We’re heading to the Serrano compound.
A sit-down.A courtesy call masked as respect.The kind of meeting where smiles are sharp and every word is a test.
These are the men who once bowed their heads and called my uncle Don.
I know exactly what fierce words will greet me today.I’ve sat at that table before, too.A teenage boy sitting next to Matteo, shoulders tense, hands folded neatly in my lap.Silent.Obedient.Watching everything.
Back then, I knew my place.
Speak when spoken to.Nod when the room expected it.Keep my mouth shut and my eyes sharp.I learned early that silence was survival in this world.That the quiet ones lived longer.Fear was currency, traded across polished tables and poured into crystal glasses with expensive whiskey.You could buy loyalty with it.You could buy time.Sometimes you could even buy forgiveness.
I watched men threaten without raising their voices.I memorized how power shifted when someone leaned back in their chair instead of forward.I learned who flinched and who didn’t.Who smiled because they were winning and who smiled because they were terrified.
Matteo used to sit there calm as a stone, one hand loose on the armrest, the other steady on his glass.Untouchable.Certain.
That version of him seems distant now.
Now I go in there alone today.
The city rushes past, neon bleeding into the darkness, each sign a wound against the night.Reds, greens, blues, all too bright, too damn loud, trying to pretend everything’s normal.Streetlights flicker over cracked pavement.Broken glass sparkles in the gutters like shattered promises.
We drive slowly.Not because of traffic, but because this is a show.Power moves at its own fucking pace.The car hums beneath me.Bulletproof.Reinforced.A coffin on wheels if things go sideways.
A week ago, the name De Luca cleared corners.Made rats choke on their own spit and vanish into shadows they didn’t belong in.One whisper used to be enough.People crossed the street, shut their mouths, pulled their curtains, and pretended they didn’t see a thing.
But things are different now.
Those files revealed everything about us.
Let the world stare directly into the heart of the operation.Every secret.Every deal.Every body we dropped and burial we made.All of it spilled like guts across the pavement.
And I am still cleaning everything up, because this empire still matters to me.
And I’ll bury anyone who tries to erase it.
We turn the corner, and the engines rumble softly.The street narrows.Shadows close in.
Out front of the Serrano estate, three black sedans idle with their engines still running.The men stepping out aren’t just muscle; they’re the kind of bastards who enjoy violence a little too much.
I spot Rocco D’Amato first.Slicked-back hair, cheap cologne, a temper like a loaded gun.He once pulled out a guy’s molars just to hear him scream.He’s surrounded by his soldiers.
The next car is Enzo Vargas.
He gets out, lights a cigarette with one hand, and adjusts his grip on his pistol with the other.He has a smile that doesn’t reach his eyes and a reputation soaked in blood.
Behind them, Nicoli Franchi steps out of the next car, calm as ever.He’s the quiet one, the kind who doesn’t raise his voice because his knife does the talking.
All of them Serrano loyalists.All of them are fucking assholes.
They’re not here to talk.They’re here to see if I bleed.
Serrano soldiers stand like statues at the entrance.They don’t hide their guns or blades, the kind of steel that instinctively tastes blood.Their hands hover near their hips, fingers brushing chrome with practiced ease.Men trained to stay still until it’s time to kill.
Their eyes follow us as we pull up.
This is what Serrano wants me to see before I even reach the door: the power, the heat, the threat.And I let them show it, because I didn’t come here to flinch.I came to remind them that De Luca blood doesn’t run.It damn well reigns.
I open the door and step outside.My soldiers fall in line silently.No commands needed, just instinct.
