Chapter 5 - The Commission’s TableTwo days later, the real war began—not in a courtroom, but in the smoke-filled back room of an Italian restaurant in Little Italy, where the heads of the five remaining families gathered in emergency session.
When the heavy oak doors opened and I walked into the room alone, every man at the table froze.
They weren't expecting Evelyn Moretti. They were expecting lawyers, mediators, or ghosts.
Old Don Salvatore, the senior patriarch of the council, adjusted his glasses with trembling hands, leaning heavily on his cane as he stared at me. “Evelyn. You have a lot of nerve walking into this room after what your husband—what the federal government did to our distribution networks.”
I didn't wait for an invitation. I walked straight to the head of the table—Roman’s old seat—and pulled out the chair, sitting down with deliberate, crushing slowness.
“Roman is sitting in a federal penitentiary facing three hundred years behind bars,” I said, my voice cutting through the thick cigar smoke like a razor. “His assets are frozen, his accounts are seized, and his empire is currently being dismantled piece by piece by the Department of Justice.”
“And you think you can just waltz in here and pick up his scraps?” snarled Marco Santoro, a rising capo who had always looked at me like a piece of meat at parties. He slammed his palm against the mahogany table. “You’re a woman who spent four years pouring champagne and playing dress-up! You don't belong at this table!”
Before I could blink, the heavy doors behind me swung open with a loud bang.
Dante Vale stepped into the room, flanked by four armed Moretti loyalists who immediately fanned out behind my chair, their weapons resting casually but menacingly at their sides.
Dante walked up beside me, resting his hand on the back of my chair, towering over Marco with lethal grace.
“She doesn't want his scraps, Marco,” Dante said softly, his voice dropping an octave into pure ice. “She owns the foundation. Every warehouse, every transport route, every offshore holding that kept this syndicate afloat for the last decade was registered under the Moretti Trust—a trust that Roman illegally seized upon my uncle’s death, and that Evelyn has now legally reclaimed through federal court order.”
The room went dead silent. The older bosses exchanged pale, terrified glances. They had underestimated the quiet girl in the corner for four years, just as Roman had.
“Here are your choices, gentlemen,” I said, opening a sleek leather folder and sliding copies across the table to each man. “Option one: You fight me, you fight the federal government, and you lose everything by Friday. Option two: You sign these restructuring agreements, acknowledge the Moretti family as the primary stakeholder in Chicago’s logistics network, and keep your respective territories under my direct oversight.”
Don Salvatore picked up the document, his old eyes scanning the legal clauses with trembling fingers. He looked up at me, seeing not the grieving girl in the silk dress, but the daughter of the man who had built this city before Roman ever learned how to steal it.
May you like
Slowly, deliberately, Salvatore reached into his pocket, pulled out a gold fountain pen, and signed his name at the bottom of the page.
“Welcome back, Evelyn,” the old man rasped.
