Chapter 6 - The Betrayal Inside the Family
Norah wanted to call the police.
Gabriel wanted to go immediately.
Luca wanted to burn the warehouse to the ground.
None of them got what they wanted.
Instead, they made a plan.
At 11:32 p.m., Gabriel drove toward the abandoned Costa warehouse beside the river.
Norah sat beside him.
“You should've stayed with Elias.”
“And spend the rest of my life wondering whether my daughter died because I was afraid?”
Gabriel didn't argue.
The warehouse had belonged to Vittorio Costa.
Gabriel had played there as a child while his father conducted meetings upstairs.
Now broken windows reflected the black river.
They entered.
Marco stood beneath a hanging industrial light.
Samuel was beside him.
Rose rested in Samuel's arms.
Norah moved forward.
“Give me my baby.”
Samuel's face twisted.
“I'm sorry.”
“You said you were protecting us.”
“I was.”
“By kidnapping my daughter?”
Marco laughed.
“Families become complicated when money enters the room.”
Norah looked at Samuel.
“How much?”
He couldn't meet her eyes.
“Three million.”
Norah recoiled as if slapped.
Gabriel understood then.
Samuel had helped her escape not merely from compassion.
Marco had paid him to control where she went.
“Give Rose to Norah,” Gabriel said.
Marco smiled.
“Evidence first.”
Gabriel held up a flash drive.
“Every copy.”
“You expect me to believe you?”
“No.”
Gabriel tossed it across the concrete.
Marco caught it.
“Now the baby.”
Marco nodded toward Samuel.
Samuel walked toward Norah.
Halfway there, he stopped.
His expression changed.
“I'm sorry, Eleanor.”
Then he suddenly turned and fired at Marco.
Chaos exploded.
Gabriel lunged toward Norah.
Samuel threw himself behind a steel pillar while Rose screamed.
Marco's men opened fire.
“Take her!” Samuel shouted.
He shoved the baby into Norah's arms.
Gabriel shielded both of them.
Luca's team stormed the warehouse from the river entrance.
Within seconds, Marco's men were pinned down.
Samuel fell.
Norah screamed his name.
Gabriel crawled toward him.
Blood spread beneath Samuel's coat.
“Why?” Norah sobbed.
Samuel looked at her.
“Your father was my brother.”
“You sold us.”
“I thought I could play Marco.”
He coughed.
“I took his money. Made him believe I was helping him. I needed him to trust me long enough to learn where he'd hidden Anthony's original files.”
Samuel reached inside his coat.
He removed a small key.
“Union Station. Locker 214.”
Norah took it.
“What's inside?”
“Everything.”
Samuel looked at Gabriel.
“Your father knew.”
Gabriel froze.
“About Marco?”
“He was collecting evidence with Anthony.”
Gabriel stared.
Their fathers had secretly worked together.
Enemies in public.
Allies in private.
Samuel smiled weakly.
“They almost ended it twenty years ago.”
His breathing slowed.
“You two finish it.”
Then his eyes closed.
Norah bowed over him, crying.
Gabriel placed a hand on her shoulder.
Across the warehouse, Marco escaped through a loading door.
But this time Gabriel did not chase him.
Rose was crying.
Norah was bleeding from a cut on her forehead.
Those mattered more.
Gabriel lifted his daughter for the first time.
Rose immediately screamed louder.
Despite everything, Norah laughed.
Gabriel stared at the tiny furious face.
“She hates me.”
“She has excellent judgment.”
Gabriel looked at Norah.
For the first time since she disappeared, they both laughed.
It lasted only seconds.
But something broken shifted.
At Union Station, locker 214 contained twenty years of evidence.
Bank records.
Audio recordings.
Photographs.
Names.
And one sealed letter.
To Gabriel Costa.
Gabriel recognized his father's handwriting.
He opened it.
Son, if you are reading this, I failed to give you the life I wanted you to have.
Gabriel's eyes blurred.
Vittorio confessed everything.
He had inherited a criminal empire and spent years trying to dismantle its most violent operations without getting Gabriel killed.
Marco discovered the plan.
Vittorio knew his death might be inevitable.
His final instruction was simple.
Do not avenge me.
End what I was too weak to end.
Gabriel sat on the station bench.
For years, he had believed becoming powerful honored his father.
Now he understood.
The empire was never his inheritance.
Escaping it was.
Norah sat beside him holding Rose.
“What will you do?”
Gabriel folded the letter.
“What my father asked.”
By sunrise, copies of the evidence were in federal hands.
Arrests began before breakfast.
Judges.
Police officers.
Businessmen.
Politicians.
Costa captains.
The organization that had ruled through fear for decades began collapsing.
But Marco disappeared.
And three days later, Gabriel received a package.
Inside was a photograph of Norah leaving the pediatric clinic with both twins.
A red circle had been drawn around her head.
On the back:
May you like
You took my family from me.
Now I'll take yours.
