Chapter 8 - The Vows Spoken in an Empty Chapel
The wedding luncheon was held in the glass conservatory of the main estate. Only four people were present: Santino, Caitlyn, Helen, and Walter, who personally served a delicate meal of poached salmon and steamed asparagus.
Helen reached across the linen table and gripped Santino’s wrist. Her grip was weak, but her eyes blazed with the fierce intensity of a protective mother.
"I know what you are, Mr. Ferraro," Helen whispered, her voice trembling. "I lived in that world with Domenico for thirty years. I know how it eats people alive."
Santino did not pull his hand away. He looked at the frail, sick woman with complete gravity. "Your husband made choices that brought the fire to your door, Mrs. Marchetti. I make choices that extinguish the fire. Your daughter will never run again. You have my word on the grave of my mother."
Helen searched his eyes for a long moment, then slowly released his wrist and nodded. "That is all a mother can ask."
At two o'clock, the medical team escorted Helen back to the private suite for her afternoon treatment.
Santino and Caitlyn remained in the conservatory. Outside, the rain had returned, tapping rhythmically against the thousands of glass panes overhead.
"We leave for the Port of Providence at four," Santino said, checking his gold pocket watch.
Caitlyn looked up from her tea. "Why?"
"Salvatore Moretti has called an emergency assembly of the Waterfront Commission at Pier 9," Santino explained, pouring another splash of mineral water. "He intends to petition the state board to revoke the Ferraro operating leases on the southern berths, claiming our family is unstable and incapable of managing maritime security."
"He thinks you're distracted," Caitlyn said, her sharp mind immediately grasping the tactical landscape.
"He thinks I am vulnerable," Santino replied. "He believes that because I married an unknown woman, my council is divided and my grip is slipping. Today, we disabuse him of that notion."
Santino stood up and walked around the table, extending his hand to her.
"Put on your dark coat, Caitlyn. Today, you show the city who owns the docks."
At 4:45 p.m., a motorcade of four armored black Suburbans rolled past the security gates of Pier 9 in Providence.
The industrial pier was a landscape of towering cranes, rusted steel shipping containers, and the pungent smell of salt, diesel exhaust, and raw fish. Inside the massive port authority warehouse, over fifty men were gathered—dock commissioners, union bosses, armed enforcers, and at the center of the room, Salvatore Moretti himself.
Moretti was sixty years old, gaunt, with slicked-back dyed black hair, cold reptilian eyes, and a camel-hair coat draped over his shoulders.
When the heavy steel doors of the warehouse slid open, the entire room fell dead silent.
Santino walked in first, his broad shoulders cutting through the damp chill of the warehouse. But he did not walk alone.
Beside him, her arm linked securely through his, walked Caitlyn. She wore a tailored black coat, the black diamond band gleaming on her left hand, her head held high with the regal composure of a woman who feared nothing on earth.
Behind them marched twenty armed Ferraro soldiers, their hands resting inside their leather jackets.
Moretti stepped forward, a patronizing smirk spreading across his thin lips.
"Santino," Moretti drawled, spreading his hands wide. "We were beginning to think you were too busy playing house in Newport to attend a business meeting. And who is this lovely young lady? A new secretary?"
The Moretti enforcers chuckled nervously.
Santino stopped ten feet from Moretti. He did not smile.
"Salvatore," Santino said, his voice ringing through the cavernous warehouse with absolute authority. "You remember Domenico Marchetti, don't you?"
Moretti’s smirk vanished instantly. His reptilian eyes darted toward Caitlyn, his pupils contracting with sudden, violent recognition.
"This is Caterina Marchetti Ferraro," Santino announced, his voice dropping into that lethal, icy register. "My legal wife. And the sole heir to every corporate asset, ledger, and banking trust your organization established between 2005 and 2018."
Caitlyn stepped forward, pulling a heavy manila folder from beneath her coat and tossing it onto the metal folding table between them.
The folder slapped against the steel with the force of a gunshot.
"Inside that folder is the complete audit of the offshore holding accounts at Credit Suisse, Banque Nationale de Paris, and the Royal Bank of Scotland," Caitlyn said, her voice clear, steady, and utterly merciless. "Every single dollar was transferred into the Ferraro Maritime Trust at nine o'clock this morning. Your operating capital has been liquidated, Mr. Moretti. You don't have enough money left in your accounts to pay the fuel tax on your boats tomorrow morning."
Moretti lunged forward, his face turning an apoplectic purple. "You little bitch—!"
Before Moretti could take two steps, the metallic sound of thirty semi-automatic slides being racked back simultaneously echoed through the warehouse like a thunderclap.
Every Ferraro soldier had their weapon drawn and leveled directly at Moretti’s chest.
May you like
Santino stepped between Moretti and Caitlyn, his eyes burning with a murderous fury that made even the hardened dockworkers shrink back.
"Take one more step toward my wife, Salvatore," Santino whispered, "and they will be scraping your remains off these shipping containers until Christmas."
