Chapter 7 - The Man Inside Dante's House
Dante trusted very few people.
That made betrayal easier to narrow and harder to survive.
By morning, Luca had locked down access to every schedule, vehicle assignment, and security log from the previous month.
Sophia sat in the conference room with Priya, two laptops, and enough coffee to restart a heart.
Dante paced near the windows.
“You are making me nervous,” Sophia said.
“I’m thinking.”
“You think aggressively.”
Luca snorted.
Dante looked at him.
Luca stopped.
Priya pulled up the access reports.
Only six people had known the Indiana location before the attack.
Dante.
Sophia.
Luca.
Priya.
A driver named Owen.
And Marco Bellini, Dante’s operations chief.
Sophia frowned.
“Marco?”
“Not the club manager,” Luca said. “Different Marco.”
“Thank God. I’m running out of emotional space for men named Marco.”
Dante ignored that.
Owen had driven Dante for eight years. Priya had worked for him for three. Luca was practically family.
Marco Bellini had been at Dante’s side since his twenties.
“Which means you’re assuming it can’t be any of them,” Sophia said.
Dante looked at her.
“I’m assuming nothing.”
“Good.”
They traced the leak through mundane details.
Parking receipts.
Badge logs.
A printer queue.
Sophia noticed the pattern because she had spent years organizing therapy research data at college.
Every leaked location had been printed from the same administrative printer fifteen to thirty minutes before movement.
Only one person routinely printed schedules instead of reading them digitally.
Marco Bellini.
Dante stared at the report.
“No.”
Sophia heard what the word meant.
Not disbelief.
Pain.
“You said assume nothing,” she reminded him quietly.
Marco arrived at eleven because Dante summoned him without explanation.
He was fifty, elegant, silver-haired, with the confidence of a man who had spent half his life beside power.
He kissed Sophia’s hand when introduced.
“You are the famous Ms. Mitchell.”
“Depends who’s talking.”
“Everyone, lately.”
Dante waited until the door closed.
“Why did Felix Ward know where we were yesterday?”
Marco’s smile did not move.
“I have no idea.”
“Why did your badge access the schedule printer at 8:14 yesterday morning?”
“I print schedules.”
“Why did Felix receive a text from a prepaid phone at 8:16?”
Marco’s eyes shifted once.
Sophia saw it.
Dante did too.
“Sit down,” Dante said.
Marco remained standing.
“What is this?”
“A chance to tell me the truth before Luca does.”
Marco looked toward Sophia.
“This is because of her.”
Sophia felt something cold move through the room.
Dante’s voice lowered.
“Careful.”
“She walks in from a strip club and suddenly we’re tearing apart fifteen years of loyalty?”
Sophia stood.
“No. Fifteen years of loyalty started tearing itself apart when you sold someone’s location.”
Marco laughed. “You think you understand this world?”
“No. I understand a printer log.”
Priya almost smiled.
Marco’s face hardened.
Then he reached inside his jacket.
Luca drew his weapon.
Dante did not move.
Marco slowly removed a phone and placed it on the table.
“Caruso has my son.”
Silence.
Dante’s expression changed.
“Matteo?”
Marco nodded.
“Three months ago. He got into gambling debt. Caruso bought it. Then he told me I could pay with information.”
“Why didn’t you come to me?”
“Because you would have killed the men holding him.”
“Yes.”
“And if you missed one, they would have killed Matteo first.”
Dante’s jaw clenched.
Marco looked at Sophia.
“I did not know they would attack the woman yesterday. I was told they only wanted the location.”
Eleanor.
Sophia’s anger returned.
“You gave them a terrified woman’s address after she spent thirteen years hiding.”
“I was trying to keep my son alive.”
“So was my father.”
Marco flinched.
Sophia saw it.
“You knew him.”
Dante turned.
Marco said nothing.
“Did you?” Sophia asked.
Finally he nodded.
“I drove Dante’s father the night David Mitchell came to the house.”
Sophia stepped closer.
“What happened?”
“David begged for help. Dante’s father refused.”
“And then?”
Marco looked at Dante.
“Your father called Caruso after David left.”
The room went dead.
Dante’s face emptied.
“No.”
“I heard the call.”
“You’re lying.”
“I wish I were.”
Sophia stared at Dante.
Dante stared at Marco as if the floor had disappeared beneath him.
Marco’s voice broke.
“Your father didn’t kill David. But he told Caruso that David had evidence and was scared. He handed him over to save himself.”
Dante stepped back.
For the first time, Sophia saw him look truly powerless.
She wanted to touch his arm.
She did not.
His rules deserved the same respect as hers.
Dante turned toward the window.
“Where is Matteo?”
Marco swallowed. “I don’t know.”
“Then we find him.”
Marco looked up, stunned.
“You’re not going to kill me?”
Dante faced him again.
“No.”
Luca looked surprised.
“So what happens?” Marco asked.
“You help us get Matteo back. Then you answer for what you did.”
Marco nodded slowly.
Sophia looked at Dante.
He had every reason to choose vengeance.
He chose a plan.
It was the first time she understood that power could be measured by what a man refused to do.
That afternoon, Priya traced one of Caruso’s ransom calls to an industrial building near the river.
Luca prepared a team.
Then Sophia’s phone rang.
Unknown number.
She answered.
A familiar voice said, “Soph?”
Her body went cold.
James.
“Don’t hang up.”
“You have five seconds.”
“I can give you Caruso.”
Sophia looked across the room at Dante.
James continued.
“But not if Dante Vieri is listening.”
Sophia covered the phone for one second. “He wants privacy.”
Dante’s mouth went flat. “He has poor judgment.”
“That part is established.”
Luca asked whether they should trace the call. Priya was already doing it. Sophia looked at the people around the table and realized how quickly her life had changed. Five months ago, her biggest fear had been an overdraft notice. Now men who carried guns were waiting for her decision.
She hated that this world could make danger feel normal.
So she made one thing clear before uncovering the phone.
“No one hurts him just because I’m angry.”
Dante looked at her. “If he threatens you—”
“That’s different. I mean punishment.”
Luca nodded first.
Dante took longer. “Agreed.”
Sophia removed her hand from the microphone.
“James, you get one conversation. You lie once, I hang up.”
His breath came through the speaker. “Fair.”
May you like
“Nothing about this is fair.”
“No,” he said. “It isn’t.”
