Chapter Twenty Two
Mario
By evening, my house is full.
Not full in the way it used to be when the boys were younger, and every room seemed to have noise pouring out of it, but full enough that the walls no longer feel quite so empty.
My brothers arrive first.
Lorenzo comes in with his sons, Edoardo and Alessio, behind him, both taller than I remember them being every time I see them, though they have been grown now for years.
Edoardo carries himself like his father in some ways.
Watchful. Measured. The kind of man who listens before he speaks and remembers everything said in the room.
Alessio is different. Quicker to smile, quicker to lean into a joke, but not foolish.
There is a sharpness behind his eyes that he hides better than most.
Ricardo arrives next with Dante.
Dante is quiet tonight.
Not unusual.
Ricardo’s son has always had an intensity to him, a darkness in his stare that makes people reconsider careless words. He does not fidget. Does not fill silence. He watches quietly and only speaks when necessary.
Diego is last, as usual, walking into my house as if lateness is a right granted to him at birth, as the youngest.
“You started without me?” he asks, handing his coat off.
“No,” I say. “Unfortunately.”
Matteo laughs from near the bar.
Tomasso lifts his glass toward Diego. “We considered it.”
“You wound me,” Diego says, pressing a hand to his chest. “My own blood.”
“You recover quickly,” Lorenzo says dryly.
“Because I am strong.”
“Because you are shameless,” Ricardo corrects.
Diego smiles. “True.”
It is good, this sound.
The voices.
The insults.
The easy movement of family through my home.
For a while, I let it remain only that.
Family.
Dinner is served the way it should be. Loud, abundant, excessive by American standards and barely sufficient by ours.
Pasta first. Then meat. Bread passed from hand to hand.
Wine refilled before anyone has to ask. Matteo and Alessio argue over football.
Tomasso makes Dante laugh once, a small, reluctant sound that draws a grin from Alessio as if he has witnessed something rare.
Diego complains about a bottle I open, then drinks more of it than anyone else.
For a while, we are not men with enemies.
We are brothers.
Sons.
Fathers.
Then dinner ends.
The plates are cleared. The last of the wine remains on the table. The staff disappears as they know to do, and the room settles into a different kind of quiet.
No one has to be told.
They all feel it.
I set my glass down and look at each of them.
Ricardo on my left, expression already flat and assessing.
Lorenzo beside him, fingers resting loosely near the stem of his wineglass.
Diego leaned back in his chair, posture careless, eyes anything but.
My sons opposite me. Matteo still, Tomasso with his jaw tight.
Edoardo and Alessio at the far end with Dante, the three of them close in a way that pleases me more than I say. Whatever else this life does, whatever it takes, the next generation remains together.
Good.
They will need each other.
“I received another request this week,” I say. “Emilio Bellandi wants to meet.”
The name kills what is left of the warmth in the room.
Ricardo’s mouth tightens.
Lorenzo’s gaze sharpens.
Diego says nothing, which tells me enough.
Tomasso exhales softly through his nose. Matteo’s expression turns cold.
Dante sits forward slightly.
“Again?” Alessio asks.
“Yes.”
“What did you tell him?” Edoardo asks.
“Nothing yet.”
Diego’s brow lifts. “That is unlike you.”
“No,” Ricardo says. “It is exactly like him. He is deciding how much insult the silence should contain.”
A faint smile touches my mouth.
He is not wrong.
“Bellandi has been a thorn in our side since we came to Chicago,” I say. “Small things at first. Pressure on suppliers. Whispers to city inspectors. Attempts to sway men who had already agreed to work with us.”
“Attempts that failed,” Matteo says.
“Yes,” I say. “But attempts nonetheless.”
Tomasso’s fingers tap once against the table. “And now he wants friendship.”
“He has wanted friendship since he discovered we were not tied to Atlantic City.”
The room stills at that.
Atlantic City.
Even now, the words carry weight. Not only because of who rules there, but because of what our father left buried between Naples, Chicago, and the Jersey shore.
“We established ourselves here,” I continue. “We grew stronger than they expected. They know there is no alliance between us and our Atlantic City relatives. They know we operate separately. They know Luca Conti has no reason to protect our interests. Bellandi believes that creates opportunity.”
“By opportunity,” Diego says, voice flat, “you mean he wants us to help him take them down.”
“Yes.”
Dante’s eyes narrow.
Alessio mutters something under his breath in Italian, disgusted.
Edoardo looks toward his father, but Lorenzo’s attention remains on me.
