He Replaced His Wife And Lost His Mafia Empire Chapter 13
By the time Dominic got back to Chicago, the captains had already been waiting for two hours.
Three withdrawal notices from their lenders had just been placed in front of them.
An older captain asked him outright, “Why did the Costa family suddenly pull its guarantee?”
Dominic said it was a small problem between him and me.
No one believed him.
The three new ventures had already devoured a huge amount of cash. With the Costa family gone, no one wanted to keep lending, and suppliers had begun demanding payment in advance. Worse, the West Coast shipping routes were no longer open to the Moretti family.
Before this, everyone had treated the wife from California as little more than decoration.
Only now that I was gone did they realize how many partnerships had been maintained because I handled them personally.
I remembered each captain’s concerns and knew which neutral institutions cared most about what. Terms Dominic had bluntly rejected at the long table were often won back by me after dinner.
Sloane sat beside Dominic and tried to take notes the way she had seen me do.
Someone asked her, “Where is the complete contact list Evelyn left behind?”
“I’m still organizing it.”
“Why did half the charity breakfast donors pull out?”
“Maybe it was the weather.”
“Why was Margaret’s relief fund never renewed?”
Sloane had no answer.
She knew what kind of coffee Dominic liked, which restaurants he preferred, and how to carry herself in front of allies.
But she had never actually maintained this family’s external relationships.
Midway through the meeting, a longtime casino hotel manager rushed in.
He hadn’t come to wish Dominic a merry Christmas. He came with a joint letter signed by more than thirty employees.
The new projects had delayed wages again and again, and employees had gone two months without overtime pay. In the past, when they brought complaints to me, I would check the books that same day and tell Dominic the problem couldn’t wait.
This time, there was no one to carry the message.
Dominic only learned how bad things were when the employees were threatening to walk out.
“Why didn’t anyone tell me sooner?” he demanded of Sloane.
Sloane pulled out a stack of unprocessed emails.
“I was in meetings with you every day and dealing with people at the old house. I thought small things like this could wait.”
Dominic stared at that stack of emails and suddenly remembered how many times he had used those exact words to describe my work.
Banquets. Thank-you letters. Employee complaints. Arguments among the elders. Small things that could be handled later.
But when every small thing was left unhandled at once, it was enough to bring down both a family’s dignity and its income.
The older captain set a short knife on the table.
It wasn’t decoration.
The blade rested against the loyalty papers, reminding Dominic that a boss could command men only if he could protect their money, their families, and their standing.
“Two weeks,” he said. “If you can’t come up with a solution, we’ll withdraw our loyalty and stop paying tribute.”
After the meeting, Dominic sent me an apology for the first time.
*Last night was my fault. Come back, and we can renegotiate the terms.*
The message never went through.
My number had already been deactivated.