Chapter 10 - The Horizon at Navy Pier
Saturday morning arrived without rain.
The autumn sky over Chicago was a brilliant, hard sapphire, the air crisp with the approaching winter.
Navy Pier was quiet at seven in the morning. The tourist boats were docked, their white hulls bobbing gently against the black pilings of Lake Michigan. At the very end of the pier, where the concrete jutted out into the open water, a private black yacht with twin engines sat humming at idle.
I stood at the railing, wearing a simple woolen coat, watching the gulls wheel against the morning light.
My wrist was wrapped in fresh, clean medical gauze—applied that morning by Luca’s private physician, who had spoken to me with the trembling deference reserved for royalty.
Footsteps echoed along the wooden planks.
Luca walked up beside me, leaning his forearms against the salt-crusted iron rail. He looked tired; dark shadows circled his eyes, and a neat white bandage peeked out from beneath the cuff of his dark cashmere coat.
He reached into his pocket and set a black leather folder on the rail between us.
"What is that?" I asked, not looking at it.
"The amended trust documents," Luca said. "Signed by the family attorney an hour ago. Fifty percent of Moretti Holdings. The shipping lines, the real estate portfolio, and the private accounts in Zurich."
I looked down at the folder. It held more money than I could spend in three lifetimes. Enough money to buy my sister a university, let alone pay her tuition.
"I don't want your empire, Luca," I said softly.
"It isn't mine to give, Emma," he replied, turning his head to look at me. "It was our father's. And by law, by blood, it belongs to you as much as it does to me."
"And Julian?"
"Julian took a one-way flight to Sicily this morning," Luca said coldly. "He has an allowance and a guard detail that will ensure he never sees an American skyline again."
A sea breeze whipped my hair across my face. Out on the horizon, a massive freighter was slowly cutting its way toward the open waters of Lake Michigan, heading north toward the Saint Lawrence Seaway.
"The yacht is fueled," Luca continued, gesturing toward the boat below. "There is a crew of four. It will take you to Toronto. From there, a private jet will fly you and Clara to Zurich. New names, clean passports, and enough capital to live anywhere on this earth without ever looking over your shoulder."
I looked at the boat. The water slapped against the hull, steady and inviting. A clean slate. An escape from the blood, the guns, and the terrible weight of the Moretti name.
"And what happens to you?" I asked.
"Antonio Bellini is meeting me at the Drake at noon," Luca said, his voice flat, completely devoid of fear. "He knows his daughter is going away for twenty years. He knows Julian is gone. He will either accept a twenty-percent cut of the northern docks to bury the feud... or he will try to kill me on the mezzanine."
He looked at me, his eyes holding that same unreadable intensity from the night he walked into my attic bedroom.
"You don't have to carry my trays anymore, Emma," he murmured. "You're free."
He turned and began to walk away, his leather shoes clicking rhythmically against the wooden planks of the pier, heading back toward the city of stone and iron that he ruled alone.
I looked at the black leather folder on the rail.
Then I looked at the yacht, its engines purring, ready to carry me into a life of safe, quiet luxury.
I reached out, my fingers closing around the cold leather of the folder.
Behind me, the wind carried the distant sound of church bells from Holy Name Cathedral—tolling eight o'clock, the hour the wedding should have begun.
May you like
I looked down at the thin red scar encircling my wrist. It was fading now, but the mark of the family was already burned deep beneath the skin.
I turned away from the boat, pulled my coat tightly around my shoulders, and began to walk after the brother I had served for two years.
