I smile faintly. “Good.”
“Bellandi arrived expecting a different outcome. At the very least, an expectation that there would be a… softening. Let’s just say, he didn’t appreciate the optics.”
“Bellandi never appreciates optics he doesn’t control.”
“He feels disrespected,” my man continues carefully. “Not just by you. By… her.”
My smile fades. “He should, since he gave her none to begin with,” I reply evenly. “Continue.”
“He’s telling his people that you’ve gone soft. That you’ve let sentiment erode judgement. That letting your wife speak the way she did, sit where she did, wasn’t modernisation. It was weakness.”
I laugh once, humourless. “Anything else?”
“Yes. He’s floating the idea that New York needs balance. That maybe the Dragoni footprint has grown too dominant.”
My grip tightens on the phone.
Men liked to throw the term pussy-whipped around when they couldn’t locate a better insult. And in all fairness, having experienced my wife’s oral talents for the first time, I wasn’t altogether averse to admitting that there was a sliver of truth to Bellandi’s inference.
Enough to make any accusations of being soft stick, though?
Absolutely not.
And a simple precision strike to the heart of his little conclave was all it would take, if he continues to make waves.
“Interesting. And did he say that to anyone who matters?”
“Not yet. But he’s feeling out the room.”
“Let him,” I say. “If he wants to test the floorboards, I’ll enjoy watching them collapse, taking him with it.”
A beat. “Do you want us to?—”
“No,” I cut in. “Not yet. We observe. We catalogue. We wait.”
“Understood.”
I end the call and immediately make another.
This one I don’t need to hear in real time.
The confirmation comes quickly, efficiently. Bellandi’s stance hasn’t shifted. If anything, it’s hardened. The dinner party didn’t intimidate him. It clarified things.
Good.
I prefer enemies who stop pretending.
The next call matters more. I scroll once, then twice, and hit dial.
“Senator Hale,” I say when the line connects. “Tell me you’re awake.”
A nervous chuckle. “For you, Giovanni. Always.”
“I don’t like surprises,” I tell him pleasantly. “Has Salvatore Bellandi spoken to you recently?”
A pause too long to be accidental. “No,” he says. “Not directly.”
“Indirectly?”
