Chapter 6 - Target on Her Back
"This... this is a trick!" Paulie screamed, backing away on the stage, signaling to his four personal bodyguards. "He's a crippled ghost! He can't run this family from a chair! He's weak!"
The gathered capos began muttering among themselves, looking uncertainly between the paralyzed boss in the wheelchair and the ambitious underboss on stage.
Massimo raised his hand. The muttering instantly died.
"I spent six months in the dark, Paulie," Massimo said calmly. "Six months listening to reports of my shipping lines being sold off, my men being paid under the table, and my death being planned by the man my father called a brother."
"You have no proof!" Paulie roared.
"We have the offshore accounts, Paulie," I interrupted, stepping forward, pulling a thick stack of printed financial logs from my coat. "We have the wire transfers you sent to the hitmen who shot up the estate three nights ago. Traced directly from your private account in the Caymans."
Paulie's eyes locked onto me with pure, unadulterated venom. "Who the hell is this bitch?"
"She is my physical therapist," Massimo said, his voice dropping into a register that sent chills through every man in the room. "And she is the woman who saved my life."
"Kill them!" Paulie shrieked, pulling a nickel-plated revolver from his coat. "Kill them all! I'm taking the city!"
Paulie's four guards raised their weapons.
Before anyone could pull a trigger, Massimo did the impossible.
He placed his hands on the armrests of his wheelchair. He took a deep, steady breath.
And then, right in front of forty high-ranking mafia bosses, Massimo Pascale stood up.
He didn't stumble. He didn't shake. Supported by six months of intense neuro-rehabilitation and sheer, unyielding willpower, he stood tall, broad, and terrifying, towering over the room.
The entire warehouse gasped.
Massimo pulled his own weapon from his holster, leveled it at Paulie's four bodyguards, and fired four quick, lethal shots before they could aim.
BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG!
The four bodyguards dropped like lead weights.
Paulie shrieked, dropping his revolver, falling onto his knees, trembling uncontrollably as Massimo slowly walked up the steps of the stage—one solid, deliberate step at a time—until he stood right over his traitorous underboss.
Massimo aimed his gun straight at Paulie's forehead.
"Massimo! Please!" Paulie wept, clutching his hands together. "I was foolish! The Valentis promised me millions! Mercy, Massimo! For your father's sake!"
Massimo looked down at the weeping traitor.
"My father taught me how to build an empire," Massimo said quietly. "Tessa taught me how to live in it. And neither of them had any room for snakes."
BANG.
Massimo lowered his gun.
He turned around, standing at the edge of the stage, his gaze sweeping over the remaining thirty-five capos in the room. Every single man immediately dropped to one knee, bowing their heads in absolute submission to their undisputed king.
Massimo looked across the crowd, his eyes finding mine.
May you like
He walked down the stairs—without a cane, without help—straight to me. He took my hand in his, raising it in front of his entire family.
"From this day on," Massimo announced to his empire, "Tessa Fitzgerald speaks with my voice. Touch her, and you burn."
