Chapter 17
Vittorio
Blood stained the cuffs of my white shirt as I paced the bedroom.
Sophie had fallen asleep from exhaustion, her breathing finally steady after the attack.
The image I couldn't shake from my mind—her standing over a dead body, knife in hand—had seared itself into my memory.
She had transformed before my eyes—from captive to survivor to something far more dangerous: a mother protecting her child.
I had created this. Every choice I'd made since dragging her into my car that rainy night had led us here.
My phone vibrated. Enzo.
"Is it done?" I asked.
"We have Carbone's location. He's at the restaurant."
Of course he was. The old fool believed himself untouchable, continuing his routines even after sending killers to my home. He'd made a critical error—he'd failed to understand that when I eliminated Antonio, I'd severed all remaining ties to the old ways.
"Keep eyes on him. I'm coming."
I glanced at Sophie's sleeping form, her hand resting protectively over her stomach. Mateo stood guard outside our door, with six more men securing the perimeter. She would be safe while I finished this.
I changed into a fresh suit—charcoal gray, my funeral attire. The symbolism wasn't lost on me. Today marked the death of the old Ricci family and the birth of something new.
Enzo waited for me in the garage, standing beside the armored Bentley.
"Six men inside with Carbone," he reported as we pulled away from the estate. "All armed. He's holding court like nothing's happened."
"The arrogance of dinosaurs," I said. "They never see the asteroid coming."
We drove in silence through the city streets. My mind calculated angles, exits, and contingencies. This would be public. Messy. A statement written in blood that no one in our world could misinterpret.
Carbone had chosen Bella Notte, a restaurant that had served as neutral ground for family business for three generations. The irony wasn't lost on me. The place where deals were struck would become the place where the old guard died.
"Park three blocks away," I instructed. "I want to approach on foot."
Enzo nodded, pulling into an alley behind a row of upscale boutiques. He opened the trunk, revealing an arsenal.
I selected a matte black Beretta with a silencer and a vintage straight razor that had belonged to my grandfather. The gun was practical; the razor was symbolic. The old ways would die by their own traditions.
"You don't have to do this yourself," Enzo said, checking his own weapon. "We have men who—"
"This is personal," I cut him off. "Carbone sent men to kill Sophie. To kill my child."
Understanding flickered across Enzo's face. He'd been with me long enough to know when certain lines were crossed; there was no delegation, no distance. Some debts could only be paid in person.
We approached the restaurant from opposite directions. Through the windows, I could see Carbone holding court at his regular table in the back, surrounded by aging captains who clung to the old ways. They laughed over pasta and wine, celebrating their failed attempt on Sophie's life.
The ma?tre d' recognized me immediately, his face paling. "Don Ricci, we weren't expecting—"
"It's a surprise visit," I said, slipping him a folded bill. "Don't announce me."
The restaurant hummed with conversation and clinking glasses. Patrons nodded respectfully as I passed, a few whispering behind their hands. Word of Antonio's death had spread, but few understood what it truly meant for our world.
Carbone saw me approaching, his weathered face registering first surprise, then contempt. He dabbed his mouth with a napkin, setting it carefully beside his plate.
"Vittorio," he said, not bothering to stand. "We were just discussing your brother's unfortunate passing."
He leaned back in his chair, studying me with calculating eyes.
"My men have orders," Carbone said with a cold smile. "If I don't walk out of here, more will come for your precious family."
I studied him—this relic of a bygone era. His silver hair slicked back, his expensive suit cut in a style twenty years out of date. He'd served my father, then Antonio, always the loyal soldier to men he considered worthy of the Ricci name.
"Were you also discussing the men you sent to my home?" I asked, my voice carrying across the suddenly quiet restaurant. "The ones who tried to kill the mother of my child?"
Carbone's eyes narrowed. "The girl is a problem. She's not family. She's not even Italian. Your father would be ashamed—"
"My father is dead," I said. "As is Antonio. The Ricci family you knew is gone."
Around us, diners began to sense the danger. Some quietly requested their checks, while others sat frozen, afraid movement might draw attention.
"You betray everything we built," Carbone said, his voice rising. "For what? Some whore who—"
The razor was in my hand before he finished speaking. I moved with a speed that surprised even me, grabbing his thinning hair and yanking his head back. The blade pressed against his throat, drawing a thin line of blood.
"Choose your next words carefully," I whispered. "They will be your last."
His men reached for their weapons, but Enzo and our team had them covered, guns drawn. The restaurant erupted in screams as patrons dove under tables or fled for the exits.
"You think killing me ends this?" Carbone hissed. "There are others who believe as I do. The old families won't accept your mongrel child as heir—"
"You sent men to kill a pregnant woman," I said, circling his table slowly. "My pregnant woman. My child."
Carbone's eyes glittered with malice. "That bastard mongrel was never worthy of Ricci blood. Just like its whore mother."
"Keep talking," I said softly, my hand moving to the razor. "Tell me more about your traditional values."
"Your father built this empire on strength and purity. Antonio understood that. But you?" He spat. "You've been neutered by sentiment."
Carbone suddenly grabbed a steak knife from the table, lunging at me with surprising speed for his age. I caught his wrist, twisting until the blade clattered to the floor.
