Chapter 10 - Salvatore’s Choice
Alessio demanded a meeting at the old fish market.
No weapons.
No captains.
No police.
Vittorio arrived with the ledger beneath his coat.
He ignored every condition except coming alone.
The market had closed for the afternoon.
Empty stalls stood beneath rusted metal roofs.
Alessio waited beside the harbor.
“You read the letter.”
“I read the line you wanted me to read.”
“There is more.”
Vittorio handed him the page.
Salvatore had selected Alessio as heir when the brothers were young.
Then Alessio began making secret agreements with Domenico Serra.
He promised access to Morelli routes in exchange for support against Vittorio.
Salvatore discovered the betrayal.
He changed his decision.
Vittorio became heir because he protected the organization even when he disagreed with his father.
Alessio wanted the organization even when owning it required destroying the family.
“You stole Father’s letter before he died,” Vittorio said.
“I read only the first page.”
“You assumed the rest named you.”
“He always preferred me.”
“No.”
“He feared what you would become if he did not.”
Alessio’s face darkened.
He admitted helping Domenico stage the warehouse fire.
The explosion was meant to kill Domenico’s rivals and allow Alessio to disappear.
But Domenico betrayed him.
Alessio spent eighteen months imprisoned inside a shipyard warehouse.
He escaped six months earlier.
“Why work with Isabella again?”
“She knew where Domenico kept the missing ledger pages.”
“Did you love her?”
Alessio laughed bitterly.
“She loved whichever brother looked closer to the throne.”
Vittorio thought of five years of marriage.
The questions Isabella asked.
The meetings she overheard.
The nights she held him while sending information to his enemies.
“Where is she now?”
“On the train to Rome.”
“With the missing pages?”
“No.”
Alessio removed a folded photograph.
It showed Isabella beside a young boy in a school uniform.
The child had Vittorio’s dark eyes.
“Your son is not at boarding school in Switzerland.”
“He never was.”
Vittorio stared at the photograph.
His eight-year-old son, Luca, had supposedly remained abroad because Isabella believed Naples was unsafe.
According to Alessio, Luca had been living in a private compound outside Rome.
Domenico used him as leverage against Isabella.
Now Isabella planned to trade the missing ledger pages for the boy.
May you like
“She did not only betray you,” Alessio said.
“She was also trying to get Luca back.”
