CHAPTER 1

CHICAGO, USA 

         ‘The Council decided that you are now an “Untouchable”, and you can’t be killed. But you still must pass through the “Fustuarium”. This is going to be MY moment, and I will make it unforgettable, Manfredi. I will enjoy seeing you getting bludgeoned by my wild boys. I will make you suffer like a dog for your arrogance, for disrespecting OUR family.’

         Manfredi Chiaramonte regained consciousness with those words still echoing in his mind. The moment he did that, he sensed he was underground. Accardi’s men moved him while he was still unconscious.

         The air was damp, thick with filth, overpowering with the stench of dirt and mildew. Despite it being summer, coldness had settled between the solid concrete walls, the windowless chamber offering no ventilation.

         A basement.

         He took a deep breath. The dense air invaded his lungs and coated the inside of his tattered chest, making every breath strained, like he was slowly suffocating.

         Buried alive…

         That was how it felt.

         Manfredi tried to move, but discovered that he was tied up to a steel pipe. He blinked, but saw nothing.

         How long had he been there?

         An hour?

         A day? 

         He wasn’t sure.

         Was he still in Chicago?

“Come down here, you sons of bitches! Let’s end this!” he screamed, but his words got lost in the darkness surrounding him.

         It was the kind of darkness that felt like a void, like one wrong move, and he might get lost in it, never to be found again.

“Accardi, show your face!” Manfredi yelled again, trying to free himself.

         The sharp pangs of pain starting from his shoulder blades and going all the way down to the back of his legs took his breath away. Manfredi gritted his teeth and pulled himself together. They could bludgeon him for days, they could break his body, but they weren’t going to break him.

         He won’t let them.

         This ordeal will end soon, and he will be a free man.

         No more Boss Chiaramonte, the soulless head of the ‘La Famiglia’. 

         Just Manfredi… the loving husband… the loving father.  

         He closed his eyes and remembered Gia’s voice on the phone.

“‘Amore (Ita. My love), don’t go to that meeting alone. You’re not the Boss anymore. Settimo Accardi is. And he hates you.’”

“‘Gia, I’ll be okay. I will sign the NDA, face the Fustuarium, and come back to you and the kids. Trust me, I can take it. For you, for Damiano, for the girls.’”

“‘Fredi, something bad is going to happen. I can feel it. Maybe Accardi will try to kill you…’”

“‘He won’t. Not even he can go against the Council’s decisions without endangering his position. But he will use the Fustuarium to break my spirit.’”

“‘Don’t go, amore… What they will do to you is so barbaric…’”

“‘I must. There’s no other way, and you know that.’”

         And he did go to that meeting.

         Alone.

         Manfredi was now a ‘sinner’, so no more friends or allies were willing to support him. 

         Until a few months ago, Manfredi was the Boss of the “La Famiglia”… an organization of ‘honorable men’, created by his grandfather, Salvatore Chiaramonte, during the Prohibition years. He came from a small town in Sicily to New York with one goal: to become powerful and feared by everybody.

         And he succeeded.

         Years later, Manfredi’s father replaced Salvatore as the Boss. Dante Chiaramonte ruled the organization with an iron fist for a couple of decades, until pancreatic cancer killed him.

         Then, Manfredi became the new Boss. He was inexperienced, but he rose to the occasion. Thanks to his important connections and relationships with influential people, Manfredi made the organization bigger, richer, and more powerful than ever, gaining the respect of everybody, but also being hated by many.

         Still, he despised the role imposed on him since birth. He never showed that, though. Being born into such an important family was a heavy cross to bear, so Manfredi promised he would not do this to his children. No matter what, the next generations of Chiaramonte will be born out of this curse.

         Meeting Gia, falling deeply in love with her, and getting married contributed drastically to his desire to change. And the birth of Damiano, his firstborn and heir, followed four years later, by that of Bianca and Fiamma, his twin girls, gave Manfredi the ultimate push to leave behind his old ways and start planning a different future for himself and his family. 

         One without the Mafia in it.

         Manfredi wanted to create a safer environment for his son, especially. At seventeen, Damiano was already a true leader. He was intelligent, determined, responsible, and wise beyond his years. And he had so many dreams. Manfredi had to make sure Damiano would see them come true in a new world, untouched by blood, blackmail, and murder.

         But Manfredi couldn't do so without meeting Settimo Accardi, the new Boss of “La Famiglia”.

