Chapter 24
RENZO
The basement smells like concrete and old blood.
I take the stairs at my own pace. No rush. Romano isn’t going anywhere.
The soldiers found him at the service road. Hiding in the groundskeeper’s shed like a rat. Thirty-two years with this family and that was his exit strategy. A fucking shed.
Two men stand guard at the bottom of the stairs. They step aside when they see me. Smart.
“Out.”
They don’t ask questions. The door closes behind them.
Romano is in the chair. Wrists bound. Ankles bound. Blood on his face from where someone got eager during the capture. I’ll deal with that later. He’s mine.
He looks up when I enter. Fear first. Then calculation. Then the search for leverage.
Good.
I pull up a chair. Sit across from him. Near enough to see the sweat on his upper lip.
Neither of us speaks. The silence stretches. Ten seconds. Twenty. A minute.
Romano breaks first. They always do.
“Lorenzo. Listen to me.”
“No.” He stops. “You listen.”
I lean forward. “You poisoned my brother. At our table. During Sunday dinner.”
“I can explain.”
“I don’t want an explanation.”
He swallows. His hands twist against the bindings. The wedding ring catches the light. He’s been turning it for years when he lies.
“What do you want?” His voice is steady. Most men would be begging by now.
“Names. Everyone you’ve been talking to.”
A calculation shifts behind his eyes. There it is. His last card.
“And if I give you names?”
I let him fill the silence.
“A quick death,” he says. “That’s all I ask. I give you everything, you make it fast.”
I look at him. This man who sat at our table for thirty-two years. Who watched my father die. Who just tried to kill my brother.
“We’ll see.”
He talks. Not at first. First he tries a speech.
“Thirty-two years.” His voice shakes. Not with fear anymore. With rage. “I gave this family thirty-two years. Blood and silence. And what did I get?”
I wait.
“Passed over. Again and again. For a boy who wasn’t born when I was making my bones.” He laughs. Bitter. “I’ve earned my place a hundred times over. But there was never room at the table. Not for someone without the Santoro name.”
“Are you finished?”
He stops.
“The names, Romano. I won’t ask again.”
His face hardens. “The boy wasn’t ready to lead. Everyone knew it. Your father told me once, near the end. Said he worried Dante was too soft. Too much of his mother in him.”
My hand finds the rosary in my pocket. The beads are smooth. Familiar.
I don’t pray. Haven’t in years. But I hold it.
“Names.”
“Give me something first. A guarantee.”
I stand. Remove my jacket. Fold it over the chair behind me. Roll up my sleeves.
Romano’s eyes track every movement. Good.
“I was going to give you a choice,” I say. “Talk now, die easy. Talk later, die hard. You chose later.”
“Wait. Just wait.”
I don’t wait.
The first finger breaks clean. The second takes more pressure.
He screams. Good acoustics down here. The concrete catches sound, holds it, lets it echo.
“Names.”
“Stefano Benedetti.” The words come out ragged. “He’s the one who approached me. Two years ago. Said they needed someone inside.”
“Who else?”
“His uncle. Flavio. He handles the money.”
I file the names away. Keep working.
The nail comes off easier than expected. Romano howls. Thrashes against his bindings.
“Who else?”
“There’s a lawyer. Downtown. Handles the paperwork for the shell companies.” He gasps. Chokes on the pain. “Fontaine. Robert Fontaine.”
More names. More connections. The rot runs deeper than we knew.
Dante upstairs. Gia fighting to keep him alive. The monitors. The machines.
My grip tightens on the pliers.
“The poison.” I pick up the pliers again. “What did you use?”
He laughs. Wet. Broken. “You think knowing will help? It’s in his blood already.”
The pliers find another finger.
“Pufferfish toxin,” he gasps. “The Benedettis source it from Japan. They added something to make it faster. I don’t know what. They never told me the full formula.”
I keep working.
“Your father was weak at the end.” Romano’s voice is different now. Spiteful. “Did you know that? Calling out for a dead woman. Lucia. Lucia. I watched him die reaching for a ghost, and I thought.”
He stops. Realizes he’s said too much.
I freeze.
“You thought what?”
Silence.
“You watched my father die.”
His face changes. The kind of fear that knows it’s crossed a line it can’t come back from.
“I was there. I was just there.”
“You were there.”
I put down the pliers. Reach for the next tool.
The kneecap is a small bone. Fragile. It doesn’t take much.
Romano screams until his voice breaks.
“More names. Everyone. Every contact, every meeting, every dollar that changed hands.”
He gives me everything. Sobbing. Broken. Two years of betrayal spilling out between ragged breaths.
I memorize it all. Every name. Every date. Every location.
When he’s done, when there’s nothing left, I step back. Look at what remains of the man who poisoned my brother.
Still breathing. Still conscious. Tougher than expected. Won’t matter soon.
“It doesn’t matter anyway.” The words come out in a whisper. Raw from screaming.
I’m at the utility sink. The water runs red, then pink, then clear.
