The first time the mafia boss’s baby reached for me, I thought he wanted the silver necklace around my throat.

The private hangar at Northeast Philadelphia Airport smelled of jet fuel and ozone.

Rain pounded against the corrugated metal roof as Marco Bellini stood near the open cargo door of a twin-engine Gulfstream, clutching a leather briefcase containing two million dollars in bearer bonds and a forged passport under the name of Marco Rossi.

"The flight plan is filed for Palermo," Marco said nervously to the pilot. "Why aren't the engines running?"

"Because the pilot works for me, Marco."

The deep, gravelly voice echoed from the cavernous shadows of the hangar.

Marco spun around, dropping the briefcase.

Luca emerged from behind a row of fuel drums, dressed in a long black wool coat, his hands shoved casually into his pockets. Dante and Mario walked five paces behind him, their shotguns held at low ready.

"Luca," Marco stammered, his face draining of all color. "Listen to me... Matteo lied to me. He swore to me the boy wouldn't be hurt! He told me—"

"You gave my son to a hyena," Luca said, his voice entirely devoid of rage. It was worse than rage. It was the terrifying, emotionless judgment of a tomb.

"He's my sister's blood!" Marco screamed, tears of panic spilling down his cheeks. "You were going to turn him into a killer, Luca! Just like you! Just like your father! I wanted him to have a normal life!"

"A normal life?" Luca took three slow steps forward, closing the distance until Marco was trembling beneath his shadow. "You had him dragged through a firefight. You left Rosa bleeding on the floor. You put my son on a fire escape twelve stories above concrete."

Marco fell to his knees on the oil-stained concrete, sobbing hysterically. "Kill me, then. Just do it. Elena is waiting for me anyway."

Luca looked down at the man who had shared his family's table for a decade. He slowly drew his pistol, the cold steel clicking as he racked the slide.

He aimed the barrel directly between Marco’s eyes.

The silence in the hangar was absolute, broken only by Marco’s ragged sobs and the drumming rain outside.

Luca’s finger tightened on the trigger.

*Double the salary,* a woman’s fierce voice echoed in his memory. *And I want a gun. And someone to teach me how to shoot it.*

He remembered Avery curled around Leo on the bathroom floor, shielding his son with her own frail body. He remembered her emerald dress soaked in rain, her hands throwing a brass cylinder into the abyss to save a child that wasn't hers.

He remembered the light in her eyes when she looked at him not as a don, but as a man worth loving.

*If I leave a single ember burning, it will catch fire again.*

Luca slowly lowered the weapon.

Marco blinked through his tears, stunned. "Luca...?"

"Elena would never forgive me if I put her brother in the ground," Luca said, his voice dead and final. "And the woman waiting for me at home deserves a man who knows when the killing has to stop."

He turned his back on Marco and looked at Dante.

"Strip him of his passport, his phones, and his money," Luca ordered coldly. "Put him on a cargo ship bound for South America. If he ever sets foot on North American soil again, shoot him on sight."

"Yes, Boss," Dante said, stepping forward with zip-ties.

Luca walked toward the hangar exit, pulling his phone from his coat pocket. He dialed the number for the head of his legal firm.

"Councilman," Luca said as the call connected. "Prepare the paperwork for the Commission by noon. I am formally stepping down from the council. Transfer all logistics, shipping, and real estate assets into legitimate corporate trusts under Avery Chen and Leo Moretti’s names."

"Mr. Moretti," the lawyer stammered, shocked. "That’s over four hundred million dollars in assets. You’re walking away from the syndicate entirely?"

Luca looked out into the gray dawn breaking over the Philadelphia skyline, watching the rain finally begin to clear.