“Dad,” I whispered, stepping forward.

Before I could reach him, the heavy metal doors behind us slammed shut with a deafening bang.

The bright floodlights mounted on the steel rafters flickered on, blinding us with a harsh white glare.

From the shadows of the catwalks above, the sound of footsteps echoed on the metal grating.

Several men appeared, their rifles aimed directly down at us.

At the far end of the warehouse, a man in a tailored grey suit stepped forward into the light.

The man in the grey suit was Enzo Vanni.

He was one of Don Alessandro’s oldest captains, a man who had sat at the family dinner table for decades.

Now, he looked down at us with a cold, thin smile.

“Matteo,” Enzo said, his voice echoing off the corrugated tin walls. “You should not have come here.”

Matteo did not move a muscle, but I felt the tension radiating off him like heat from a radiator.

“You turned, Enzo,” Matteo said quietly.

“The old man is dying,” Enzo replied, gesturing to the men on the catwalks. “The Vitale empire belongs to those who are strong enough to take it.”