Chapter 11 - Blood on the Pearl Necklace
The basement clinic at Blackwood Hall smelled of iodine, cold surgical steel, and the metallic stench of Maeve’s blood.
Dr. Aaron Keller wiped sweat from his brow with the back of a gloved wrist, his hands slick with crimson as the surgical monitors chimed an erratic, frantic beat.
“Vascular clamp, now!” Keller barked at the head surgical nurse. “The bullet nicked the subclavian branch. Blood pressure is dropping—eighty over fifty! Hang another two units of O-negative!”
Outside the observation glass, Elias Marchetti stood motionless.
He refused to sit. His broad shoulders were rigid, his boots planted shoulder-width apart on the linoleum floor. His white dress shirt was shredded, soaked in Maeve’s blood from collar to hem, drying into a dark, rust-colored crust against his skin. His hands, still coated in her blood, hung loosely at his sides.
Gabriel Ferraro approached from the corridor, holding a secure satellite phone and a heavy tactical rifle. He stopped two paces behind his Don, his eyes dropping to Elias’s perfectly stable legs before rising to his face.
“Carmine Moretti’s cell is dead,” Gabriel reported, his voice low and guttural. “The two shooters in the library were North Side contract hitters. Moretti thought you were an invalid pinned to a motorized chair. He paid them two million to finish the job while the Commission was still driving home, then planned to step into the power vacuum by sunrise.”
Elias didn’t blink. His gray eyes remained fixed on the small, pale figure lying on the operating table, her chest rising and falling beneath an oxygen mask.
“Where is Carmine now?” Elias asked. His voice wasn’t loud; it was flat, devoid of rage, carrying the terrifying, absolute stillness of an oncoming avalanche.
“Hiding at his private riverfront estate in Cicero,” Gabriel replied. “He’s fortified the perimeter with thirty men. He’s waiting for the morning papers to confirm your death.”
A soft, mechanical hiss came from the intercom as Dr. Keller stepped through the pressurized clinic doors, pulling down his surgical mask. The doctor looked exhausted, his scrub shirt spattered with red.
Elias turned slowly. “Speak.”
“The bullet is out,” Keller said, letting out a ragged breath. “It missed the heart by less than two inches. The subclavian artery is repaired, and we’ve stabilized her pressure. She’s strong, Elias. Far stronger than any girl her size has a right to be. But she’s in a medically induced coma. The next forty-eight hours will decide if infection sets in.”
Elias stepped past the doctor without another word, entering the sterile recovery suite.
Maeve lay motionless beneath a white thermal blanket, an IV line taped to the back of her hand, the steady, rhythmic beep of the heart monitor marking her fragile hold on life. On the stainless-steel tray beside the bed lay the three-strand Tahitian pearl necklace she had worn during dinner—the pale white pearls now stained with deep scarlet blotches.
Elias walked to the edge of the bed. He reached out with trembling, blood-caked fingers and gently swept a stray lock of auburn hair from her pale forehead.
“You foolish, brave little bird,” Elias whispered, his voice cracking against the silence of the room. “You threw yourself in front of a firing squad for a man who lied to you from the moment you walked through those doors.”
He picked up the blood-stained pearl necklace from the metal tray, wrapping the heavy stones around his knuckles until the edges bit into his skin.
He turned toward the doorway, where Gabriel and Salvatore stood waiting.
The black onyx ring on Elias’s pinky finger caught the harsh fluorescent light.
“Salvatore,” Elias commanded.
May you like
“I’m here, boy,” his uncle answered, his face hard.
“Call the five families. Tell them to turn on their phones.” Elias stepped out of the clinic, his gait smooth, predatory, and lethal. “Tell them Chicago’s Don is walking. And tell them to watch what happens to Cicero before the sun comes up.”
