She Married The Mafia Heir I Married The Next Don Chapter 09
The Top
I put the papers beside Nico’s breakfast.
“Alessandro has been meeting with the man who handles fleet purchases.”
Nico opens the folder.
“Who told you?”
“A driver who used to work for my father.”
“Does he know you’re telling me?”
“He knows I don’t collect gossip for fun.”
Nico reads.
Dates.
Names.
Copies of invoices that don’t match the equipment supposedly bought.
“This isn’t enough on its own,” he says.
“I know.”
He looks at me.
“I’m giving you somewhere to start.”
He nods.
Then he closes the folder and takes it with him.
The rest takes months.
An accountant checks what I found.
Nico speaks to the people who approved the purchases.
A repair shop confirms that work listed on several invoices never happened.
One of the men admits who told him to sign.
By the time Nico puts the records in front of his father, Alessandro can’t dismiss them as his brother making accusations.
The man responsible for purchasing loses his position.
Two of Alessandro’s closest supporters lose access to the accounts.
For the first time, people ask Nico questions before they make decisions.
My father comes to see me the following afternoon.
He doesn’t ask about the house.
Or whether I’m happy.
“Do you understand what you’ve done?”
I put down my cup.
“You’ll have to be more specific.”
“Bianca is married to him.”
“I was at the wedding.”
“Mara.”
“What do you want me to say?”
“That you’ll stop making this harder.”
“For whom?”
His face tightens.
“For the family.”
I look around the study.
The desk where I learned how little we had.
The chairs where Nico and I sat through arguments, setbacks, and figures that wouldn’t work no matter how often I checked them.
“I have a family here, too.”
“You know what I mean.”
“Yes. You want me to make sure Bianca never loses anything.”
“She is your sister.”
“And I’m your daughter.”
He looks away first.
I let him.
Then I say, “You arranged both marriages. You don’t get to support one and expect the other to remain harmless.”
“Your husband is provoking a fight he may not win.”
“Then decide how much you want to lose if he does.”
My father stares at me.
I don’t smile.
I’m not enjoying this as much as I once imagined I would.
But I’m not backing down.
He leaves angry.
A week later, a shipment our warehouse has been waiting for finally arrives.
A payment he said was delayed clears.
He doesn’t call.
Neither do I.
Don Carlo’s health worsens before winter.
The meetings become shorter.
Then less frequent.
Alessandro begins speaking as though the decisions are already his.
Some people accept it.
Others remember the accounts.
They remember who fixed the problems nobody else wanted.
Nico comes home one night and shuts the study door.
“My brother is moving early.”
I set down my pen.
“How early?”
“Soon.”
“What do you need?”
He looks at the papers on my desk.
“The records kept safe. The businesses running. And you somewhere I know you can leave if this goes wrong.”
“I’m not going back to my father.”
“I didn’t ask you to.”
For a moment, neither of us speaks.
Then I ask the question I’ve been avoiding.
“Can we win?”
“Yes.”
“Tell me what you really think.”
His expression shifts.
At last, he says, “I think so.”
I nod.
I would rather have that than a promise he can’t keep.
When Alessandro acts, it happens at night.
Phones ring.
Cars leave the house.
Nico comes into the study wearing a coat I haven’t seen before.
He looks at the desk.
Names.
Numbers.
The records we’ve spent months collecting.
“You know what to do.”
“Yes.”
He pauses beside the door.
I want to tell him not to go.
I hate that I want it.
Instead, I say, “Come back.”
He looks at me.
Then he nods.
All night, I stay in the study.
I answer calls.
Make sure the people who depend on our businesses know who is still authorized to pay them.
Keep our staff away from places where they might get caught in someone else’s fight.
Salvatore stays with me.
Rosa brings coffee I barely touch.
There is a bag beside the door.
Documents.
Money.
The few things I won’t leave behind again.
If Nico loses, I intend for us to have somewhere to go.
Near dawn, I hear a car.
I stand before Salvatore reaches the window.
Nico comes through the door with blood on his sleeve.
I cross the room.
“Yours?”
“Some.”
I take his arm.
He catches my hand.
“It’s done.”
I look at him.
For a moment, I don’t understand how two words can mean so much.
Then my knees nearly give.
He holds me steady.
Only for a second.
Then I call for someone to look at his arm.
Alessandro had tried to issue orders in his father’s name while the Don was too ill to receive visitors.
The men who refused were told they would lose their positions.
Some were threatened.
He expected uncertainty to make people obey.
Instead, it gave them a reason to choose.
Nico had warned enough of them.
And when they asked what proof he had, he could show them.
Don Carlo lived long enough to hear what his eldest son had done.
He withdrew his support.
He named Nico to take over.
By the time he died several weeks later, the family had already begun turning to his younger son.
The transition wasn’t gentle.
Alessandro’s supporters lost positions.
Accounts changed hands.
People who had never returned Nico’s calls began asking when he could see them.
Alessandro himself was allowed to leave.
No command.
No claim to the businesses.
No return without permission.
When Nico tells me, I look at him.
“Your decision?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“He’s finished.”
I wait.
Nico studies my face.
“Did you want something else?”
I think about it.
The man at the center of the room.
The husband my parents were so pleased to give Bianca.
Then I shake my head.
“No.”
Bianca leaves with him.
I watch from an upstairs window as they load a small car outside the house where my parents once stood promising she would never be alone.
My mother cries.
My father speaks to Alessandro briefly.
Bianca looks back before getting in.
For a moment, I wonder whether she sees me.
Then she gets into the car.
They leave together.
It isn’t the future she was promised.
But it is the one she has chosen.
I stay at the window until the road is empty.
Behind me, Nico enters the room.
“My father-in-law wants a meeting.”
I turn.
“About?”
“A few arrangements he’d like to keep.”
Once, my father made me wait outside a door while he decided how much attention I deserved.
Now he wants to know when we can see him.
“Tomorrow,” I say.
Nico nods.
“He asked whether he should speak to me or to you.”
“Both.”
“That’s what I told him.”
I look at the papers in his hand.
There is still work.
There will always be work.
We wanted the top without knowing everything it would cost to stay there.
Now we know more.
Not enough.
But more.
Nico sets the papers on the table.
I sit beside him.
He has the authority his family kept from him.
I have a voice nobody in this room can pretend not to hear.
We haven’t said we love each other.
Neither of us has asked.
But when he opens the first folder, he turns it so we can both read.
I move my chair closer.
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