Chapter Two – The Smell of Blood
Blood still stained the marble floor when I came back downstairs.
One of the guards—some kid named Frankie—was being hauled out on a stretcher, a bullet in his leg and piss down his pants. Two more had minor wounds. The rest? Shaken. They weren't used to this. Not anymore.
The Romano family had gone soft.
I walked past the bodies, past the broken glass and bullet-pocked banister, and lit a cigarette like it was just another Tuesday. The others watched me, all silent, all calculating. That's how I knew—one of them had set it up.
The sniper didn't miss. Not really. He chose not to kill me. That shot was a test. A message.
And the message was clear: You're not welcome here.
I stepped into the war room—what used to be a wine cellar before my father turned it into a fortress.
Concrete walls. No windows. One table. Twelve chairs. Each chair for a captain.
Nine were filled.
Three were empty.
"Where the fuck were Costello, Rivas, and Antonetti?" I asked, voice cold.
The captains exchanged looks. Costello ran our West Harlem operations. Rivas handled imports from Jersey. Antonetti was supposed to be our logistics guy. If they weren't here, they were hiding—or planning.
"They weren't notified," Giovanni said from across the table, rubbing his temple. "I told them to stay out until you settled in."
"Bullshit."
He raised an eyebrow. "Excuse me?"
I leaned forward, cigarette burning between my fingers. "We just got hit inside the compound. Inside. That means inside help. And the only ones missing are the ones with reach, muscle, and motive."
Silence.
One of the older captains—Salvatore, I think—cleared his throat. "Could be a message from the Giordanos. They've been sniffing around our docks."
I flicked ash into a nearby tray. "Giordanos don't shoot through reinforced glass from a rooftop four blocks away. That was military precision. Professional."
"Then who?"
"Someone who knows how I think."
I turned my gaze on Giovanni. He smiled like a wolf pretending to be a priest.
"Don't look at me," he said. "If I wanted you dead, you wouldn't be talking right now."
"That's the problem, Gio. You're good at talking."
After the meeting dissolved into grumbles and whispers, I went upstairs to my father's study.
Everything was covered in dust. The smell of cigars, whiskey, and secrets still hung in the air. I opened the drawer behind the painting—his old stash spot. Found a leather-bound notebook and a locked gun case. Still had my prints on it from when I was seventeen.
I sat at the desk and opened the notebook. Names. Numbers. Timelines.
And a single line written in red ink:
The king dies only once. But his shadow lives forever.
I didn't know what it meant yet. But it felt like something my father would write when he knew death was crawling up his spine.
Then my phone buzzed.
Unknown number. No caller ID.
I picked up. "Yeah?"
A voice crackled through. Distorted. Mechanical. Cold.
"You came back for a throne made of ash."
"Who the fuck is this?"
"One bullet today. The next won't miss."
"You should've pulled the trigger, asshole."
Click.
Dead air.
That night, I walked the old Romano docks with a gun in my coat and death in my eyes. The air reeked of oil and rust, the shadows thick with old ghosts.
I found Rivas.
Smoking by the crates. Talking too low. Watching the wrong direction.
"Hey, Rivas," I said, stepping out from the dark.
He jumped. Too guilty. Too fast.
"Boss—Luca—I didn't know you were coming down here."
"That's the point."
I drew the Glock and pressed it to his gut. "Who paid the sniper?"
"What—what the fuck, man?"
"Don't play dumb. That game gets people dead."
He raised his hands. Sweat gleamed on his forehead. "I swear—I didn't know! I got a tip, told me to stay away from the house today. I thought it was just another shake-up. I thought—"
I clocked him across the jaw with the butt of my gun. He dropped to his knees, coughing blood.
"Next time someone warns you off a meeting," I said, crouching in close, "you come to me first. Or I'll gut you and ship your spine to Jersey."
"I didn't betray you, Luca!" he cried, hand shaking. "But someone did."
I believed him. Not because he was innocent. But because he was too much of a coward to pull something this clean.
Someone else was pulling strings.
I stood on the edge of the dock, staring out at the city lights across the black water.
This wasn't just a test. This was a fucking chess game. And someone already had three moves on me.
But I didn't come back to lose.
I came back to burn the board.
The king is dying.
The crown is cracked.
And in the shadows, something hungers for blood.