Chapter 11 - The Commission's Summons
-11-
Three weeks had passed since the bloodless purge of the Rinaldi inner circle. The autumn winds had grown fierce, stripping the last stubborn oak leaves from the branches and driving cold rain against the reinforced glass of the Manhattan penthouse where the five ruling families of the East Coast syndicate held their secret summits.
Massimo Rinaldi sat at the head of the polished obsidian conference table, flanked not by treacherous underbosses like Dean Foster, but by Marcus and four newly appointed captains whose loyalty had been tested in the fires of the old guard.
Opposite Massimo sat Don Salvatore Moretti, the aging, silver-haired patriarch of the Sicilian faction, whose cold blue eyes glittered with suppressed irritation.
"You've shaken the tree pretty hard these past few weeks, Massimo," Moretti said, his voice raspy as he lit a thick Toscano cigar. "Executing your right-hand man without a commission trial, exiling Camille Ashwood, purging half the dock supervisors in Newark. The board is getting nervous. People are starting to wonder if the bullet on Brooklyn Avenue scrambled your brains."
Massimo didn't flinch. He leaned forward, resting his forearms on the table, his gaze locked onto the older don with an intensity that made the surrounding capos shift uncomfortably in their seats.
"My brain was never clearer, Salvatore," Massimo replied smoothly. "Dean Foster wasn't executed because of a dispute over dock tariffs. He was executed because he partnered with the Bellandi family to put a bullet in my spine and a neurotoxin in my water."
A murmur rippled through the conference room. Moretti’s cigar paused halfway to his mouth, his expression hardening. "You have proof of this treason?"
Marcus stepped forward, placing a thick leather-bound dossier on the table between them. It contained Dr. Julian Hale’s encrypted digital logs, the independent lab analysis of the synthetic neurotoxin, bank transfers originating from offshore accounts controlled by Dean Foster, and signed confessions extracted during the final hours at Pier 42.
Moretti flipped open the folder, his eyes scanning the pages with rapid, experienced efficiency. The longer he read, the deeper his frown became.
"Dean was playing both sides," Moretti muttered, closing the dossier with a heavy thud. "He promised the Bellandis full control of the northern shipping lanes once you were incapacitated."
"And in return, they backed his hostile takeover of the Rinaldi estate," Massimo added coldly. "The commission promotes family loyalty above all else, Salvatore. Foster broke that oath. I didn't just protect my house; I protected the entire syndicate from a worm eating away at our foundation."
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Moretti stared at him for a long, calculating moment, weighing the political fallout. Then, slowly, the older don nodded in grudging respect.
"You survived the ambush, you survived the poison, and you walked back into this room standing on your own two feet," Moretti acknowledged, raising his glass of whiskey in a silent toast. "The Rinaldi empire isn't weakening, gentlemen. It just shed its dead skin. Consider your actions approved by the commission, Massimo."