“He’s dead by now, most likely.” Romano coughs. Blood flecks his lips. “I made sure of it.”
I don’t remember moving.
One second I’m at the sink. The next I have him by the throat, chair tipping backward, his broken body dangling from my grip.
“What did you say?”
He can’t answer. Can’t breathe.
The funeral. Neither of us cried. Someone had to hold the others together.
I let go.
Romano crashes to the floor, chair and all. Gasping.
“You don’t get to talk about him.” My voice doesn’t sound like mine. “You don’t get to say his name.”
He’s coughing. Wheezing. Trying to breathe through a half-crushed throat.
I right the chair. Drag him upright.
Then I go to the cabinet.
The vial is old. The liquid inside is amber.
“Do you know what this is?”
Romano’s eyes find the vial. What’s left of his face goes white.
“Carmine’s recipe.” I turn it in the light. “He used it on the Calabresi family back in ’78. They thought they could move against him. Carmine invited them to dinner.”
I crouch down. Eye level.
“Twelve men. One dinner. None of them made it home.”
“Lorenzo. Please.”
“Fast enough that you know what’s happening. Slow enough that you feel everything.”
His mouth opens. Closes. The begging dies in his throat.
“You poisoned my brother. At our table. In front of our family.” I uncork the vial. “Poison for poison.”
He tries to turn his head. I grab his jaw. Broken fingers scrabble at my wrist. No effect.
“Open.”
He doesn’t. I pinch his nose. Wait. He has to breathe sometime.
The liquid goes down. He chokes, gags, tries to spit it out. Too late.
I release him. Step back. Watch.
It starts with tremors. His hands first, then his arms, then his whole body shaking. Then the burning. I see it in his face. His eyes go wide. His mouth opens in a silent scream.
He looks at me. Pleading.
I don’t look away.
This is what Dante felt. The confusion. The terror. His body turning against itself.
Is he still alive?
Is Gia keeping him breathing?
Is Cassia watching the monitors?
I don’t know. I’ve been down here for hours.
The thought lodges in my chest. Blade-deep.
If Dante dies.
I don’t finish the thought.
Romano convulses. Foam at his mouth. His heels drum against the floor.
I watch. My hands hang at my sides. The water made them clean. They’re still clean.
The convulsions slow. His breathing turns ragged. Wet.
Romano’s chest rises. Falls. Rises.
Stops.
I stand over the body. The basement is quiet. Just the hum of the pipes. The drip of water in the dark.
My hand finds the rosary. The beads click between my fingers. No words come.
I let go of the rosary. Step over Romano’s body.
The stairs stretch upward.
The medical wing is on the other side of the compound. Every second stretches.
I pass soldiers in the hallway. They look at me. Look away. No one asks about Romano. They know.
The medical wing doors. White. Clinical.
I stop. My hand is on the handle.
Right now, he’s alive. Right now, I don’t know. Not knowing is better than the alternative.
Coward.
I push open the door.
The first thing I see is Gia. Exhausted. Blood on her scrubs. Her eyes find mine.
“Is he alive?”
“Barely.” Her voice cracks. “I don’t know what Romano used, but it’s aggressive. I’m treating him blind.”
“Tetrodotoxin.” I cross the room. “Pufferfish toxin. The Benedettis modified it, made it faster. He didn’t know the full compound.”
Dr. Biagi looks up from the monitors. His face changes at the word.
“Tetrodotoxin.” He moves to the bedside, checks Dante’s pupils, his reflexes.
“That explains the paralysis pattern. The respiratory depression.” He turns to Gia.
“No true antidote, but now we know what we’re fighting.
Keep him ventilated. Maintain blood pressure.
The toxin will clear in twenty-four to forty-eight hours if his organs hold. ”
“They’ll hold.” Gia’s voice is steel. “I’ll make sure of it.”
Dr. Biagi nods. Pulls off his gloves. “The critical window is the next six hours. After that, if he’s stable, he’ll make it.”
He writes on a pad. “My cell. Call if anything changes. I’ll check back at dawn.”
He pauses at the door. Looks at Dante, then at me. “Your brother is a fighter. I’ve seen men half his size die from less. He’s still here.”
Then he’s gone.
Gia adjusts the ventilator. Checks the IV lines. Her hands are steady.
She looks at me.
“You might have just saved his life.”
I nod. My hands hang at my sides. Empty.
Cassia is in the corner. Curled in a chair. Face swollen from crying. She looks at me.
Doesn’t ask about Romano.
She knows.
I cross to Dante’s bed. He’s pale. Too pale. Tubes and wires and machines keeping him here.
His chest rises. Falls.
The monitor beeps. Slow. But steady.
I reach out. Touch his hand. Cold.
“Don’t.” My voice is a thread. “Don’t you fucking dare.”
The monitor beeps.
I stand there. Holding my brother’s hand. Watching him breathe.
My hand on his is steady. Has always been steady.
But my chest seizes. Tight. Wrong. Like a fist closing around something I didn’t know was still there.
I don’t know the word for it anymore.