Chapter 6 - The Weight of the Crown
The air in the D’Angelo dining room hung heavy with the scent of roasted coffee and old pine, but no one reached for the silver pots. The four capos sat frozen in their leather chairs, their eyes darting from the silver-plated baby rattle on the mahogany table to Roman’s unblinking, slate-grey eyes. The silence stretched so long that the ticking of the grandfather clock in the hallway sounded like a sledgehammer striking stone.
Carmine Rossi was the first to shift his massive bulk, his leather chair groaning under the sudden movement. He reached out with a thick, scarred finger and tapped the edge of the manila audit folder.
"Nobody said anything about walking out, Roman," Carmine grumbled, his voice like gravel grinding in a cement mixer. "We've been riding with the D’Angelo name since your grandfather was running bootleg whiskey out of a converted dairy truck in Staten Island. If the old lady went rogue and started playing games with the family ledger behind your back, that’s her funeral—literally. But don't sit there and act like we had a hand in starving your kid. We didn't know she was even alive."
"I know you didn't," Roman said, his voice dropping an octave, carrying a quiet menace that cut deeper than any shout. "If I thought any of you had a hand in putting my daughter in that Queens basement, you wouldn't be sitting at this table right now. You'd be fertilizer in the Jersey wetlands."
Vincent Moretti swallowed hard, his tongue darting out to wet his dry lips. "So what's the play, Roman? The feds aren't going to wait forever for their quarterly envelope. If the Zurich accounts are frozen and the church funds are locked down by the diocese lawyers, how do we pay the port authority inspectors on Friday?"
"You pay them with clean capital," Roman said. He stood up, towering over the seated men. "We’re phasing out the underground currency loops. Starting this quarter, sixty percent of our revenue goes into the legitimate shipping and real estate holdings. We buy warehouses in Brooklyn, logistics hubs in Newark, and commercial strip malls in Queens. We become legitimate businessmen, gentlemen. The kind who wear expensive suits, hire corporate tax attorneys, and donate openly to mayoral campaigns instead of burying cash in church basements."
Sal DeLuca let out a sharp, incredulous snort. "Legitimate? Roman, we're the D’Angelos. The FBI has a dedicated floor in the federal building in Manhattan just for our wiretaps. You can't just turn a mafia syndicate into a Fortune 500 trucking company overnight."
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"Watch me," Roman said. He picked up the baby rattle and slipped it back into his pocket. "Meeting's adjourned. Get your books to my accountants by Thursday morning. If a single penny is missing from the manifest totals, I'll deal with you personally."
Without waiting for a response, Roman turned and walked out of the double doors, leaving the four veteran capos staring at one another in stunned, uneasy silence.
