<h4>Chapter 499: Chapter 499 : Calm Before the Storm</h4>


    *Giovani*


    I stood in my office, leaning over a map of Florence on a spare table we’d dragged in there a few days ago. My desk had been pushed against the wall to amodate, but I hadn’t wanted to sit since then anyway. The map, push-pinned to hell and back, took precedence.


    Tallon, Alessandro, and Gabriele had all been rotating in and out of my office for days. I didn’t take meetings outside thepound anymore. I couldn’t, not until I knew Lorenz was six feet under.


    I sighed and smoothed out a wrinkled corner of the map. Lorenz hadn’t made a peep since we took Sal back. The man clearly had more information than he could’ve wanted out, so Lorenz’s silence unnerved me. What was he nning?


    Could we have been wrong to trust Sal?


    Again?


    The door swung open to reveal Tallon with a bag of chips in his hands. I straightened.


    “Had to pull the heist of the century to get these without Maria appearing to make me something ‘more substantial,’” he said.


    I forced a chuckle. I’d kept Tallon by my side thesest few days, devoting the lion’s share of his time to parsing Sal’s information and nning, and he’d finally started to loosen up from that stiffness he acquired after I sed Gabriele on Alessandro’s crew a few too many times. He kept that razor wit I’d noticed over thest month as well.


    He still wore those Easter-looking suits, though. Right now, he only had on a gray button-down and the salmon pants of today’s pick, his jacket abandoned over a chair.


    “When will the others be here?” I asked.


    We were nearly certain we’d gotten everything we could out of Sal and were running out of further extraptions to make. It was time to pick a n and set it in motion.


    I nced at the video receiver of the baby monitor. Olivia and Elio sat on the floor of the nursery, coloring in a massive coloring book together in the evening light. I hadn’t left my office before midnight since Sal woke up, and this was mypromise to keep from losing my mind. The more days passed without a contact from Lorenz, the more nervous I got.


    Tallon checked his watch. “Couple minutes. Got any early thoughts?”


    I almostughed. I’d fallen asleep dreaming of this map, nning entrances and escapes. “A few, but I’d rather not repeat myself.”


    He nodded andpsed into silence.


    A couple of minutes, just a couple minutes, and then I’d know when my family could be safe again, when we could let Elio sleep through the night without checking on him every couple of hours... when I could move my gun from the locking holster I’d attached under our bedframe back to its case, and when I could breathe without the weight of the world on my shoulders.


    As Tallon casually perused the map and munched, it struck me suddenly that a regr operation like this never felt like the weight of the world before. I’d turned myself over to the same goddamn Russians with less angst.


    Olivia’s eyes came back to my mind, nearly dead with exhaustion, as she asked me if I’d ever consider retiring.


    Someone knocked on the door once, then opened it without an invitation. Gabriele and Alessandro stepped together into the room.


    “Evening.” Gabriele inclined his head.


    Alessandro rubbed his hands together. “Let’s n a raid.”


    My lips twitched, but I nodded. “Yes. Come see what we’ve figured out.”


    Gabriele and Alessandro walked closer. On all four sides, we leaned over its pocked surface.


    There were at least thirty pins in the map, covering every quadrant of the city. Sal had given up every location where he knew business went down, and I grimaced every time I looked at just how much of a hold the Russians had established in my city under my nose. But most of them were in metal push pins. Only eight, scattered across the city, bore colored tops.


    Gabriele pointed at one and quirked an eyebrow at me.


    “Hearts of the operation,” I said. “The Russians grew fast, but to do so, they had to be sloppy. Most of these are only half-owned by them.”


    “Or less,” Tallon offered. “Intel suggests a lot of the ones near our territory, ” he said as he pointed to a few push pins unsettlingly close to thepound, “are more aesthetic presences than anything official.”


    I nodded at him.


    Gabriele pointed to a red push pin, then a yellow one. “Do these colors have meanings? Should we n around that?”


    I waved my hand at Tallon. I knew, but it had been his idea. He smiled.


    “Green is drugs. The only ones that made it to this level are big-time cookers, so anybody who goes there is going to have to be prepared for explosives,” he said. “Red is warehouses, and yellow is major safehouses.”


    Gabriele hummed. “We could hit the hearts, then run cleanup when they scatter?”


    “One more thing.” I pointed to a ck-painted pin in the heart of the city, barely a block from the Questura, the Florentine police headquarters. “That’s Lorenz’s primary safe house.”


    Tallon and I were surprised when Sal had that particr piece of information. It turned out that his being a rat who was totally willing to sell out to the highest bidder with no provocation made him desperate to learn a lot of valuable things about the Russians.


