Chapter 12 - The War for Brooklyn
The revelation hung between them in the warm cabin air like a crackling electrical charge.
Sophia stared at Dante, trying to process the fact that her humble, struggling life was built on a massive lie.
"I don't want an empire, Dante," she said, her voice shaking with genuine emotion.
"I just want my family to be safe. I want my brother to finish college. I want my mother to stop crying."
Dante reached out, taking both of her hands into his massive, warm palms, squeezing them firmly.
"I will protect your family with my life, Sophia," he swore, his deep voice carrying absolute, unbroken conviction.
"But the Lucchese family knows who you are now. They raided your grandmother’s old house in Bensonhurst an hour ago."
Sophia gasped, horror washing over her. "My mother! My brother!"
"They are safe," Dante reassured her instantly. "Enzo moved them to a secure apartment in Queens before the raid."
"But the Lucchese men tore that Bensonhurst house apart looking for Matteo's ledger."
"Did they find it?" she asked frantically.
"No," Dante replied, a dark, calculating glint appearing in his eyes. "Because they don't know where to look."
"Do you know where it is, Sophia?"
Sophia closed her eyes, traveling back in her memory to her grandmother’s tiny, cramped Brooklyn kitchen.
She remembered Nonna Rosa standing on a stool, reaching into the hidden hollow space behind the tin backsplash above the stove.
This is where we keep the things that keep us alive, little one, Nonna Rosa had whispered to her years ago.
May you like
Sophia opened her eyes, looking directly into Dante’s expectant gaze.
"I know exactly where it is," she said softly. "It's inside the old brick oven in Bensonhurst."