“Bellandi made enemies of Atlantic City when they attempted to expand into the northeast region, and now they are pushing for us to stand with them,” I say. “A friendship. Their word, not mine. They want to stand beside us against the Atlantic City Contis. They believe we share a common enemy.”
Tomasso’s expression hardens. “Do we?”
The question earns him a look from Alessio, but Tomasso does not look away.
He is not wrong to ask.
That is why we are here.
“That is what we must decide carefully. Not tonight, not with emotion, and not because Emilio Bellandi thinks he can whisper poison in our ear and make us act against our own blood.”
I lean back in my chair.
“There may come a day,” I continue, “when we have to face our cousins.”
“Brother,” Tomasso interrupts.
The room goes utterly still.
No one dares to breathe too loudly.
My eyes move to him.
Tomasso’s face is tense, but not uncertain. He looks at me with the same stubbornness I know will make him a great don. People may look at my oldest and see a quiet man with his nose buried in the books, but I know better.
There is steel under his silence. Fire under his restraint. A sense of right and wrong that will make him harder to bend than any man who rules by temper alone.
In this, perhaps, he is right.
I hold his stare.
“Yes,” I say quietly. “Brother.”
The word changes things.
As well it should.
Luca Conti is no cousin. Certainly not a distant relation.
Not the son of Elio Conti and Maria Conti as the world believes.
Francis Conti’s firstborn.
My brother, if the evidence Father left behind is to be believed.
And I do believe it.
I did not want to.
For a long time, I wanted to bury it with him. Francis Conti built his life on secrets, and even at the end, he tried to hand them to me as if they were an inheritance. Keep it close. Trust no one. Let no weakness show. Let no truth escape unless it could be used as a weapon.
That was his way.
It is not mine.
Not in this.
Not with them.
My sons know. My brothers know. Their sons know. Not because Father would have approved, but because I refuse to build the future of this family on a lie no one is allowed to name.
“Brother,” I repeat.
Tomasso lowers his chin once.
Matteo looks at his twin, then back to me, his expression unreadable.
I continue.
“We do not know how Luca Conti runs Atlantic City. We know pieces. Reputation. Influence. The loyalty of his people. The strength of what he built before he went to prison and maintained throughout his time there. He came out just as strong. He has ruled for over thirty years. We know he is not a man to underestimate.”
“No,” Ricardo says. “He is not.”
“Whatever happened between Father and Elio all those years ago,” I say, “whatever hatred Father carried until his last breath, I have no intention of running headfirst into a feud with a man who has Luca Conti’s power, reach, and discipline.”
“Especially not for the likes of Emilio Bellandi,” Diego says.
“Especially not for Emilio Bellandi.”
Lorenzo rests his forearms on the table. “It may still be wise to make allies with those we know will stand with us.”
“Yes,” I say. “But not the Bellandis.”
Ricardo’s gaze turns sharp with agreement.
“An alliance with them would be a direct challenge to Atlantic City,” I say. “There can be no mistake about that. Bellandi knows it. Luca would know it. Everyone watching from here to the coast would know it.”
“And Bellandi would get exactly what he wants,” Edoardo says.
I look at him.
“Protection,” he continues. “Legitimacy. A stronger name to stand behind while he pushes.”
“Correct,” I say.
Alessio leans back. “And when the blood starts spilling, he’ll call it loyalty and let us bleed first.”
Diego smiles faintly. “There is Lorenzo in that one.”
Lorenzo does not look amused, though I know he is.
“He is right,” I say. “Never mind the fact that I have no interest in allying with a man who resorts to the means Bellandi uses to gain power.”
The disgust is immediate.
Matteo’s jaw tightens.
Tomasso looks down, lips pressed into a thin line.
Ricardo’s expression goes murderous.
We’ve all heard the stories.
The measures Bellandi resorted to in order to gain power in Luca Conti’s territory. Trying to have a pregnant woman killed because he wouldn’t do business with him.
There are lines.
People outside rooms like this do not believe men like us have them. They think because we break laws, we break everything. Because we use violence, we have no standard for how violence is used. Because we do what must be done in the dark, we must be without honor.
They are wrong.
Whatever we are, whatever we do, whatever others think of us and what we do, we maintain our own personal honor. We do not harm women carrying children. We do not use unborn babies as leverage.
“We will not ally with Emilio Bellandi,” I say. “If he asks again, the answer will still be no. If he threatens us, we will answer differently.”
Diego’s mouth curves slightly at that.
Ricardo looks almost pleased.
“Until then,” I say, “we watch.”
Dante speaks for the first time.
“And Atlantic City?”
I look at him.
His voice is even, but there is something beneath it. A quiet curiosity.