Chapter 2 - Scars Beneath the Silk
The black armored Mercedes-Maybach screamed through the slick, rain-drenched streets of Michigan Avenue, tires kicking up sheets of gray water. The interior of the vehicle smelled of fine Italian leather, gun oil, and the faint, citrus scent of Sofia’s shampoo mixed with the stale tang of champagne.
Behind the wheel was Marco, Luca’s only childhood friend and the sole lieutenant who had dared to sprint out of the ballroom after his commander. Marco’s eyes darted frantically between the rearview mirror and the downpour outside.
“Luca, the Falcone family has already mobilized three strike teams from Cicero,” Marco barked over the hum of the twin-turbo engine. “And your old man just put a five-million-dollar bounty on your head on the syndicate’s dark channel. Half the hitmen between here and New York are booking flights to O’Hare.”
Luca didn’t answer immediately. He was sitting in the rear passenger seat, his jacket discarded, his crisp white shirt unbuttoned at the throat. In his hands, he held a warm, damp cloth he had pulled from the vehicle’s medical console.
“Luca, listen to Marco,” Sofia wept softly, curled into the corner of the leather seat. She was still shivering violently, her skin pale under the yellow streetlights flickering through the tinted glass. “Take me back. Drop me off at a train station. If you go back to Vittorio and tell him it was a momentary lapse, he might forgive you. Bianca will forgive you if you beg. You have everything to lose!”
Luca grabbed her chin, firm but tender, forcing her to look into the storm brewing in his obsidian eyes. “Look at me, Sofia. Look at me!”
She met his gaze, her chest heaving.
“I spent six years watching my father treat people like cattle,” Luca whispered, his voice trembling with an emotion he had buried for a decade. “I watched him sacrifice my mother to secure a heroin route through Montreal. I promised myself I would never be him. But more than that... I watched you for two years, Sofia. Every morning when you placed coffee on my desk, every night you cleaned the blood off my coats without asking a single question. You think you’re invisible? You think I didn’t notice the bruises your ex-boyfriend left on your wrists before I put him six feet under the Calumet River?”
Sofia gasped, her eyes widening in pure shock. “That was... you?”
“No one touches what belongs to my soul and lives,” Luca said softly. He pressed the warm cloth gently against the red welt on her arm where Bianca’s manicured nails had dug into her flesh. “You are not a maid, Sofia. You are the only clean thing in my filthy, rotten life. If I have to burn this city to ash to keep you safe, I will strike the match myself.”
A sudden burst of static crackled through the encrypted radio on the dashboard.
“Maybach Alpha, this is Vanguard,” a panicked voice shouted through the speaker. “The perimeter around the Gold Coast penthouse has been breached! Falcone’s hitters used military-grade thermite on the basement gates! They’re inside! Repeat, they are ins—”
A deafening pop of gunfire cut the transmission short, followed by the hiss of static.
Marco slammed his palm against the steering wheel. “Damn it! We can’t go to the penthouse! Where to, Boss?”
Luca looked out the window. The skyline of Chicago loomed like a jagged black saw against the storm clouds. He racked the slide of his Beretta, the metallic click echoing with chilling finality in the enclosed space.
May you like
“Take us to the Old Saint Jude’s Catacombs,” Luca ordered, his voice devoid of all warmth. “The underground armory. We’re going to war.”
***
