Chương 7 - THE MAN WHO STAYED LOYAL TOO LONG
Marcus stepped into the open.
Sarah caught his arm.
“He wants you angry.”
“He has Paolo.”
“And twenty armed men watching you.”
Raffaele smiled faintly from across the loading lane.
“He always did choose clever women.”
Marcus’s face hardened.
“Let him go.”
“Bring the watch.”
Marcus removed Lorenzo’s watch.
Raffaele’s eyes fixed on it.
“You found the compartment.”
“Yes.”
“Your father always did enjoy theatrical hiding places.”
“You sound proud of him.”
“I loved him.”
The answer was immediate.
That made everything worse.
Marcus walked closer.
Sarah stayed beside him.
Raffaele looked at her.
“Thomas’s daughter.”
“You tried to kill me.”
“No.”
Sarah stopped.
“The sniper?”
“Not mine.”
Marcus’s voice changed.
“Don’t lie.”
“I ordered your boat disabled.”
There it was.
Not a confession given easily.
An admission because evidence had already cornered him.
“I ordered men to search Sarah’s apartment. I ordered Paolo taken.”
He looked at Sarah.
“But I never authorized a rifle on your street.”
Marcus stared.
“Then who did?”
“One of my partners decided you were both too dangerous.”
“Name.”
“After I have the ledger.”
Sarah looked at Paolo.
The old captain subtly shook his head.
Don’t.
Raffaele saw.
“Paolo, please don’t become brave now. You have been irritatingly cautious for thirty years.”
Paolo gave him a tired smile.
“And you’ve been an idiot for longer.”
Raffaele almost smiled back.
That was what frightened Sarah.
They knew each other.
Had probably shared meals.
Weddings.
Funerals.
This was not good against evil.
It was rot inside something that had once resembled family.
Marcus held up the watch.
“Why did you continue?”
Raffaele’s expression hardened.
“You really want that conversation here?”
“Yes.”
Trucks rumbled around them.
The ferry horn sounded once.
Raffaele looked toward the Santoro warehouses beyond the port.
“When your father inherited the organization, we were three months from collapse.”
“I know.”
“No. You know the clean version.”
His voice rose slightly.
“Seven hundred men on payroll. Families. Widows. Dockworkers. Drivers. Rivals waiting to take every business and every street.”
“So you moved drugs.”
“I borrowed money from people who demanded routes.”
“You trafficked people.”
Raffaele’s face tightened.
“That came later.”
“As though chronology helps.”
“No.”
For the first time, shame entered his voice.
“It doesn’t.”
Sarah watched him.
He knew what he had become.
That was not redemption.
But it made him real.
“I told myself each line would be the last one,” Raffaele continued. “Then crossing it made the next one easier.”
Marcus looked at him.
“My mother tried to stop you.”
“Yes.”
“Did you kill her?”
Raffaele closed his eyes.
“No.”
Marcus’s face became terrifying.
“Thomas saw her alive after the collision.”
“I know.”
“Where did she go?”
Raffaele looked toward the ferry.
“I put her on another boat.”
“Why?”
“To get her away from Lorenzo’s enemies.”
“You were the enemy.”
“One of them.”
The answer stunned them.
Raffaele continued.
“I arranged the collision to frighten Teresa and Thomas. Damage the boat. Destroy the evidence. Force them back to shore.”
“You could have killed them.”
“I know.”
“But the second vessel?”
“Mine.”
Sarah whispered, “Thomas said men attacked him.”
“I ordered them to restrain him.”
“And Teresa?”
Raffaele’s face twisted.
“She was supposed to be taken to Malta.”
“Supposed to be?”
“There was a man aboard named Emilio Vescari.”
Marcus went still.
Sarah saw recognition.
“Who?”
“Former Santoro security,” Marcus said.
Raffaele nodded.
“My partner.”
“The sniper?”
“His son, now.”
The current attacks suddenly gained another layer.
Raffaele was guilty.
But not alone.
“Emilio realized Teresa had enough evidence to destroy the network,” Raffaele said. “He changed the destination.”
“To where?”
“I didn’t know until the next morning.”
Marcus stepped closer.
“You expect me to believe you lost my mother?”
Raffaele’s voice broke.
“I spent eleven years trying to find out where he took her.”
Marcus stopped.
Eleven years.
“Why didn’t you tell my father?”
“Because I had caused the collision.”
“You protected yourself.”
“Yes.”
The answer came quietly.
“And because exposing Emilio would expose every route, every account, every politician we had paid. The family would have collapsed overnight.”
Marcus stared at him.
“You chose the organization over my mother.”
“Yes.”
No excuse left.
The ferry horn sounded again.
Raffaele lifted the pistol.
“Watch.”
Marcus tossed it.
One of Raffaele’s men caught it.
Raffaele checked the hidden receipt.
Then he looked at Paolo.
“You’ll retrieve Box 422.”
Paolo laughed.
“I won’t.”
“I don’t want to hurt you.”
“You took me out of a sickbed at gunpoint.”
“Yes. My manners have declined.”
Despite everything, Sarah understood why Marcus once loved this man.
Raffaele could still sound human while doing monstrous things.
Maybe that was how people followed him.
Suddenly one of Marcus’s guards shouted.
A van tore through the terminal barrier.
Gunfire erupted from inside.
Raffaele’s men scattered.
“That isn’t mine!” he shouted.
Marcus grabbed Sarah and pulled her behind a truck.
The van doors flew open.
Men in gray tactical clothing poured out.
Raffaele fired back.
“Vescari!”
The truth became obvious.
Raffaele’s partner was cleaning up everyone at once.
Paolo tackled one captor.
Marcus ran toward him.
Sarah saw a gunman raise a rifle at Marcus’s back.
“Marcus!”
Raffaele fired first.
The gunman dropped.
Marcus stared at his uncle.
Raffaele had just saved him.
Then a bullet struck Raffaele high in the side.
He fell.
Marcus reached him.
Raffaele grabbed his nephew’s jacket.
“Ferry.”
“What?”
“Vescari’s cargo is already aboard.”
“Let it go.”
“You don’t understand.”
Raffaele coughed.
Blood touched his lips.
“It isn’t weapons.”
Sarah’s stomach turned.
“What is it?”
Raffaele looked toward the enormous ferry.
“People.”
Marcus went still.
“How many?”
Raffaele’s eyes closed briefly.
“Forty-three.”
The loading ramp began rising.
Sarah looked toward the ferry.
Marcus looked at his bleeding uncle.
May you like
And somewhere beneath the vehicle deck, forty-three people were being carried out to sea.
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