9. Max
— ? —
Max
The house smells like smoke.
The call that brought me home hasn’t prepared me for this, the acrid taste in the air, staff moving with that particular tension that means crisis, and underneath it all, a silence where her presence should be.
“What happened?” I demand, grabbing the nearest guard. “Where’s my wife?”
“Sir, there was a fire in the east wing laundry. Minor damage, contained quickly, but-”
“Where. Is. My. Wife.”
The guard’s face goes pale. “We don’t know, sir.”
I’m moving before he finishes the sentence, taking the stairs three at a time, my heart pounding with something that feels too much like fear. The bedroom is empty. The bathroom is empty. Her closet has gaps where clothes should be.
I go to my study.
The door is unlocked. I step inside, and my eyes go straight to the desk, to the cream stationery centered perfectly on the blotter, to the glint of gold sitting on top of it.
Her wedding ring.
My hands are shaking as I pick up the note.
You want me gone. I’ll save you the job. I’ll disappear myself. Forget me. But if you ever come after my life again, Massimo, war comes to your doorstep.
I read it three times.
If you ever come after my life again.
What the hell does that mean?
The ring is cold in my palm. Small. Delicate. I can still remember sliding it onto her finger in the cathedral, the way she looked up at me with eyes that wanted to believe.
I slide the ring onto the chain I always wear and fasten the clasp. The ring settles against my chest, cold metal against skin.
Then I pick up my phone.
“Get me every capo in this house in the conference room in ten minutes.”
Nico’s voice is groggy on the other end. “Max, it’s four in the morning-”
“I don’t care if it’s the second coming of Christ. Ten minutes. Everyone.”
“What happened?”
“She’s gone.”
Silence. Then: “Gone where?”
“If I knew that, I wouldn’t be waking you up, would I?” I’m already moving, pulling on a fresh shirt, checking my gun out of habit. “Ten minutes, Nico. Not eleven.”
I hang up before he can respond.
The conference room is chaos.
Eight of my most senior men, dragged from their beds, all talking at once. I let the noise build for exactly three seconds before I slam my hand on the table.
Silence.
“My wife is missing.” I keep my voice flat, controlled, even though every cell in my body is screaming. “She left yesterday morning while I was en route to Chicago. She set a fire in the east wing as a distraction and went over the garden wall.”
Yesterday’s midday report said Cat was in her rooms. It mentioned nothing about a fire. Just after midnight, a guard coming on duty finally called to ask whether I’d authorized her retreat. I hadn’t. I was back on a plane within half an hour.
“The garden wall?” Bruno frowns. “There’s no breach in the garden wall.”
“There’s a gap behind the north hedge. Crumbling stonework. How long has it been there?”
Silence. Bruno shifts uncomfortably. “I’d have to check with-”
“The repair was marked complete. I want the man who signed it and the man who approved yesterday’s report.” I let that land. “Who was on perimeter yesterday morning?”
“Ricci and Fontaine,” Dominic answers. “They reported nothing unusual.”
“Nothing unusual. The donna scaled a wall and vanished, and they reported nothing unusual.”
“The fire split the guards. Then someone sent the rest to the guest wing, supposedly to escort her-”
“Someone used our own orders to let my wife disappear.” I look around the table until every man has met my eyes. “Here’s what happens now. Every airport in a two-hundred-mile radius, monitored. Every bus station. Every train line. Every car rental agency.”
“Sir, that’s a massive allocation of-”
“I’m not finished. Camera feeds from every highway toll booth between here and the state line. Our contacts at the airports checking passenger manifests. Every favor we’re owed, called in tonight.”
“What about the police?” someone asks.
“No police. This stays internal. The last thing we need is outside attention while we’re cleaning up our own failure.”
“And the perimeter team? Ricci and Fontaine?”
“Suspended pending review. Someone explain to them that ‘nothing unusual’ doesn’t cover a missing donna.”
Nico steps forward, his face carefully neutral. “Max, what exactly are we dealing with here? Did someone take her, or did she leave on her own?”
“She left.” The words taste like broken glass. “Voluntarily.”
“Then maybe we should respect-”
“No.” I cut him off before he can finish. “We find her. Whatever resources it takes, whatever it costs. This is now the only job anyone in this room has.”
“The Greco situation-” Bruno begins.
“Can wait.”
“With respect, Don Moretti, it can’t. Your father’s old guard has been moving pieces for months. If we pull resources now-”
“I said it can wait.” I meet his eyes, letting him see exactly how serious I am. “My wife is missing. Everything else is secondary. Am I clear?”
