Chapter 3 - THE GHOST OF THE PENTHOUSEWhile Dominic and his team prepared to breach the parking structure, miles away in a high-rise glass monolith overlooking Lake Michigan, Don Vincenzo Moretti—Dominic’s estranged uncle and bitter rival—sat in a leather armchair, swirling a glass of 30-year-old scotch.
The digital clock on his mahogany desk read 11:42 PM.
"It should be over by now," Vincenzo muttered in Italian, staring into the dark amber liquid. "The boy was too arrogant. He thought his throne at the Bellhaven Grand was untouchable."
His chief enforcer, a hulking brute named Marco, stepped out of the shadows. "The advance team hasn't checked in, Don Vincenzo. Mateo’s phone went to voicemail."
Vincenzo frowned, setting his glass down with a sharp clack. "Check the traffic cameras around the hotel. Something is wrong."
Marco tapped furiously on a secure tablet, bypassing the city’s public feeds to access the private security network of the Bellhaven Grand. Lines of code scrolled across the screen until the live feed from the nineteenth-floor service corridor popped up.
What they saw made both men freeze.
The camera showed the aftermath of the hallway shootout. Mateo was gone. The two hitmen lay motionless on the floor in pools of dark blood. And standing right in the center of the frame, looking directly into the camera lens with a cold, mocking smirk, was Dominic Moretti.
Dominic raised his right hand, slowly lifted two fingers in a silent salute, and then—with a single punch from his heavy ring—shattered the camera lens into a spiderweb of black static.
Vincenzo’s face drained of color. He rose so violently from his chair that it tipped backward, crashing onto the Persian rug.
"He knew," Vincenzo whispered, his voice trembling with sudden, unadulterated panic. "He knew before we even made our move. How? Who leaked the briefing?"
Marco stared at the blank screen, his heart pounding against his ribs. "It wasn't one of us, Boss. Nobody knew the details except the inner circle."
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Vincenzo walked to the floor-to-ceiling window, looking out over the glittering, rainy expanse of Chicago. A terrifying realization dawned on him. Dominic hadn't just survived an assassination attempt; he was hunting down the architects of the betrayal.
"Get every available soldier to the Bellhaven Grand," Vincenzo roared, his voice echoing off the glass. "Burn the hotel to the ground if you have to! I want Dominic Moretti's head on a silver platter before midnight!"
