11. Nico
11
Nico
P ain crawls through my body like liquid fire as consciousness returns, dragging me from the depths of darkness into a world of chaos.
The first thing I register is the argument, voices raised in fury, accusations flying like bullets.
"This is their fault!" Matteo's voice cuts through the haze, razor-sharp with rage. "The Morettis brought this down on us. If they hadn't—"
"I just can't believe our mother would do this," Lorenzo interrupts, his voice laced with something dark.
The machines monitoring my vitals beep in protest as I force myself to sit up, ignoring the stabbing pain in my shoulder, leg, and side.
"Enough." My voice comes out rougher than intended, but it has the desired effect. The room falls silent.
Matteo approaches my bed first, his face contorted in rage.
There's something in his eyes that makes my blood run cold before he even speaks. "My mother,” he stops and shakes his head, then starts again. “Francesca contacted us."
Her name hits like another bullet and it hurts like shit. "What does she want?"
"Everything." Matteo exhales sharply. "Complete immunity. Freedom. Access to offshore accounts. Safe passage to Europe. Control of certain territories." He pulls out his phone, and my heart stops when I see the video playing on the screen.
They tied Isabella to a chair, but even bound and captured, she is still defiant.
Her green eyes flash with fury as she yells, "Don't you dare give in to her demands! ”
The video cuts off, and I have to resist the urge to throw something, to break something, to kill someone.
"Why?" Matteo's voice cracks slightly. "Why would our mother do this? Thirty years of—"
I turn to my father, something clicking into place. I said, studying his face. "You weren't surprised. When we discovered Francesca was the mole. You didn't even flinch."
The room goes deadly quiet.
Antonio Bellanti, the man who raised me to be a monster, who molded me into a weapon, looks away first. "I knew."
The admission detonates like a bomb in the room. Before I realize what I'm doing, I've grabbed Matteo's gun from his holster and aimed it at my father. The movement sends fresh waves of agony through my injuries, but I barely feel them through the rage.
"You selfish prick!" I spit the words, "Your fucking selfishness has put the love of my life in danger. Your silence—"
"It was okay when she was out for the Morettis," Antonio says, his voice eerily calm despite the gun pointed at his head. "But coming after my blood crossed a line."
"Nico." Luca's voice cuts through the red haze of my fury. "We need to focus on saving Isabella. This can wait."
He's right, damn him. I lower the gun, watching as the Bellanti and Moretti families that have been at each other's throats for generations come together to form a plan.
We'll appear to accept Francesca's terms while Matteo and Lorenzo will position their men strategically at the meeting point. Olivia will work on false documentation while Angelo sets up convincing but fake financial transfers.
"I'm leading the rescue," I announced.
Matteo opens his mouth, to argue perhaps, but the look in my eyes shuts him up.
I’m coming to get you, principessa.
The warehouse where we meet Francesca is a powder keg waiting to explode. Armed men surround the building, and in the center, Isabella sits bound to a chair.
Next to her stands Diana, her supposed best friend, and I can't imagine how Isabella must be feeling right now.
"Finally," Francesca says, her elegant features arranged in a smile that doesn't reach her eyes. "I was thinking you wouldn't come."
"Let's get right into it. I don't suppose you have time to waste," I say sharply.
Francesca circles Isabella's chair, her heels clicking rhythmically against the concrete floor. The sound echoes through the warehouse like a metronome counting down to disaster.
"Thirty years," she says, her voice steady but laced with rage. "Thirty years I've waited for this moment, Nico. Do you have any idea what it's like to wake up every morning next to the enemy? To smile and kiss a man whose family destroyed everything you ever loved?"
My blood runs cold. "What are you talking about?"
Francesca laughs, a hollow sound bounces off the metal walls. "Of course you don't recognize me. Why would you? I was just a child when the great Bellanti family decided the Rossis needed to be wiped off the map."
The Rossis. The name hits me like a physical blow, unlocking memories I've spent years trying to forget. The bloody turf war that nearly tore the city apart.
The Rossis had broken every code of honor in the Mafia world and they had to go.
It was an unforgettable war.
"That's impossible," I whisper, but even as I say it, I'm searching her face for traces of that family's features.
"Is it?" Francesca pulls a gold locket from beneath her blouse. She clicks it open and tosses it to me.
Inside is a faded photograph of a man I recognize from old newspaper clippings, Caprice Rossi, standing beside a woman and a little girl with familiar eyes.
"My father. My mother. Me. Before the Bellanti executed them and burned our home to the ground."
Isabella gasps, straining against her restraints. "You've been lying this entire time? To all of us? To Papa?"
"I married Luca for one reason only," Francesca continues, turning back to me. "I became his perfect wife, the mother of his children, the loyal Bellanti daughter-in-law. All while documenting every criminal enterprise, every corrupt deal, every body buried. Thirty years of evidence, now in the hands of people who will use it to dismantle everything his family built."