Nobody argues.
“Good. Nico, you’re coordinating. I want updates every two hours. Go.”
The room empties. Nico hangs back.
“Max.”
“What?”
“What happened? What made her run?”
I stare at the note still clutched in my hand. If you ever come after my life again.
“I don’t know.”
“You always know.”
“Not this time. Not yet.” I fold the paper carefully, slip it into my pocket. “Find her, Nico. Whatever it takes.”
Three Days Later
“Nothing from the airports.”
Nico’s voice is flat, exhausted. We’ve been running on coffee and desperation for seventy-two hours, and every report comes back the same.
At least we know how the false reports got through.
Ricci admits taking money to sign off the unfinished wall repair and send updates he hadn’t checked.
The same anonymous number told him to direct the guards to the guest wing during the fire.
He is locked up now, and every shift reports to Nico. It doesn’t put Cat back in her room.
“The train stations?”
“Nothing. No one matching her description purchased a ticket anywhere in the tri-state area.”
“Rental cars?”
Nico spreads the map across my desk, every red pin a place she isn’t. The blank spaces are starting to feel like a taunt.
“We’ve checked every agency. No Caterina Moretti, no Caterina Romano, no variations.”
“She’s using a fake name.”
“Obviously. But without knowing what name, we can’t-”
“Then find out what name.” I’m pacing, unable to sit still, the ring around my neck swinging with each step. “She didn’t vanish into thin air. She had to get somewhere. She had to use something.”
“Max.” Nico’s voice is careful. “Have you considered that maybe she doesn’t want to be found?”
I stop pacing. “What?”
“The note. The ring. The fire.” He holds up his hands. “I’m not saying we stop looking. But maybe we need to think about why she left.”
“She thinks I want her dead.”
“What?”
“The note.” I pull it out, hand it to him. “Read it.”
He reads, then shuts his eyes. “She asked me after the attack whether you wanted her dead. I told her no. I should have told you how frightened she was.”
“I don’t know.” The admission burns. “I don’t know what I did, what she saw, what made her think-” I break off, running a hand through my hair. “I was trying to protect her.”
“Protect her from what?”
“From the coup. From Sergio and his old-guard faction. From the war that’s been brewing since my father died.
” I sink into a chair, suddenly exhausted.
“I’ve spent the last six months tracing traitors, Nico.
Every hour locked in that study, every canceled dinner, I was trying to keep the blood away from her door. ”
“By ignoring her?”
“I thought they meant to take her to force my hand. So I posted guards and tried to convince them she wouldn’t buy them anything.
I mistook a threat against the alliance itself for a threat against me.
” I laugh, and it sounds hollow even to me.
“The meeting, Nico. The one where Sergio pressed about the marriage.”
“I was there.”
“What I said, about not loving her enough, about not being able to stand it, that was theater. Rehearsed. I practiced those words in a mirror until I could say them without being sick, because I knew there were traitors at that table and I needed them to believe she didn’t matter to me.”
Nico stares at me. “You told your entire leadership that you couldn’t stand your wife. As a strategy.”
“To protect her.”
“Did you tell her that?”
The silence is answer enough.
“Jesus Christ, Max.”
“And the bedroom attack, the men we captured days before she left?”
“Cutout payment. Burner phones. Nothing that traced back to anyone useful.” Nico shakes his head.
“I doubled the guards afterward. Two men had been overpowered at her door, and I kept thinking more men would fix it. I should have moved her somewhere she chose and told her why.”
“At first I told myself she might reveal something without meaning to. Then I couldn’t bear telling her what I’d already allowed. Every day I waited made the next conversation worse. I thought-” I stop, because what I thought doesn’t matter anymore. “I was wrong.”
“You think?”
“Don’t.”
“Someone needs to say it.” He leans forward. “You froze her out for months. You made her feel worthless in front of everyone. You dropped her hand at the christening to catch Marcella’s fake fainting spell-”
“Catching her was a reflex. Staying with her was a choice. I could manage Marcella without admitting anything painful. Cat was asking me for the truth, and I walked away from her again.”
“And you never told her any of this.”
“No.”
“So she spent months thinking her husband hated her, and then she ran, and you’re surprised?”
“I’m not surprised.” My voice cracks on the word. “I’m terrified.”
Week 1
The phone rings twice before Enzo answers.
“Moretti.” His voice is neutral, guarded. “What can I do for you?”
“I’m checking in. Cat mentioned she’d be out of reach for a while. Writing retreat.”
“That’s right. Remote location, limited signal. She’s deep into the new book.”