,” he answers.
“Now start talking.”
“The syndicate’s mission is to wipe out existing structures,” he breathes hard. “Change the game. It’s something bigger than you think.”
My gaze sharpens on his. “Wipe existing structures?”
“Yes. It’s a Reform. They want to change th—”
Suddenly, a gun goes off, and I stare back at a dead Julio, blood gushing out of where he’d been shot in his neck.
Fuck! Instantly, I get up, pointing my gun at the man who emerges from the shadows.
He walks slowly and my breath hitches when he comes to light.
Nero.
Without wasting time, I fire at the bastard, aiming at his legs. But he’s fast. He quickly dives behind a metal vent, my bullets narrowly missing him by an inch.
“Why are you here, Nero?” My aim remains steady on the vent.
A short, dry laugh meets my question. “I thought you were smarter than this, Cortez.”
“Indulge me,” I grit and aim to fire when the clip comes out empty. Damn!
Before I can blink, Nero roars, shooting out from the vent and tackling me to the ground with brute force. The gun falls from my hand.
“Revenge,” he grunts. I barely recover when he grabs my head and slams it against the gravel.
My vision thins out momentarily but is restored just in time to dodge an incoming blow.
My knuckles crack into his jaw. Thrice. He staggers backwards, and I rearrange our positions, straddling him. I quickly recover my gun and bash it against his skull.
“Damien was a coward. He touched somebody he shouldn’t have,” I grit, slamming his head into the rooftop. “What’s the syndicate’s plan?”
Blood pools beneath his head as a savage laugh rips his throat. “They’re winning, Cortez. Restructuring the entire mafia world so that no more dons sit at the top.”
My eyes narrow at him. That’s impossible.
“…In this new world, the ground is leveled. Everyone can play fair. No one holds all the fame…glory. And the best part? It was never about you from the start.”
“You, Cortez, embody everything we want gone—things that can’t work in this new era we’re bringing.
The era of loyalty, suits, and hierarchy is dead.
” His voice, though weak, holds bitter triumph.
“Loyalty weakens, hierarchy creates a system of kings. All of this makes crime predictable and traceable by the feds. We’re tearing down that system. ”
I drive a blow into his face, my mind racing like bullets against a barrel. “And you replace it with what? Chaos?”
His head falls back almost limply, voice growing weak.
“It is time for an evolution. Once you, the mighty, have fallen, the other mafias have no choice but to join this powerful vision…or die. When that happens, we decentralize the mafia world.”
My breath stops. What the fuck?
“No more dons, no more turf wars.” He meets my eyes. “All we’d have then is encrypted transactions, anonymity, and scalable wealth. Untraceable in the event of chaos, and giving everyone equal chances to grow.”
Impossible!
As I stare at him in horror, I catch a glimpse of his hand moving beside me. Just as he fires a shot, I twist his wrist, deflecting the bullet, which nicks my ear.
Fuck. I groan.
His eyes widen as I force the barrel to his skull.
“Say hi to your brother in hell for me.”
The bullet pierces his skull, and I waste no time in getting up and hurrying downstairs towards Alej.
Reform the mafia world. My head feels hot, fury raging beneath my veins. There’s a fucking reason our godfathers stuck to the old tradition. The mafia isn’t just business. It’s control, order…not some damn haphazard evolution.
“Boss,” Alej meets me halfway on the staircase after shooting a man. Seems more enemies had trooped in. He and the men had been holding the line.
I recount everything to him and watch his eyes grow wide. “Shit!”
“Mi ha dato dei nomi (He gave me names). As soon as we get to the mansion, find out whatever you can on the names. I have an idea on how to stop this madness.”
The ride to the house is a blur as the tires screech to a halt in front of the mansion. I jump down, hurrying inside and straight to my office.
Once there, I open my laptop, but immediately pause in my tracks when the disavowal draft is the first thing that hits me. I did not open this.
The thoughts are still swirling in my head when Alej bursts through the door.
“She’s gone,” he says.
My blood runs cold. A wave of fear rises in my chest and seizes my breath. “The guard says she asked to attend a meeting with her brother, and when he refused her exit, she left anyway.”
Fuck!