Chapter 8 - The Commission Summit
The St. Regis Private Club on East 55th Street was a fortress of mahogany wood, stained glass, and centuries of dark history.
For eighty years, the top floor of the club had served as the neutral meeting ground for the heads of the Five Families. No weapons were permitted inside the private dining hall. Every boss was allowed only two bodyguards within the room, while their strike teams remained on the street below.
When I stepped through the heavy bronze doors of the dining room at 4:00 p.m., the atmospheric tension inside was suffocating.
Sitting around a massive oval oak table were the leaders of the Italian syndicates: Don Moretti, Don Lucchese, Don Genovese, and Don Gambino.
And sitting at the far end of the table, his face flushed red with unbridled, volcanic fury, was Viktor Kolov.
Kolov was fifty years old, heavy-set, with a thick grey beard, cold blue eyes, and wearing a ten-thousand-dollar pinstripe suit that couldn't hide the predatory tension vibrating through his body. Beside him stood two towering Russian bodyguards with hands tucked beneath their jackets.
When I walked into the room, flanked by Marco and Antonio, every single eye turned toward me.
I walked with calm, deliberate authority, pulling out a heavy leather chair at the foot of the table directly across from Kolov, and sat down comfortably, crossing my legs.
“Dominic Castellano,” Don Moretti growled from the head of the table, his aged voice raspy with years of cigar smoke. “You called an emergency session of the Commission, yet you spent last night launching an unsanctioned raid on Russian territory in Brooklyn.”
Moretti slammed a heavy hand onto the mahogany table.
“You destroyed an asset! You stole sixty million dollars! You broke the 1998 Truce that has kept peace in this city for twenty-eight years!” Moretti barked. “Explain yourself before we vote to sanction your family!”
The other family bosses nodded grimly, watching me with calculating, dangerous eyes.
I sat back in my leather chair, resting my hands on the carved armrests, entirely unfazed by the old man’s anger.
“I didn't break the truce, Don Moretti,” I said, my voice smooth, quiet, and echoing clearly off the high plaster ceiling. “Viktor Kolov broke it.”
Kolov slammed both fists onto the table, standing up so violently his chair scraped loudly against the hardwood floor.
“LIAR!” Kolov roared, his accent heavy and guttural. “You attacked my club! You beat my enforcer! You stole my private accounts and transferred them to a worthless servant girl!”
I looked at Kolov, my eyes cold and entirely void of emotion.
“Seventeen hours ago,” I said quietly, addressing the entire table, “two of Kolov’s men ambushed a young woman named Emma Carter four blocks from my estate. They beat her until her ribs were broken and her skull was fractured. They did it because she wore the Castellano family crest on her uniform.”
I stood up slowly, leaning forward over the oval table, my massive frame casting a long shadow across the polished wood.
“Kolov ordered that attack to test my resolve,” I continued, my voice dropping into a lethal, velvet register that made every boss in the room go dead silent. “He wanted to see if the Castellano family was weak. He wanted to see if he could spill blood on my street and walk away without consequence.”
Don Lucchese, a sharp-eyed boss from Brooklyn, leaned forward, frowning at Kolov. “Is this true, Viktor? Did your men target a domestic employee wearing the Castellano crest?”
Kolov hesitated, his face flushing darker. “She was a street girl! She was carrying a phone! It was a street robbery!”
“Lev Sokolo gave a full, signed confession on video three hours ago,” Marco added smoothly, stepping forward and tossing a silver flash drive onto the center of the oak table. “Including audio recordings of Kolov explicitly ordering his men to target Castellano domestic staff to provoke a territory dispute.”
The room went completely, suffocatingly still.
Don Moretti looked down at the flash drive, then lifted his aged, stern eyes to Kolov.
In our world, there were rules. You fought bosses. You fought soldiers. You fought rival syndicates on the docks and in the alleyways.
You did not target innocent housekeepers to start a war. It was seen as pathetic, cowardly, and an insult to the honor of the Commission.
“Viktor,” Don Moretti said softly, his voice cold as ice. “Did you order an attack on a Castellano domestic?”
Kolov looked around the table. He saw no allies. He saw no support. The four Italian bosses were staring at him with dark, contemptuous disgust.
Kolov’s eyes flared with pure, desperate madness.
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“Fuck your honor! Fuck your Commission!” Kolov shrieked, reaching into his jacket pocket.
He pulled a concealed snub-nosed revolver from his coat lining—violating the sacred no-weapons rule of the summit room.
