Chapter 5 - The War on the RiverThe peace inside the hospital room was broken at 2:00 PM when Marco knocked softly on the suite door.
I stepped out into the quiet corridor, closing the door gently behind me so Elena wouldn't hear.
Enzo Caruso—my oldest lieutenant who had survived the river ambush twenty-four hours ago—was standing in the hallway leaning on a wooden cane, his shoulder heavily bandaged, his face pale but his eyes burning with intense, vengeful fire.
"Luca," Enzo rasped, offering a tight, respectful bow. "The doctor said I can walk. I came as soon as I heard about the girl."
"She's my daughter, Enzo," I said cleanly.
Enzo's jaw dropped in absolute shock, then a proud, fierce smile broke across his weathered face. "A Mancini heir... My God, Luca. This changes everything."
"It does," Marco interjected, his tone grave as he held up an encrypted tablet. "Victor Moretti just issued a formal challenge through the Commission. He claims that because you executed his three enforcers on hospital property, the Mancini syndicate has breached the 1998 peace accord."
I took the tablet, looking at the formal declaration issued by the five primary Chicago families.
Victor Moretti was using the hospital confrontation as a political pretext to launch a full-scale war against my territory, hoping to seize our shipping terminals along the Chicago River while I was distracted by my personal life.
"He thinks I'm weak because I spent the last twenty-four hours sitting beside a hospital bed," I murmured, my baritone dropping into a dark, lethal register that made the guards along the corridor straighten their posture.
"What are your orders, Boss?" Enzo asked, his hand tightening over his cane.
"Call a sit-down with the Commission at the Grand Union Terminal tonight at 9:00 PM," I commanded cleanly. "Tell every boss in Chicago to be there. And tell Victor Moretti that if he wants to talk about blood... I will give him a lesson he will never survive."
I turned back toward the suite door, looking through the small glass window at Elena, who was sitting up in bed, drawing in a sketchbook I had bought her from the hospital gift shop.
"Marco," I added softly.
May you like
"Yes, Luca?"
"Prepare the Lake Forest estate," I ordered. "My daughter is coming home tomorrow, and I want fifty armed men on that perimeter until every single Moretti soldier in this city is buried."
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