Chapter 8 - THE ROSARY
The cold rain continued to fall, washing the blood into the drains of the shipyard.
Daniel froze, still holding me tight against his side. We stared at the tactical truck.
The head of security—a man named Vargas, who had worked for the Russo family for fifteen years—stood in the open doorway. His gun was pressed hard into Michael’s temple. Behind them, I could just see the edge of the transport bin where Leo was sleeping.
“Vargas!” Daniel roared, pushing himself to his feet despite the bullet hole in his leg. “What are you doing?”
“Finishing the job,” Vargas shouted back, his voice echoing off the concrete. “Elena paid well, but she wasn’t the architect. She was just a puppet.”
“Who?” Daniel demanded, limping forward. Marcus raised his rifle, but Daniel put a hand out to stop him. If Marcus fired, Vargas would pull the trigger, and Michael would die.
“Your father, Daniel,” Vargas sneered.
The words hit Daniel like a physical blow. He staggered.
“My father is dead,” Daniel said, his voice hollow. “He died ten years ago.”
“He’s dead to the world,” Vargas corrected. “He faked his death to avoid federal indictment. He’s been running the syndicate from the shadows ever since. Silas, Elena, me... we all answered to him. He didn’t want you marrying an outsider like Camille. He didn’t want a tainted bloodline. He ordered the ambush.”
I felt sick. The betrayal went so deep it had poisoned the very roots of Daniel’s life. His own father had ordered the execution of his wife.
“Let the mechanic and the nurse go,” Daniel said, his voice dropping to that terrifying, deadly calm. “You have me. You take me to my father.”
“The order wasn’t to bring you in, boss,” Vargas said, racking the slide of his pistol. “The order was to end the line tonight. No heirs. No witnesses.”
Vargas shifted his grip, preparing to execute my brother.
“Wait!” I screamed, stepping out from behind Daniel.
I reached into my pocket.
“You can’t kill him!” I yelled, walking slowly toward the truck. “If you shoot him, you’ll never find the ledger.”
Vargas hesitated. “What ledger?”
I pulled out the St. Christopher medal and let it dangle from its broken chain.
“Camille gave Michael a safety deposit box receipt,” I lied, my voice carrying over the wind. “It’s not just cash. It’s a ledger. A physical book detailing every offshore account, every bribe, every shadow transaction your boss has made for the last ten years. Camille knew who ordered the hit. She documented everything.”
Vargas’s eyes narrowed. “You’re lying.”
“Am I?” I asked, holding the silver medal up. “This medal has the vault number inside. Without it, you get nothing. The feds will raid the bank tomorrow morning if I don’t check in.”
Vargas looked at the silver medal glinting in the harsh work lights. Greed and fear warred in his eyes. If he returned to Daniel’s father without that ledger, he was a dead man.
“Throw it to me,” Vargas ordered.
“No,” I said, taking another step closer. “I hand it to you. You let my brother step out of the truck. Then you take the medal.”
Vargas scoffed. “You’re not in a position to negotiate, nurse.”
“I’m the only one with the code,” I bluffed. I was ten feet away now. I could see the sweat on my brother’s pale face. I could see Leo, still miraculously asleep in his bin.
Vargas slowly lowered the gun from Michael’s head, aiming it at my chest.
“Bring it here. Slowly.”
I walked up to the bumper of the truck. Vargas reached down with his free hand to take the St. Christopher medal.
I didn’t hand it to him.
Instead, I looked at Michael. I gave a tiny, almost imperceptible nod.
Michael had spent his entire life taking hits for me. Now, he took one more.
Before Vargas could grab the medal, Michael threw his body weight backward, slamming his elbow brutally into Vargas’s groin.
Vargas gasped, doubling over, his gun firing harmlessly into the roof of the truck.
In that split second, Marcus didn’t hesitate.
Crack.
The single sniper shot echoed from the crane above.
Vargas’s head snapped back. He collapsed backward out of the truck, hitting the wet concrete with a heavy thud. Dead.
I scrambled up into the back of the truck. I threw my arms around Michael, who was gasping in pain but smiling.
“You always were a terrible liar, Rach,” Michael wheezed, hugging me back.
Daniel limped up to the bumper. He looked at Vargas’s body, then up at us.
He didn’t say a word. He just reached into the transport bin and carefully lifted his sleeping son. He held Leo against his chest, burying his face in the soft blue blanket.
The empire was fractured. The betrayals were absolute.
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But as Daniel looked at me over his son’s head, I knew one thing for certain.
The war was over.
