Chapter 5 - The Unbroken King
In the blue guest suite, the atmosphere was relaxed, celebratory, and thick with victory.
Dominic Moretti stood near the mahogany table, holding a crystal glass filled with thirty-year-old scotch. Beside him, Vivien Lombardi was holding the signed legal contract, her eyes devouring the heavy black ink of her own signature across the final page.
“A pleasure doing business with you, Vivien,” Moretti said, lifting his glass in a smooth, aristocratic toast. “Your father would be proud of your... efficiency.”
“My father was a coward who let Damian Russo control his fleet for twenty years,” Vivien said coldly, setting her fountain pen down on the rosewood table. “Damian was strong once, but strength without flexibility is just wood waiting to break.”
“To broken wood,” Bruno Vescari laughed from the window, raising his glass of grappa.
BOOM!
The heavy oak double doors of the blue suite didn't just open—they exploded inward, shattering the heavy brass lock and sending long wooden splinters flying across the marble floor like shrapnel.
Marco Sarto, the lawyer, screamed, dropping his laptop onto the carpet as he scrambled backward toward the Four-poster bed.
Moretti’s two armed guards near the door reached for their weapons under their coats, but before their hands could touch leather, two heavy shots echoed through the room.
THWACK! THWACK!
Carlo Bellini stepped through the smoke, his silenced Sig Sauer firing with terrifying precision. Both guards collapsed onto the marble floor without uttering a sound, their weapons clattering across the tiles.
Moretti dropped his scotch glass. It shattered against the table, dark liquid soaking into the signed contract.
Bruno Vescari drew his pistol from his belt, spinning away from the window—but froze dead in his tracks.
Walking slowly through the ruined doorway, framed by the smoke and the shadows of the hallway, was Damian Russo.
He didn't have a cane. He didn't have a wheelchair. He walked erect, dark, and terrifying, his broad shoulders filling the doorway, his silver-plated Magnum held loosely in his right hand, pointed straight at Bruno’s chest.
Vivien’s face turned the color of wet chalk. Her lips parted, but no sound left her throat. Her eyes locked onto Damian’s legs, watching his heavy leather boots step over the bleeding body of Moretti’s guard with effortless, predatory grace.
“D-Damian…” she breathed, her voice cracking into a high, pathetic squeak. “You… you can walk…”
Damian didn't look at her. His dark, icy eyes were locked on Dominic Moretti.
“Dominic,” Damian said smoothly, his low baritone voice cutting through the silent, smoke-filled room like a razor blade. “You’re sitting in my late mother’s favorite chair. And you’re drinking my scotch.”
Moretti stood frozen, his hands raised slowly to shoulder height, his thick face flushed a dark, dangerous red. He was a veteran of thirty years of mob warfare, but the sight of a man he believed was paralyzed standing before him like an unyielding titan broke his composure entirely.
“Russo…” Moretti gasped, his silver hair messy, his eyes darting toward the open French doors. “This… this is a misunderstanding. Vivien invited me here. She said—”
“I know what she said, Dominic,” Damian interrupted, taking two slow steps toward the table. “I’ve been listening to every word spoken in this room for three days.”
He shifted his gaze to Bruno Vescari.
Bruno was sweating heavily, his hand trembling as he held his pistol aimed at Damian’s chest. “Stay back, Damian! I swear to God, I’ll open you up!”
“You had your chance yesterday, Bruno,” Damian said coldly. “You had your hand on a girl’s throat because you thought I couldn't stand up to snap your arm. Let’s see how brave you are now.”
Bruno’s eyes flashed with desperate, cornered madness. He began to pull the trigger—
BOOM!
The heavy Magnum in Damian’s hand roared. The high-caliber round struck Bruno squarely in the right shoulder, shattering the joint and blowing him backward through the glass French doors onto the rain-soaked balcony.
Bruno hit the stone balustrade with a sickening thud, his pistol falling three floors down into the courtyard below as he screamed in agony, clutching his ruined shoulder.
Vivien dropped to her knees beside the rosewood table, her expensive cashmere coat soaking up the spilled scotch and blood on the floor.
“Damian! Please!” she sobbed, holding her trembling hands up toward him, tears running down her pale, beautiful face. “It was Moretti! He forced me! He threatened my father’s life! He said he would kill me if I didn't sign those papers!”
Damian finally turned his eyes down to his fiancée.
He looked at her perfectly styled dark hair, her diamond earrings, and the frantic, fake horror in her eyes—the exact same fake horror she had displayed when she stood beside his wheelchair four weeks ago.
“You’re a terrible actress, Vivien,” Damian said quietly. “And an even worse businesswoman.”
He reached down, picked up the wet, scotch-soaked contract from the table, and tore it cleanly in half. He tossed the pieces onto her lap.
“Carlo,” Damian commanded without looking back.
“Yes, boss?”
“Take Mr. Moretti and his lawyer down to the wine cellar. Hold them until their families pay fifty million euros for their return. If they hesitate, send them Moretti’s left hand.”
“With pleasure, boss,” Carlo grinned, stepping forward with his shotgun and gesturing for Moretti and Marco Sarto to move toward the door.
Damian turned back to Vivien.
“And her?” Carlo asked, pausing in the doorway.
Damian looked down at the weeping woman on her knees.
“Put her in the car,” Damian said, his voice flat, devoid of passion or hatred. “Drive her to the airport in Milan. Give her one thousand euros and a one-way ticket to Buenos Aires. If she ever sets foot in Italy again, bury her beside her father.”
Vivien let out a long, broken wail as two of Carlo’s men stepped into the room, grabbed her by the arms, and dragged her out into the hallway, her high heels scraping uselessly against the marble.
Silence returned to the blue suite.
Damian walked out onto the balcony. The rain beat down on his face, washing away the smell of gunpowder and cigars. He looked down at Bruno Vescari, who was lying groaning in the rain near the stone balustrade.
Damian didn't shoot him again. He didn't need to. Bruno’s life in the underworld was over; a capo who betrayed his Don and failed was a dead man walking in every city in Europe.
Damian turned back toward the stairs.
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He didn't look at the spilled scotch. He didn't look at the blood on the floor.
He walked down the grand marble staircase, his heavy boots echoing through the vaulted halls of his estate, heading straight back to the only room that mattered.
