Chapter 7 - Fractured Allegiance
The clock in Arturo’s private study at the club struck ten at night.
Laura paced the Persian rug, her hands clasped tightly against her stomach. Every minute felt like an eternity. On the street below, she could hear the muffled sounds of Manhattan traffic, but up here, the silence was deafening.
Suddenly, the heavy double doors clicked open.
Laura spun around, expecting Arturo. Instead, Levian Rossi slipped into the room, his face pale and covered in cold sweat. He didn't have his usual calm composure; his tie was crooked, and he was clutching a secure satellite phone in his hand.
“Miss Bell,” Levian said, his voice clipped and urgent. “We have an emergency. We need to move you immediately.”
Laura took an instinctive step backward. “Where is Arturo? He told me to wait here for him.”
“Don Arturo has been ambushed at the Brooklyn Navy Yard,” Levian said, stepping closer, reaching into his trench coat. “Moretti had federal agents on his payroll. Arturo’s convoy was intercepted by tactical teams before they could reach the warehouse. He sent me to secure you and take you to the private hangar at Teterboro Airport.”
A cold dread pooled in Laura’s veins. Something was wrong.
She looked at Levian’s boots. They were clean, polished, devoid of the mud and grime that would have coated anyone returning from the rainy industrial docks of Brooklyn. And then she remembered what Arturo had told her during the raid: “No one enters this wing except Levian and myself. But if you see anyone acting out of order, trust no one.”
“Show me the radio confirmation,” Laura said, keeping her voice as steady as she could, taking another small step toward Arturo’s heavy mahogany desk.
Levian stopped. The mask of loyalty cracked, revealing a cold, calculating sneer beneath.
“You’re smarter than you look, little maid,” Levian spat, pulling a silenced pistol from beneath his coat. “Arturo went soft the second he saw you dancing in that miserable little room. He risked forty million dollars in port assets just to keep Moretti’s men away from your bed. A boss who thinks with his heart is a dead boss.”
“You set him up,” Laura whispered, horror freezing her breath. “You gave Moretti the security codes to the mansion. You told him how to breach the grounds.”
“Moretti offered me thirty percent of the concrete contracts and full control of northern New Jersey,” Levian sneered, raising the gun toward her chest. “All I had to do was leave the terrace doors unlatched and hand you over to Moretti as leverage. Arturo won't fire a single bullet at Brooklyn if he knows Moretti has his precious pet hanging over a vat of industrial lye.”
“I am not his pet,” Laura said fiercely.
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Her hand dropped behind the edge of the desk, finding the red recessed button Arturo had shown her two days ago—the panic switch linked directly to the armored tactical team stationed in the basement.
She pressed it down with all her might.
