Chapter 14 - The Gathering of the Wolves
The subterranean assembly hall beneath the historic Chicago Union Station had not been opened in twenty-four years.
Built during the Prohibition era as a private underground speakeasy and bunker for the city’s founding syndicate families, its walls were lined with damp red brick, arched limestone vaults, and heavy iron sconces holding flickering torches.
The air smelled of aged limestone, wet gravel, and cold, impending violence.
Two hundred heavily armed men stood in disciplined, silent ranks along the perimeter of the cavernous hall.
These were not street-corner dealers or petty extortionists.
These were the captains, enforcers, and logistics masters of the Richi syndicate—men who controlled the rail terminals, the cold-storage warehouses, the private docks, and the labor unions across the entire Midwest.
Every man wore dark overcoats over formal suits, their faces hardened by years of surviving the urban trenches of Chicago.
At the center of the hall sat a massive circular stone table bearing the carved crests of the original five founding families of 1920.
Dante stood at the head of the table, wearing a clean charcoal suit beneath a long wool coat that fell to his knees.
His right hand rested casually on the pommel of an ornate silver-hilted dagger driven deep into the ancient oak center of the table.
I stood immediately at his right hand.
I was dressed in a floor-length black velvet gown with long, tailored sleeves, my hair pinned back tightly, my mother’s silver Saint Michael medallion resting prominently over my sternum.
In my hands, I held the heavy, green-leather Bellisario Black Ledger.
Every pair of eyes in the hall was pinned to that book.
The legends surrounding Antonio Moretti’s secret archives had circulated through the speakeasies and union halls for three decades.
To these men, that ledger was not merely paper; it was the Holy Grail of the Chicago underworld.
The heavy iron double doors at the southern end of the hall creaked open with an agonizing, rusty groan.
Marco, his left arm strapped tightly against his chest in a black tactical sling, escorted three elderly men down the stone steps.
These were the neutral arbiters of the National Commission—representatives sent by the Gambino, Genovese, and Lucchese families from New York to oversee the balance of power in the Midwest.
The lead arbiter was an eighty-year-old man named Don Carmine Falcone, whose face was lined with the deep, weathered trenches of six decades of underworld warfare.
Falcone leaned heavily on an ebony walking cane, his milky, cataract-clouded eyes scanning the assembly before settling upon Dante and me.
“Dante Lorenzo Richi,” Falcone rasped, his voice sounding like dry gravel ground beneath a boot heel. “You summoned the Commission under the Emergency Mandate of Nineteen-Seventy-Two. Why have you dragged old men onto the red-eye from LaGuardia?”
Dante stepped forward, pulling the silver-hilted dagger from the table with a sharp, resonant ring.
“Because the peace of nineteen-ninety-nine is dead, Don Carmine,” Dante declared, his voice carrying effortlessly across the vaulted brick arches.
“Silvio Moretti claims you violated the border by claiming the Bellisario maritime territory,” Falcone countered, stopping ten feet from the table.
“Silvio Moretti is a traitor, a thief, and a dishonorable dog,” I spoke out, my voice ringing clear and steady through the subterranean hall.
A murmur rippled through the ranks of two hundred armed men.
Falcone’s cloudy eyes turned slowly toward me, his brow furrowing beneath his silver eyebrows.
“The girl speaks?” Falcone asked, his tone skeptical. “Who gives a woman voice at the Table of Wolves?”
“Her blood gives her voice,” Dante said, his baritone dropping into a menacing, protective rumble. “And anyone who disrespects my wife will not walk out of this tunnel alive, Falcone.”
Falcone held up a gnarled, liver-spotted hand, silencing his own bodyguards.
He took two slow, shuffling steps toward me, peering closely at my face under the torchlight.
His old eyes widened slightly as he took in the high cheekbones, the line of my jaw, and the cold, unyielding fire in my gaze.
“Gesù Cristo,” Falcone whispered, crossing himself with a trembling thumb. “Antonio’s eyes. Teresa’s mouth.”
“I am Eliza Bellisario Moretti,” I said, lifting the heavy green ledger with both hands and slamming it down onto the stone table with a resounding thud. “And this is the record of every penny my uncle Silvio stole from the Commission over the last twenty-five years.”
The hall fell into a breathless, suffocating silence.
Falcone reached forward, his liver-spotted fingers trembling as he turned the first heavy parchment page.
He scanned the bank codes, the federal payoffs, and the secret accounts in Grand Cayman.
“Silvio skimmed fifteen percent of every narcotics shipment entering the St. Lawrence Seaway,” I continued, pointing a finger at the ledger. “He told the New York families that the coast guard seized the containers. In reality, he sold the surplus to independent cartels in Detroit and kept the profits in an offshore holding company registered to his mistress in Panama.”
Falcone’s face turned an ugly, mottled gray.
He looked at the two younger capos flanking him.
“Is this verified?” Falcone demanded.
“Our forensic accountants ran the routing numbers three hours ago,” Dante answered smoothly. “The funds are sitting in the Banco Nacional de Panama right now. Twenty-eight million dollars that belongs to the five families of New York.”
Falcone closed the ledger with a heavy, definitive slap.
The elderly arbiter looked up, his face hardening into a terrifying mask of ancient, unbending syndicate law.
“Silvio Moretti has broken the sacred trust of the Commission,” Falcone declared, his voice rising in an authoritative bellow that echoed off the damp bricks. “He has stolen from his brothers, murdered his kin, and brought foreign mercenaries into our city.”
Falcone turned to face the two hundred armed soldiers standing in the shadows.
“By the authority of the Five Families of New York, Silvio Moretti is stripped of his title, his territory, and his life.”
Falcone looked directly at Dante, then bowed his head slightly toward me.
“Dante Richi. Eliza Bellisario. The Commission recognizes your union. The Commission recognizes your sovereignty over the North, the South, and the maritime waterways of Cook County.”
Falcone raised his ebony cane, pointing it toward the northern tunnel exit.
“Go take your city,” the old man commanded. “And leave nothing of Silvio Moretti behind to be buried.”
A roar of savage approval erupted from two hundred throats, the sound echoing through the subterranean tunnels like rolling thunder.
Dante turned to me, his amber eyes burning with an intoxicating, triumphant fire.
He took my hand, lifting my knuckles to his lips, kissing the platinum ring that bound us together.
“It is time, my queen,” he whispered against my skin.
May you like
“Let’s finish it,” I answered.
We turned together and led our army up into the freezing Chicago night.
