Page 71 of Ivory Obsession
“Bastard’s playing chess while we’re playing checkers,” I muttered, the sound of my own voice like gravel tossed onto a silent street. My gaze lifted from the report, meeting the expectant eyes of the men gathered around me.
Marco slipped quietly into the room, his presence like a shadow that fell over all of us. He caught my eye, reading the situation as easily as one might read the headlines of a morning paper. “What’s the move, Dante?” he asked, his eyes sharp and vigilant.
“Were you just waiting outside?”
Marco tilted his head toward Luca. “He’d already said something about the report,” he said.
“Right.”
I paused, feeling the weight of every life in my hands, the gears in my mind working overtime as I sifted through options, discarding them as quickly as they came. This was more than a territorial piss; this was Caruso clawing at the foundation of our empire, a challenge to the Moretti throne.
Just as I was about to lay out the beginnings of a plan, the door burst open again. Salvatore staggered in, his breath coming in hurried gasps, eyes wide with an urgency that sent a cold stab through my chest.
“Lorenzo sent a message,” he panted, clutching the doorframe for support. “He’s threatening ‘Dante’s little whore.’”
“A message like…”
“A Milwall brick,” Sal said.
“The fuck is a Milwall brick?” Luca asked, turning to look at him.
“It’s a weapon, made from a newspaper rolled up tight,” Sal explained, his face pale under the office light. “Used to be popular among hooligans at football matches.”
“And the connection with Jade?” Marco asked, his brow furrowed in confusion.
Sal extended a shaky hand, opening his palm to reveal a crumpled piece of newspaper - the obituary section. It wasn’t wet, so it had to be wrapped around the Milwall brick. My heart stopped as I saw a single name circled in red: Jade Bentley.
“She’s not…dead,” I said, my heart dropping to my stomach.
“No, but they did call up to get this placed in the paper,” Sal replied, his voice heavy with concern. The room filled with a silence so complete it felt like a suffocating shroud, punctuated only by the rustle of newspaper as I touched the circled name. “Do you want me to read it or…”
“Do I want you to read it?” I echoed incredulously.
“No, I mean if you can’t...” Sal trailed off, his cheeks flushed with embarrassment.
I picked up the newspaper, my hands trembling as they held the fragile pages. The words blurred together, forming a sea of black ink that drowned my rational thoughts. Jade. My Jade. The thought of losing her was unbearable. Yet, here it was, her name circled in a death notice she didn’t deserve.
There it was. Her credentials, her age, her neighborhood, her families’ names.
“Holy shit,” I breathed, the words caught in my throat like a snare. This was a warning, a sick and twisted promise of what was to come.
The words I was reading seared through the room, crude and venomous, an insult meant to provoke. My vision tunneled, the edges tinged with a red haze. The implication of those words, the sheer audacity—it made my blood boil hot enough to scorch the earth beneath my feet. But despite the wildfire raging inside me, I clamped down on my rage, locking it away behind a mask of composure.
“Keep talking, Sal,” I said, my voice steady despite the storm inside, putting the newspaper down in front of me. “Every damn word.”
“Caruso’s men were seen near Jade’s lab,” Salvatore continued, his voice strained as if he could feel the tension strangling the air. “Lorenzo’s saying they can reach her whenever they please.”
“That son of a bitch,” I growled, my knuckles blanching as I gripped the edge of the mahogany desk—a gift from my father, its surface now bearing witness to the fury that threatened to splinter it. Violence was a beast writhing under my skin, eager for release, but I couldn’t let it dictate my moves. A rash decision now could crumble the empire we had built brick by bloody brick.
Marco stepped closer, a mirror of my own tightly coiled anger. “We can’t just sit on this, Dante. Caruso’s closing in, and he just made it personal,” he warned, his gaze locked onto mine, fierce and unyielding.
I nodded, the image of Jade—her dark hair, her determined eyes—flashing in my mind. Protecting her wasn’t just about safeguarding an asset; it was about shielding something far more precious.
“Personal is right,” I spat out. “But we’re not going to play this game on his terms. We’ll be silent. Deadly. He won’t see us coming until it’s too late.”
“So what’s the plan, boss?” Luca asked.
“We tighten our own net. Increase our surveillance on Caruso’s movements. Find every weak link in his operation and exploit it.”