Chapter Four #2
“You are young,” Esposito said. “You have proven competent in collections. You have Santino Moretti’s backing, the cousin of one of the founders, which carries weight.
But competence is not enough. A seat requires permanence.
A bloodline. Proof that you are building something that will outlast you. ”
Greco leaned forward slightly. “The condition is simple and non-negotiable. You will marry. You will produce heirs. Multiple. As many as your wife can safely carry. Daughters are acceptable. Sons are preferred. The syndicate will not invest authority in a man who cannot secure his own legacy. Fail to produce a living bloodline within a reasonable window and the seat will be revoked and reassigned.”
Another of the older men added, voice cold, “We are not interested in temporary power. We are interested in continuity. You want the Vernizzi holdings, the docks, the voting weight that comes with them, then you will give us children. Legitimate. Documented. Raised inside our life. That is the price.”
I let the silence sit for a beat. Inside, something sharp and satisfied uncoiled. Outside, I kept my expression serious, appropriately weighed by the magnitude of what they were offering.
“I accept the condition,” I said.
Esposito studied me for a long moment. “You have a wife in mind, or will the family arrange a suitable match?”
“I have someone in mind.”
A few glances were exchanged. Leo’s expression did not change, but I felt the slight shift in his attention. He said nothing. He rarely needed to. The weight of his presence did the work for him.
“Then present her when the time is right,” Esposito said. “The seat is yours provisionally from this moment. Full recognition follows the marriage and the first confirmed pregnancy. Disappoint us and we will remove you as cleanly as the Bratva removed the Vernizzi sons. Do you understand?”
“I understand.”
“Good.” Esposito sat back. “This meeting is concluded. The formal announcement will be made through the proper channels. Until then, you will conduct yourself as a man who holds the power he has been given. Any sign of instability will be noted.”
Chairs moved. Men stood. The quiet conversations that always followed these decisions began in low voices near the windows. I rose with the others, shook the hands that were offered, and ignored the ones that were not.
Leo remained seated until most of the room had cleared.
When he finally stood, he crossed the space between us with the unhurried calm of a man who had never needed to rush in his life.
He stopped a few feet away. Up close the years sat lightly on him.
The same dark eyes. The same sense that he was measuring the distance between my pulse and the nearest exit.
“Congratulations,” he said. The word was neutral.
“Thank you.”
“Choose carefully.” His gaze held mine for a second longer. “The wrong wife can destroy a man faster than any rival family.”
There was no warmth in the warning, but there was history. The same man who had put a bullet in Lorenzo Ventura still looked at me like he was measuring the distance between a boy who had cleaned blood off a floor and the man who might one day leave the same mess for someone else to clean.
I thought of Chiara. Of the way she looked at him when she thought no one else was watching. Of the life they had built after our father was gone.
“I have,” I said.
Leo’s mouth moved in something that was not quite a smile. Then he turned and left the room without another word.
I waited until the estate was behind me and the city was opening up along the highway before I let the satisfaction show on my face.
The condition was heirs. And the girl who would give them to me was dancing on a stage under another man’s collar, unaware that her future had just been decided in a room full of killers.
I drove toward the only place that mattered.
After Dark would open in a few hours. I planned to be there when it did.The club was quiet in the late afternoon, the main floor empty except for staff resetting tables and checking the private rooms. The air carried the faint scent of leather and last night’s whiskey.
I took the private stairs to the upstairs office without being announced.
Santino Moretti was behind the desk, sleeves rolled up, a ledger open in front of him. He looked up when I entered and closed the book with deliberate care.
“I heard,” he said.
I dropped into the chair across from him and rested my forearm on the armrest. “News travels fast.”
“In this world it does.” He studied me for a long moment. The silence had weight. “Congratulations.”
The word was correct. The tone underneath it was not. There was no warmth in it. Only the strained acceptance of a man who had spent years trying to keep someone out of the deep end and had just watched him dive in anyway.
“You don’t approve,” I said.
“I wanted better for you than this.” Santino’s voice stayed level, but the tension in his jaw gave him away.
He looked older in the afternoon light than he had a year ago.
The same man who had handed me his twin’s, Angelo’s watch, now sat across from me trying not to say the thing we both knew: that every seat eventually demanded a piece of the person who took it, and Santino had already paid that price once for Aurora.
“A seat comes with a target on your back and blood on your hands that never really washes off,” he said. “I brought you into the edges so you would have protection and options. Not so you could become another name the families use until they decide you’re inconvenient.”
“I asked for this.”
He exhaled through his nose and leaned back in the chair. “That doesn’t mean I have to like it. You’re family. Aurora would never forgive me if something happened to you because I didn’t push harder to keep you clear.”
“I’m not a child.”
“No. You’re a man who just accepted a seat that requires a wife and a line of heirs to hold it.” His eyes narrowed slightly. “Have you thought about what that actually means?”
“I’ve thought about it.”
Santino watched me for another beat, then shook his head once, slow. The argument was over. He had said what he needed to say. The rest would sit between us like it always did.
He reached for a folder on the side of the desk and slid it toward me.
“There’s something else. We’re hosting a private bride auction here in three weeks.
High-end. Invitation only. The kind of men who buy permanent arrangements, not nights.
The club takes a commission and provides the secure venue.
I want extra security on the floor and the private rooms that night. ”
I opened the folder and scanned the first page without really seeing the words.
A bride auction. In this club. In three weeks.
The image of Morena on the secondary stage rose behind my eyes. The empty expression. The way she had looked last night like something vital had been scraped out of her. Dario’s hand on her cheek. The phone held just long enough to keep her obedient.
This was the opening. Clean. Public. Final.
I could take her in front of every relevant player in the city, put my claim on her in a way no one could dispute, and satisfy the syndicate’s demand for a wife in a single move.
No quiet negotiation. No risk of Dario selling her elsewhere first. No more nights of watching her disappear a little further under someone else’s control.
I closed the folder and looked up.
“I’ll handle the security details,” I said. “Personally.”
Santino’s gaze sharpened. “You’re volunteering for auction night?”
“Yes.”
He was quiet for a moment. Something unreadable moved behind his eyes, but he didn’t press. Not yet.
“All right,” he said finally. “Three weeks. Don’t make me regret letting you anywhere near this life, Matteo.”
I stood, adjusted my cuffs. “I won’t.”
I left the office and took the stairs back down to the main floor. The club was empty, but in my mind it was packed with men holding paddles.
Three weeks. I had three weeks to make sure that when the auction began, Morena Caruso walked onto that stage belonging to me in every way that counted.
And when the bidding ended, I would be the only one left standing.