Chapter 5 - The Red Hook Meeting
Two weeks passed.
The Moretti estate slowly began to shift its internal axis.
The sterile, quiet nursery floor was no longer silent. By the middle of November, the sound of wooden trains clattering against tracks, quiet laughter, and bright watercolor paintings hung on the high walls had transformed the third floor.
Leo’s cheeks had regained their color. He ate his meals—simple, wholesome soups, homemade pasta, and warm apple slices that Clara prepared herself in the secondary kitchen—without throwing plates or screaming into the dark.
And Rico was changing too, though he fought it with every muscle in his body.
He began coming home earlier. By six o'clock every evening, his heavy leather shoes would sound against the third-floor stairs. He would stand at the nursery door, his coat removed, his tie loosened, watching Clara read stories to Leo from a large cloth book.
He still didn't know how to hold his son with ease, but he was trying. He would sit on the edge of the velvet armchair, allowing Leo to climb onto his lap to show him a painted wooden car or a blue drawing of a horse.
On a rainy Thursday afternoon, Marcus stepped into the nursery, his face unusually pale.
“Boss,” Marcus said, looking past Clara to Rico, who was sitting on the carpet attempting to help Leo stack wooden blocks into a tower. “It’s Matteo Rossi. He’s at the Red Hook terminal. He brought four cars.”
Rico’s hand froze over a red wooden block.
The air in the room instantly dropped ten degrees.
Matteo Rossi was the head of the Rossi family—the rival syndicate that controlled the Manhattan docks and had long contested the Moretti family’s territory in South Brooklyn. Rumors had circulated for months that Rossi was the one who had financed the hit on Elena Moretti, though no definitive proof had ever emerged.
“Did he bring an escort?” Rico asked, his voice returning to that flat, terrifying iron tone.
“Just his primary crew,” Marcus said. “He says he wants to finalize the harbor boundary agreement before the union elections next week. He’s demanding you meet him at the pier house.”
Rico stood up smoothly, buttoning his jacket.
Leo, sensing the sudden shift in energy, immediately scrambled off the carpet and reached for Clara’s hand, hiding his face behind her trousers.
Rico looked at his son, then looked at Clara.
“Stay on this floor,” Rico commanded softly. “Marcus, double the gate guards. Nobody enters the grounds until I return.”
“Mr. Moretti,” Clara said, stepping forward, her hand firmly holding Leo’s small fingers. “Be careful.”
Rico paused at the nursery door. He looked at Clara—at her calm grey eyes, her protective posture over his son, the way she stood like a shield between Leo and the dark world outside.
“I am always careful, Miss Vance,” Rico said quietly.
Two hours passed.
The rain outside intensified into a heavy November storm, beating against the nursery windows with violent force.
Clara sat on the floor with Leo, trying to keep him focused on a puzzle of the solar system, but her own mind was far away, tracking the tick of the antique grandfather clock in the hallway.
At 5:30 PM, the heavy mahogany doors of the nursery were thrown open.
It wasn't Rico.
It was Dominic—the maître d’ from Il Stellino, who also served as Rico’s house administrator during private events. His clothes were soaked through with rain, his face white as chalk.
“Miss Vance!” Dominic gasped, holding the doorframe. “You need to get the boy to the safe room below the basement! Right now!”
Clara stood up instantly, pulling Leo into her arms. “What happened? Where is Mr. Moretti?”
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“It was a trap!” Dominic cried. “Rossi’s men opened fire at the pier house! Signor Rico took a bullet to the shoulder—they’re bringing him back through the rear entrance now, but Rossi’s scout cars were seen turning onto Dyker Heights Boulevard!”
Before Dominic could finish his sentence, the dull, heavy thud of an explosion echoed from the front gate half a mile down the driveway, making the entire stone mansion tremble to its foundation.
