Chapter 5 - The Glass Vial
The rain had turned into a heavy, freezing sleet by the time the Gold Coast club was cleared.
The thirty commissioners had been escorted out of the building by Franco’s men, their faces pale, their phones seized to prevent any leaks to the press. The dining room was empty now, the crystal chandelier casting a cold, yellow glow over the single porcelain cup that sat on the blood-stained tablecloth.
Filippo was kneeling on the floor, his hands cuffed behind his back, his silk tie torn. His face was covered in sweat and dirt from where Franco’s men had pinned him to the floor.
"Who else, Filippo?" Alessandro asked, standing over him with his coat off, his shirtsleeves rolled up to the elbows. "Who else in the family was helping you with the Rotterdam shipments?"
"Nobody!" Filippo sobbed, his voice cracking with a pathetic, desperate terror. "It was just me! I wanted the shipping lanes, Alessandro! The New York families promised to back me if I could clear the thallium through Cicero! I had no choice! They were going to squeeze me out of the real estate trusts!"
"You had a choice," Alessandro said, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a small, glass vial with a blue plastic cap. It was the medicine bottle Carlos Alvarez had kept in his desk—the one Emma had recognized. "You had the choice to be a Duca. Instead, you chose to be a rat. And you killed a father because he had more honor than you."
"The child..." Filippo whispered, looking up through his matted hair. "The little girl... where is she?"
"She is under my protection, Filippo," Alessandro said. "The protection you threw away when you put that poison in my cup."
He turned to Franco. "Take him to the warehouse in Cicero. Let him sit in the same chair where they kept Carlos Alvarez. And call the state attorney. Tell him we have the manifests, the recordings, and the executioner."
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"And the New York families, Don Alessandro?" Franco asked.
"Tell them the Duca family is under new management," Alessandro said, his gray eyes locking onto his cousin’s face one last time. "My management. And the next shipment from Rotterdam is going to be returned to sender. In pieces."