    Alessandro smiled viciously. “Maybe we hit there tonight, scare ‘em for whateveres next.”


    Gabriele red at him. “And give them a chance to flee? We need to finish them this time.”


    “Sorry.” Alessandro put his hands up. “I just don’t want him running around any longer than necessary.”


    I breathed out slowly through my nose, trying to stay the Don rather than the furious, vengeful father. I nearly left as soon as Sal gave that up, but I knew it would be stupid. If we didn’t do this right, we might as well not do it at all.


    “Nobody does,” I said through gritted teeth. “But early strikes are exactly the sort of fuck-up I won’t be having this time around. Last time, he slipped through our fingers.” I met Alessandro’s eyes, then Tallon’s. “Not again.”


    They nodded in unison.


    “I think Gabriele has the right idea,” I said more calmly. “We’re not going to get enough impact from a single hit, so we’re going to have to spread thin and be ready to scatter. The cement of his safehouse is obviously a taunt, but we can’t know whether he actually has enough polizia to pose a significant threat in that sector.”


    “So we need eight team leaders,” Alessandro said. “At least.”


    “I’ve considered that.” I’d considered everything. “For a while, I thought it would be smartest to assign each of us a team and give four to other men I trust, but I’ve changed my mind.”


    I paused. All three men paused with me, waiting for my pronouncement. I’d gotten into the habit of little tricks like this when I first became Don, just testing how much other people were really willing to listen to me, but I’d given them up over the years. I didn’t need them when I knew this would happen every time.


    This time, I did it as a different sort of test. I wanted to see if it gave me the same rush it used to, knowing I was the only thing holding three extremely dangerous criminals in check, and they would wait as long as it pleased me.


    Instead of the sharp rush of power, I just kind of felt like an asshole. These men were my family and old friends. I didn’t need to hold my silence over their head to feel important.


    “Gabriele and I will go together, and lead the team on Lorenz’s safe house.”


    Tallon nched and Alessandro made a small, disgruntled noise, but I put up a hand.


    “Part of making sure there are no fuck-ups is putting the best people in the best positions to do the best work.” I looked at both brothers. “He knows your weak spots already, at least well enough to escape you once. I know you’re both very different people now, but I can’t take that risk.”


    Tallon dropped his head. “That makes sense.”


    Alessandro scowled at the map but didn’t say anything.


    I looked at Gabriele, who shrugged. I shook my head. I could deal with Alessandro’s sulkter.


    “Gabriele, can you draw up a list of the five best, immediately avable people?” I asked.


    “It’s basically already done. I guessed something like this wasing.”


    I nodded. “Alright. Now let’s get into the weeds. How do we get in–” I began, pointing to a random colored pin, “there?”


    Hours passed in a blur. Ins and outs, police patrols and street names raced through my mind like tape in a tape yer. I argued back and forth with my men, hammering out every detail of the perfect assault on the Russians.


    When I looked up, it waste again. Olivia rocked a pajamaed Elio in her arms, clearly preparing him for bed. And the n was done.


    I stared at the map, now scribbled all over with little ck and red arrows.


    “We’ll be spread thin,” Tallon said.


    “Not thin enough to screw us,” Gabriele replied. “And that’s all that matters for an attack this massive.”


    I nodded. “Can we have everyone ready by tomorrow night? We’ve already waited long enough to set all this up.”


    “They took your son.” Gabriele’s gaze grew hard. “You say jump, and half our men’ll take flight.”


    Alessandro crossed his arms. “I’m ready now, and I doubt I’m the only one.”


    Tallon nodded. “I’ll make sure they’re ready.”


    I looked from them, to the map, to my wife on the tiny receiver.


    “Tomorrow night,” I said. “Go tell everyone.”


    The three of them trooped out, and quiet reigned over my office. I sighed heavily. Our n was good, good enough that I shouldn’t be worried. But somehow my mind kept straying back to Sal on the floor of that warehouse, bleeding and staring at us as we fled. Nothing should’ve gone wrong then, either.


    I ran a hand through my swiftly graying hair and realized with a shock that it was trembling slightly. I was scared, scared of going out tomorrow night, triumphant already with this stupid n, and getting hurt.


    I slumped against the table. Did I ever think of retiring? Yes, all the goddamn time these days. How could I not, when I knew every step out my front fucking door could leave Olivia widowed and Elio fatherless?


    The portraits of all the Dons before me stared down at me. Most of them had wives, and several had families. They endured the life despite the danger. I always thought I’d be able to when my time came.


    I took a deep breath. I needed to go see Olivia.