I drew the razor across his throat—my grandfather's blade ending my grandfather's era. Carbone collapsed forward, the old ways dying with him as crimson stained the white linen.
"The old Ricci line is over," I announced, watching him slump forward into his plate of linguini, now stained crimson. "Anyone who clings to it dies with it."
His men sat frozen, guns still half-drawn, faced with the choice of their lives. One by one, they lowered their weapons.
"Wise decision," I said, wiping the razor clean on Carbone's suit jacket. "You have until tomorrow to decide. Join the new organization or disappear. There is no third option."
I turned and walked toward the door, Enzo falling in step beside me. Behind us, Carbone's body lay still in a pool of blood and wine.
"The police will be here soon," Enzo said as we emerged onto the street.
"Let them come. By the time they arrive, we'll be ghosts."
The plan had been in motion since the attack on Sophie. Accounts transferred, identities created, safe houses secured. The empire I'd built would continue under Enzo's management while Sophie and I disappeared.
When we returned to the estate, I found Sophie awake, standing by the window. She turned as I entered, her eyes taking in the blood on my hands, the grim set of my jaw.
"It's done," I said simply.
She nodded, no judgment in her eyes. "What happens now?"
"We disappear. Tonight." I crossed to the safe behind the painting, entering the combination. "I've prepared for this possibility. New identities, untraceable accounts, properties off any official record."
I removed stacks of cash, passports, and a satellite phone, placing them on the bed.
"How long have you been planning this?" she asked.
"Since the day I learned you were pregnant." I met her gaze. "I always knew there might come a day when the only way to protect what matters would be to walk away from everything else."
Sophie picked up one of the passports, opening it to find her photo alongside a name she'd never used. "Victoria Blackwood?"
"It seemed fitting. A piece of me, hidden in plain sight."
A ghost of a smile touched her lips. "And you?"
"Marcus Blackwood. Wealthy investor, living quietly with his wife and soon-to-be child."
She set down the passport, studying me with those penetrating eyes that had seen through me from the beginning. "Can you really walk away from all this? Your empire, your power?"
I took her hands in mine, ignoring the dried blood still on my skin.
"What I built was never the point. It was just a means to an end—security, control, freedom from anyone else's authority.
But now…" I placed one hand on her stomach.
"This is what matters. You. Our child. Everything else is just… infrastructure."
The doubt in her eyes cut deeper than any blade. She had every reason to question me, to doubt my capacity for change. I had taken her freedom, used her as a pawn, and dragged her into a war not of her making. That I had fallen in love with her along the way didn't erase those sins.
"I need you to believe me," I said, the words feeling foreign on my tongue. I wasn't accustomed to asking for faith rather than demanding it. "No more lies. No more games. You and the baby come first. Always."
Sophie studied me for a long moment, her hand covering mine on her stomach. "I believe you," she said finally. "But Vittorio, this life… it follows you. You can change your name, your address, even your face, but can you change who you are? What you've done?"
It was the question that had haunted me since the moment I'd decided to leave it all behind. Could a man like me ever truly escape his nature? Or would I simply build a new empire, create new enemies, put my family at risk all over again?
"I don't know," I admitted, the honesty burning my throat. "But I know what happens if we stay. I won't risk that."
She nodded, accepting my answer for what it was—not a promise of perfection, but a commitment to try.
"Where will we go?" she asked.
"First, Switzerland. I have a property in the mountains, isolated, secure. From there, perhaps Portugal or Argentina. Somewhere we can breathe, somewhere our child can grow up seeing more than just walls and guards."
I began gathering what we would need, the essentials only. Everything else could be replaced.
"We leave in an hour. A helicopter will take us to a private airfield. From there, we disappear."
Sophie moved to her closet, selecting only what she could carry in a single bag.
No hesitation, no looking back. Her strength still surprised me, though by now it shouldn't have.
She had survived Antonio, survived captivity, survived Falco's torture, and now Carbone's assassins.
She was, in many ways, stronger than I had ever been.
As we prepared to leave the life I had built, I found myself watching her—this woman who had entered my world as a pawn and would leave it as my equal. My partner. The mother of my child.
Enzo appeared at the door. "The helicopter is ready. We've cleared the route."
I nodded. Enzo wasn't blood, but he'd proven more loyal than my own brother. "You know what to do in my absence."
"The organization will be waiting when you return," he said. "If you return."
The possibility hung between us—that this wasn't a temporary retreat but a permanent exit. That Marcus Blackwood might completely replace Vittorio Ricci.
"Take care of her," Enzo said, nodding toward Sophie. "She's… not what I expected."
I smiled faintly. "None of this is what I expected."
We made our way to the helipad on the east lawn, the wind from the approaching helicopter whipping Sophie's hair around her face. I helped her aboard, then turned for one last look at the estate I had built, the empire I had killed for.
It meant nothing compared to the woman beside me.
As the helicopter lifted into the night sky, Sophie's hand found mine. No words passed between us, but her grip told me everything I needed to know. Whatever came next, we would face it together.
The lights of Newark fell away beneath us, and with them, the last vestiges of Vittorio Ricci. In his place sat Marcus Blackwood, a man with only one purpose: to protect what was his.
The future stretched before us, uncertain but full of possibility. For the first time in my life, I welcomed the unknown.