Chapter 7 - The Captain Who VanishedEnzo Marra had been a Bellandi long enough to know that Dominic would eventually find him.
The question was whether Dominic would find him before Vittorio did.
At 4:30 the following morning, Enzo sat in a motel room outside Rockford, Illinois, with a pistol beside the bed and a duffel bag full of cash beneath the table. He had changed cars twice, discarded his regular phone, and shaved his beard in the bathroom sink.
None of it made him feel safer.
On the television, a local news presenter reported that several industrial buildings in Chicago had suffered fires after a suspected organized-crime dispute. The Bellandi organization declined to comment.
Enzo laughed bitterly.
Declined to comment.
Dominic would be tearing Chicago apart by now.
His burner phone vibrated.
You were supposed to be at the southern warehouse.
Enzo typed a reply.
The convoy changed routes. I barely escaped.
You were supposed to prevent that.
Enzo stared at the words.
He had spent fifteen years inside the Bellandi organization. He had sat beside Dominic through meetings, stood behind him at funerals, and watched him turn a small criminal operation into one of the most feared families in the Midwest.
He had also watched Dominic become increasingly suspicious of everyone around him.
Enzo had been the one who recommended Francesca.
At the time, he had justified it as a way of keeping Dominic stable. A leader who slept properly made fewer mistakes. A man who could discuss his fears without threatening his own subordinates was easier to work with.
Vittorio had offered him something else: information about the operation that had killed Enzo's younger brother thirteen years earlier.
Enzo's brother had been an informant, though nobody in the family had known it. He had secretly provided information to a law enforcement task force while continuing to work for the Bellandis.
When his cover was discovered, he disappeared.
Enzo had been told that Dominic ordered the execution.
Vittorio claimed to possess proof.
Enzo had believed him because believing him was easier than accepting that the truth might never be known.
Now he was caught between a man who controlled the Bellandi family and a man who claimed the right to destroy it.
The phone buzzed again.
Vittorio is losing patience. Find Elena.
Enzo went cold.
He had expected orders about the next stage of the operation. He had expected instructions to destroy communications records, abandon the motel, or make arrangements for extraction.
But Elena?
He had known her for twelve years.
She had once driven two hours through a snowstorm to bring his injured daughter to a hospital after Enzo's car broke down. She had never asked for anything in return. She had never treated the captains as though their lives were less valuable than Dominic's.
When one of Enzo's men died, Elena remembered his children's names.
When another suffered an injury, she made sure his wife received money for rent.
She had lived inside their dangerous world without ever becoming comfortable with the idea that people were disposable.
Enzo had respected her.
He had also betrayed her.
He put the phone down and covered his face.
Then the motel room door rattled.
Three knocks.
A pause.
Two more.
Enzo reached for the pistol.
“Who is it?”
“Room service.”
He almost laughed.
The motel did not offer room service.
He moved toward the window and lifted one corner of the curtain.
A black SUV stood beside his car.
Two men were getting out.
One was wearing a dark coat.
The other was Dominic's personal driver.
Enzo's stomach dropped.
He hadn't been followed.
He had been found.
He grabbed the duffel bag, shoved the pistol into his waistband, and hurried toward the bathroom window.
It was too small.
He tried the back door.
Locked.
The first kick landed against his motel room door.
“Enzo!” a voice called. “Open it.”
He recognized the voice.
Matteo.
Not Dominic.
That almost made it worse.
Enzo considered firing through the door. He could possibly escape in the confusion, but he knew Matteo would not come alone, and he had no desire to die in a roadside motel over a lie that had already ruined too many lives.
He opened the door with his hands raised.
Matteo stood in the hallway, his expression unreadable.
“Hello, Enzo.”
Enzo swallowed.
“Matteo. I can explain.”
“Excellent. You can explain in the car.”
“Where's Dominic?”
“Looking for Elena.”
Enzo looked down.
That was all Matteo needed to see.
“You know where she is?”
“No.”
“Do you know why Vittorio wants her?”
Enzo's face went pale.
Matteo stepped closer.
“That's interesting.”
“I don't know anything about Elena.”
“You just reacted to a name I haven't mentioned since I arrived.”
Enzo tried to recover.
“I heard you on the phone.”
“Really? I haven't made a call.”
For a second, Enzo considered fighting.
Then he looked beyond Matteo and saw four armed men at the far end of the hallway.
He lowered his hands.
“I'm not your enemy.”
Matteo grabbed him by the collar.
“You burned our warehouses, disappeared during an attack, and helped someone access our security files. You don't get to tell me who your enemy is.”
“I didn't plan the attacks.”
“But you helped make them possible.”
Enzo said nothing.
Matteo's grip tightened.
“Did Vittorio tell you to find Elena?”
Enzo swallowed.
“He said she was important.”
“To what?”
“I don't know.”
Matteo studied his face.
For the first time, he believed that part.
Enzo looked frightened, but the fear wasn't only for his life. It was the fear of a man who had discovered too late that the people promising to help him were never interested in his survival.
Matteo released him.
“You're coming with us.”
“Will Dominic kill me?”
“That depends on how much truth you have left.”
They put Enzo in the SUV and drove toward Chicago.
During the journey, he gave a statement. He admitted that he had introduced Francesca to the organization through a consulting firm that had worked with several wealthy families. He admitted that Vittorio had contacted him months earlier. He admitted that he had provided information about security rotations, although he insisted he had not known the attacks would involve explosives.
He also revealed something that made Matteo stop taking notes.
“Vittorio believes Elena has access to records from the old Bellandi estate.”
“What records?”
“I don't know exactly. He mentioned your father's final arrangements and something about the original succession agreement.”
Matteo turned toward him.
“Dominic handled those records.”
“Not all of them.”
“What does that mean?”
Enzo hesitated.
“Your father trusted Elena. More than Dominic realized.”
Matteo leaned forward.
“Explain.”
Enzo looked toward the windshield.
“Before Alessandro died, he asked Elena to deliver something to Dominic if the family ever turned against him. I don't know what it was. I only know that she refused to give it to Vittorio.”
Matteo went still.
“What did she say?”
Enzo closed his eyes.
“She said it belonged to Dominic, and Dominic would receive it when he was ready to hear the truth.”
The SUV went silent.
Matteo remembered the weeks following their father's death. Elena had been the only person who could make Dominic sit still long enough to listen. She had spent hours sorting old letters and personal effects while the brothers argued over the organization.
Matteo had assumed she was helping Dominic organize his father's affairs.
He had never considered that Alessandro might have entrusted her with something important.
“Where is it now?” he asked.
Enzo shook his head.
“I don't know.”
“Did Vittorio know she had it?”
“He believes she does.”
Matteo stared at him.
And suddenly, Elena's disappearance looked different.
Maybe Vittorio had not merely been using her as leverage against Dominic.
Maybe he believed she possessed evidence that could destroy his claim to the Bellandi empire.
By the time they reached the city, Matteo had sent the information to Dominic.
The response came immediately.
Bring Enzo to the estate. No stops.
Then another message followed.
And find out what our father gave Elena.
Matteo looked at the screen.
For twelve years, Elena had kept something from Dominic.
Not because she wanted power.
Not because she wanted money.
May you like
But because she had believed he wasn't ready to hear the truth.
And now, with the Bellandi family under attack and the woman he had ordered to leave missing, Dominic was beginning to realize that the person he had dismissed as too emotional to understand his world might have understood it better than any of them.
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