"Name him."
"I can't."
"Then you have nothing."
"I have something better than a name."
She looked at Matteo.
"I have the recording."
For the first time that evening, Matteo's composure broke.
"What recording?"
Elena reached beneath the folded white cloth on her tray.
A tiny black device appeared between her fingers.
It was an old digital recorder.
The casing was scratched. One corner had been repaired with adhesive tape. It looked insignificant compared with the expensive watches and polished silverware surrounding it.
But Alessandro Moretti recognized it immediately.
His face went pale.
"Where did you get that?"
Elena's voice became quieter.
"My father gave it to me."
Alessandro looked at the device.
Then at her.
"What was your father's name?"
"Daniel Rossi."
The old man's fingers released the knife.
For several seconds, he did not move.
Matteo looked between them.
"Father?"
Alessandro ignored him.
"Daniel Rossi is dead."
"Yes."
"He's been dead for twenty years."
"I know."
"How old are you?"
"Twenty-six."
Alessandro looked at her again.
This time, he was no longer looking at a waitress.
He was looking at a memory he had spent two decades trying to bury.
"Your mother?"
Elena's lips trembled.
"Her name was Sofia."
The old man's face changed completely.
A glass slipped from Vincent's hand and shattered against the floor.
Alessandro did not even turn toward the sound.
"Sofia Rossi," he whispered.
Elena nodded.
"She told me everything before she died."
Matteo stood.
"Father, who is Sofia Rossi?"
Alessandro's gaze remained fixed on Elena.
"Someone who should never have been involved with this family."
Elena's eyes filled with anger.
"She wasn't involved with your family. Your family destroyed hers."
Alessandro slowly rose from his chair.
The movement was deliberate, but his knees seemed weaker than before.
"Careful, young woman."
"No, Mr. Moretti. I've been careful for twenty years."
She placed the recorder on the table.
"And I'm tired of being afraid."
Vincent reached toward it.
Alessandro stopped him.
"Don't touch that."
The entire room had become silent.
Matteo moved closer to his father.
"Tell me what is happening."
Alessandro looked at his son.
For the first time in Matteo's life, he saw something in his father's eyes that had never been there before.
Fear.
Not fear of death.
Fear of being remembered.
"Sit down, Matteo."
"No."
"Sit down."
Matteo remained standing.
"Who was Daniel Rossi?"
Alessandro closed his eyes briefly.
"He was the best man I ever had."
Elena let out a bitter laugh.
"Then why did you leave him to die?"
The old man looked at her.
And somewhere beneath the expensive suit, the powerful name, and the decades of carefully constructed lies, Alessandro Moretti finally began to remember.
Twenty years earlier.
Before Matteo became the heir.
Before the Moretti organization expanded into three countries.
Before the family name became synonymous with untouchable wealth.
There had been a man named Daniel Rossi.
Daniel had not been born into crime.
He had been a mechanic in Brooklyn, the son of Italian immigrants who believed that honest work could protect a family from almost anything.
He was intelligent, loyal, and unusually good at understanding people.
Alessandro had met him in 1998.
At the time, the Moretti organization was fighting a war against the Bellandi family. Businesses were burning, men were disappearing, and every alliance seemed to last only until somebody offered a better price.
Daniel had saved Alessandro's life during an ambush outside a warehouse.
He had been driving the car.
When the first bullets shattered the windshield, Daniel had pushed Alessandro beneath the dashboard and driven through a metal gate.
He received two bullets in his shoulder.
Alessandro promised that he would never forget it.
And for several years, he kept that promise.
Daniel became his trusted adviser, his personal driver, and eventually the man responsible for protecting the family's financial records.
He was not a soldier.
He was something more valuable.
He knew where the money went.
He knew who received it.
And he knew which respectable businessmen were paying the Moretti family to make certain problems disappear.
Then came the night of October 17.
Alessandro's younger brother, Lorenzo, was found dead inside a vehicle near the Brooklyn waterfront.
The police described it as a professional execution.
Three bullets.
No witnesses.
No fingerprints.
Alessandro declared war.
He blamed the Bellandi family and ordered retaliations that left seven men dead over the following month.
But Daniel had discovered something.
Lorenzo had not been killed by the Bellandis.
He had been murdered by someone who knew the family's movements.
Someone who had access to the private security schedules.
Someone who knew exactly which roads Lorenzo would take that evening.
Daniel discovered that the information had been sold by Vincent Bellini.
Vincent was not merely an associate.
He was Alessandro's closest adviser.
He had grown up with the Moretti brothers, attended their father's funeral, and stood beside Alessandro when the organization was barely more than a collection of neighborhood businesses.
He was considered family.
Daniel had gathered the evidence.
Bank transfers.
Telephone recordings.
Photographs.
A signed agreement between Vincent and the Bellandi organization.
But before he could deliver everything to Alessandro, he disappeared.
His apartment was found empty.
His car was abandoned.
And his wife, Sofia, was discovered unconscious in their kitchen.
The official story was that Daniel had betrayed the family and fled with money.
Alessandro believed it.