Chapter 6 - THE RIVAL’S MOVE
Dante did not return to New Jersey.
Driven by humiliation and burning resentment, he drove his sedan straight to a secluded private estate in Westbury—the residence of Carmine Lucchesi, the leader of the rival Lucchesi crime family.
For three years, the Moretti and Lucchesi families had maintained a tense, uneasy truce over the distribution rights at the Brooklyn docks. But Carmine Lucchesi was old, greedy, and eager for an opportunity to weaken Vincent’s hold over the territory.
Inside Lucchesi’s dimly lit study, Dante poured himself a large glass of brandy, his neck still displaying red bruises from Vincent’s grip.
“Vincent has lost his mind, Carmine,” Dante said bitterly, pacing across the room. “He’s distracted. He’s spending his days playing family with a maid and her kid. He demoted me over pocket change from the payroll!”
Carmine Lucchesi sat in a leather armchair, puffing on a cigar, his old eyes calculating.
“Vincent Moretti is not a man who loses his mind easily,” Lucchesi observed calmly. “He is a predator. If he is distracted, it is a tactic.”
“It’s not a tactic!” Dante spat. “I saw him in the kitchen! He’s soft! He hasn't touched a gun in five years. He lets his grief rule him.”
Lucchesi leaned forward, resting his liver-spotted hands on his knees. “What are you proposing, Dante?”
“A hit,” Dante whispered, his eyes gleaming with desperate ambition. “We strike the Long Island estate this Sunday during the storm. My loyalists inside the guard force will leave the North Gate unlocked. You take out Vincent, I assume leadership of the Moretti family, and I sign over forty percent of the Brooklyn shipping lanes to you.”
Lucchesi stared at Dante for a long moment, assessing the younger brother's desperation.
“And the maid?” Lucchesi asked casually. “The child?”
“Do whatever you want with them,” Dante sneered. “They mean nothing.”
Lucchesi took a slow drag from his cigar, blowing a plume of grey smoke into the air. He smiled—a cold, ruthless expression.
“An arrangement can be made,” Lucchesi agreed softly. “Sunday night. When the snow covers the roads.”
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What Dante did not know was that standing outside the study door, holding a tray of drinks, was a young waiter whose mother had worked for the Moretti family twenty years ago.
By midnight, a coded text message was sent directly to Aldo Rinaldi’s secure phone.
