Page 1 of Betrayal of the Mafia Rebel
1
Catalina
Three hours down here.Plink. Plink. Plink.Water drips in the dark and every drop marks another minute before my uncles realize I'm gone. The Chicago River flows directly above my head, tons of freezing, murky water pressing down on this decommissioned stretch of the River Speakeasy, and the single dim bulb swinging on its frayed wire throws jagged shadows against the brick that all look, if I stare too long, like men I recognize.
The leather bag at my feet holds everything I managed to take. Ten thousand dollars in vacuum-sealed cash. A fake passport. A burner phone with exactly one encrypted contact programmed into it. An encrypted drive holding a major piece of the Bellanti shipping network—South Side armory codes, river warehouse rotations, and the manifest for the textile crates moving through the 43rd Street docks tomorrow night..
I'm a walking bomb. The Costas want that information to cut into their two-decade war. I want a new identity and a plane ticket. A simple, cutthroat transaction. Except my hands won't stop shaking. My teeth won't stop chattering. If my family finds me before the Costas extract me, what the Bellanti basement does to defectors will be worse.
I learned the absolute truth of my bloodline before I lost my milk teeth. You don't leave the Bellanti machine. You die inside it. Women in our family who tried—and there have been a few—never made it back to a hot meal. My uncles drank sixty-year-old scotch the morning after each one and toasted to family loyalty. I sat at the long mahogany table and watched the coffee go cold in their cups.
I pace. Twenty-two steps from the rusted iron grate at one end of the tunnel to the reinforced steel door at the other. Turn. Twenty-two steps back. Pacing keeps the blood moving in my freezing legs. It keeps the panic from taking permanent residence in my throat. My denim jeans cling tight to my thighs, offering zero protection against the subterranean chill.
The wool coat is useless against the aggressive dampness. I check the burner phone for the hundredth time. Dark. I check the steel door again. The deadbolt has not moved. Above me, the muffled rumble of a subway train shakes dust from the brick ceiling. People up there are buying lattes, complaining about the weather, rushing to dinner reservations.
They have no idea a decades-old shadow war is bleeding out beneath their feet. My uncles sit at the heads of long tables up there, carving up the city like prime rib. I grew up in the parlor in pristine white lace listening to the screams from the soundproofed basement. My hands are technically clean. My soul is not.
A metallic scrape tears through the silence.
The noise violently bounces off the brick walls. My pacing stops instantly. My lungs lock. Oxygen refuses to move. Every instinct honed by two decades of Bellanti paranoia screams at me to run. There's nowhere to go. This tunnel is a dead end. A kill box.
The reinforced steel door at the far end of the tunnel groans under pressure. Hinges shriek in protest. Shadows warp andlengthen across the damp floor as the heavy deadbolt slides back. The stagnant air thickens with something new. A new scent invades the space, overpowering the smell of the river water.
Motor oil. Smoke. Sun-warmed metal.
The scent is heavy. Aggressive. Unapologetic. It wraps around my throat, cutting through the stench of the mildew. It's a primal scent. Garages. Firearms. The kind of work that ends in blood. My lungs expand, pulling it in deeply. The reaction is involuntary. The scent grounds the frantic panic spiraling in my chest. A man steps through the threshold. The dim, flickering bulb hanging from the ceiling illuminates his towering frame.
Fabio Costa.
The boogeyman. The monster my uncles invoked to keep the Bellanti children in line. He is a titan. A towering wall of pure, unadulterated muscle. His presence alone is a weapon. The black tactical gear he wears stretches tight across his broad chest and thick thighs. He is designed for absolute destruction.
The stories my family told about the Costa enforcers were not exaggerated. If anything, they failed to capture the terrifying magnitude of the man standing in front of me. The steel door slams shut behind him with a final, echoing boom. The deadbolt clicks back into place. We're locked in.
A violent jolt snaps through my nervous system. Something pulses low in my belly, sudden and unwelcome. It spreads rapidly through my veins, chasing away the subterranean chill. The absurdity of the reaction makes me want to laugh hysterically.
I'm standing in a damp crypt, facing my executioner, and my body picks this moment to wake up. The magnetic pull is violent. It drags at me, urging me to step closer to the danger. He does not speak. He simply exists in the space, devouring the oxygen. He is a predator assessing a trap.
"Catalina Bellanti." His voice is a low growl carved out of broken glass. It scrapes against the damp stone. It vibrates directly in my chest.
"In the flesh." I lift my chin. I force my shoulders back. Show no weakness. That's the first rule of survival in my world.
He evaluates me. Dark eyes slide over my frame, cataloging my face, my throat, the curve of my hips beneath the wool coat. The look is thorough and unforgiving. Tactical. Searching for hidden weapons or wires. But the lingering heat in his gaze betrays something feral beneath the surface.
My curves suddenly feel heavy under his scrutiny. The bulky coat hides nothing. A muscle twitches along his sharp jawline. The faint silver dusting of gray hair at his temples catches the dim light, giving him a distinguished, lethal edge. The gold chain with a medallion resting against his throat glints.
"You're smaller than the intel suggested." He takes a slow, deliberate step forward. The thud of his boot echoes off the brick.
"And you're exactly as rude as your reputation implies," I fire back. The words leave my mouth before my brain can censor them. The sass is a defense mechanism. A shield I have wielded since childhood. My family expects submission. I survive by offering sharp edges.
His eyes narrow. The depths of his gaze lock onto mine. The intensity is staggering. He stops ten feet away. The scale of him is overwhelming up close. He stands a full head and shoulders above me, forcing me to look up. The proximity is suffocating. The heat radiating off his body hits the freezing air, creating an invisible force field.
"You have a smart mouth for a woman standing in a grave." The hostility in his tone is palpable.
"It's only a grave if you're stupid enough to kill your best asset." I stand my ground. Every instinct screams at me toretreat, to press my back against the wall. I refuse. I hold my position in the center of the tunnel.
"Asset." He spits the word like a curse. "You are Bellanti blood. You are poison."
"I am defector blood," I correct him sharply. "There is a difference."