"You—" Matteo's voice cuts through the tension, raw and sharp. I turn to see him and, for the first time, I see him lose control, shaking with rage.
His gun is in his hand, but his grip trembles.
"You took my sister, your own daughter," he seethes, stepping forward. "You put our family in chains. You did this knowing that your own children would stand here, pointing guns at their mother. What the hell is wrong with you?"
Francesca's eyes flash with something unreadable—pain, maybe, but it's gone in an instant. "I did this for our true family. For the Rossis."
Matteo lets out a bitter laugh, his mask of cold calculation shattered. "Our true family? The family we never even knew? The one you chose over the people who actually loved you?"
His voice cracks, but his fury doesn’t wane. "I spent my life protecting this family, protecting you. And you threw it all away."
Luca steps forward then, his expression torn between fury and heartbreak. "Francesca, please—"
The gunshot shatters the air.
Luca stumbles back, not from a wound but from shock, his gaze dropping to where the bullet struck the ground inches from his foot.
"Don't," Francesca warns, her voice trembling for the first time. "I don't want to hurt you. But I will if you get in my way."
Luca exhales shakily, lifting his hands slightly. "You already have."
Matteo is breathing hard, his finger twitching on the trigger.
"You don't get to do this, Ma. You don’t get to pretend like you're the victim here when you're the one holding the gun, when you're the one who stole Isabella from her home and put us all here."
Francesca glances at Isabella, at the tears streaking her face, then back at Matteo. And for the first time since this nightmare began, uncertainty flickers across her features.
"You have every right to hate the Bellantis, Francesca," I declared, stepping forward, my voice steady despite the surrounding chaos."What happened to your family was unforgivable. But this—" I point to Isabella, to Luca, to Matteo, whose entire body is coiled with grief and rage. "Your actions mirror the very thing you condemn in them."
Diana shifts uncomfortably beside Isabella, and I notice something in her expression. This wasn't what she signed up for. The realization gives me a sliver of hope in this impossible situation.
Francesca's face contorts with fury. "Don't you dare judge me, Nico. You have no idea what it's like to lose everything."
"You're right," I admit. "I don't. But neither do your children. And after today, they will."
"I had another child," she says, and something in her voice makes everyone freeze. "My firstborn. The Bellanti killed him before I infiltrated the family."
Her eyes find Luca's. "I wanted to stop, you know. Over the years, I fell in love with you, grew to love our children. But then a surviving member of my family found me, reminded me of my duty, of my dead son—"
I make a move toward Isabella, but Francesca's gun instantly presses against her temple. "One more step," she warns, "and she becomes collateral damage. She may be my child, but she's also a Bellanti."
"Mom, please." Isabella's voice breaks through the tension, thick with tears. "I'm pregnant."
The words hit like a physical blow. I stagger slightly, my injuries forgotten in the face of this revelation. Francesca's hand wavers, her eyes wide with shock, and I seize the opportunity.
The chaos that erupts is deafening. Matteo, Luca and I take out Francesca’s men. She tried to escape, but one of our men captured her.
Amid it, I see Isabella break free from her bonds—something she must have been working on during the entire confrontation.
She lurches to her feet; her face contorted with a mixture of rage and desperation as she lunges toward her mother. "How could you? All these years—"
"Isabella, no!" I rush forward and grab her arm, pulling her back against my chest despite the searing pain from my injuries. She struggles against my hold, but I don't let go. "You'll have all the time in the world to confront her," I murmur in her ear as we watch our men drag Francesca away. "I promise."
The warehouse echoed with the sound of boots and shouted orders. Matteo appears at my side, his expression dark. "Diana slipped away in the chaos," he spits out, hands clenched into fists. "But don't worry—she won't get far. We'll find her." The bitterness in his voice matches the icy determination in his eyes. "We always do."
“What's going to happen to Mom?” Isabella asks weakly, sniffling.
"Well, we will not kill her," Matteo responds, his voice devoid of warmth. "But we have to come up with something. If it comes out that she's the mole, that our father slept beside the enemy for thirty years, our allies will never trust his judgment again.”
Isabella bites her lips, her voice cracking. “Okay.”
Matteo nods wordlessly at me as he takes charge of cleaning up.
I feel Isabella tremble against me, and I know it's not just from adrenaline. Her mother’s betrayal and Diana’s cut deep.
I turn her in my arms, cradling her face between my hands. "I love you," I whisper against her hair. "Both of you."
"I love you too," she says, her hands fisting in my shirt. "I'm sorry I didn't tell you about the baby. I just found out, and then everything happened—"
I silence her with a kiss, pouring everything I can't say into it. Around us, two of New York's most powerful crime families work together to prevent a war, to protect their own. But at this moment, my world narrows to Isabella and the miracle she carries within her.
We'll deal with Francesca. We'll handle the fallout. We'll figure out how to move forward from this betrayal that cuts bone-deep. We'll find Diana and make her answer for her role in all of this.
But right now, at this moment, I hold the future in my arms—and I'm never letting go again.