         His biggest enemy.

         In his presence, Manfredi had to sign a non-disclosure agreement… in blood, renouncing any claim in the organization. After the signing, there will be one more step to take: the ‘Fustuarium’, a corporal punishment inflicted on a member of the organization guilty of cowardly pursuing his self-interest.   

         This is why he was here, in this stinky basement, tied up to a steel pipe. Accardi’s goons had already ended the first round. They tortured him mercilessly and beat him until he could no longer stand. Then, Accardi joined them and started taunting him all along, waiting for him to crack.

         ‘Beg for mercy, Manfredi, and I’ll ask my boys to skip the second round…’

         But Manfredi didn’t beg.

         He barely made a noise.

         He endured the ‘Fustuarium’ in silence, passing out before waking up to suffer even more.

         Besides, pain was nothing for a man who had almost been burned alive at ten years old. Nothing they could do to him would ever surpass the feeling of his body on fire, the sensation of his shirt melting right into his skin, fabric dripping like candle wax, charring him.

         This was a piece of fucking cake.  

         Unexpectedly, the basement door thrust open, and the bright light filtered through. He winced from the harshness, too drained to move, unable to shield his eyes. Someone was descending the stairs. He blinked as they approached, trying to make out his surroundings, his gaze meeting his captor's.

“Finaly! Let’s start the second round so I can leave this place and never see your fucking face again!” Manfredi said in a low but determined tone.

         The man stopped in front of Manfredi, his shadowy figure blocking out the blinding glare. Behind Accardi, Manfredi saw Luca Palladino, once his most trusted ‘consigliere’ and friend. One look at Luca, and Manfredi knew he was definitely alone.

“You too, Luca?” Manfredi asked, hissing. “Why am I not surprised? You’ve always been as scheming as Accardi.”

         Luca lowered his gaze and stood there in silence.

“Well, Settimo, unleash your minions and let’s end this!”

“End it…” Settimo said, grinning. “Okay. But allow me to give you my farewell present,” he added, then turned and whispered something to his two bodyguards.

         They left the room for a few seconds and came back, dragging by the feet the body of a young man. They left him on the ground, face up. The man didn’t move. His face was swollen beyond recognition, his body was one gigantic open wound, and he was barely breathing.

         Manfredi looked closely at him.

“Who is this poor devil?” he asked. “Your goons have beaten him so badly I can even see his face.”

         Settimo smiled with satisfaction and walked toward the beaten guy lying on the floor. With the tip of his shoe, he pointed at a tattoo on the man’s lower arm.

“Look here…”

         It was the image of an angel praying…

         The man was Angelo, who went missing a few weeks ago.

“‘Fratellino!’ (Ita. little brother)” he yelled.

         His brother moaned slowly.

“I knew you’d love this little reunion,” Accardi said and started laughing. “Well, I cannot kill you, but at this point, any Chiaramonte coward will do…”

         Fury swirled through Manfredi, strengthening him.

“‘Figlio di puttana’… (Son of a bitch!) You attacked an innocent man. He’s not even part of the organization…” he said, trying to control his strained breathing.

“Oh, but he is,” Settimo replied, grinning. “Angelo came to me when he discovered that you had betrayed OUR family. He was so disappointed in his big brother. So much so that he asked for my permission to become an active member.”

“No! Angelo, what have you done?!” Manfredi murmured, then looked at his enemy. “Let my brother go, and I’ll take his place, Settimo. Kill me!”

         Settimo laughed, terribly amused by his despair.

“There’s nothing I’d love more, Manfredi, but disrespecting the Council might cost me my position. And I’ve worked too damn hard to reach this point… So, the second part of your Fustuarium is going to be a bit different.”

         Accardi’s phone rang. He looked at the caller ID, smirked with satisfaction, and left the room. Manfredi saw this as a possibility to save his brother.

“Luca… Save Angelo…”

         Luca approached the steel pipe.

“I can’t, Manfredi. If I go against Accardi, he’d have my family killed… Sabrina and the girls are my world, you know that…”

“And Angelo is part of mine… Free him, and I will take his place.”

“It’s impossible. And you have to accept this… Initially, Accardi wanted to kidnap Damiano… I was able to get through him and stop that.”

“No, not my son…” Manfredi mumbled. “He’s just seventeen…”

“This is what saved your little bastard…” Accardi yelled while entering the room again. “So, this is why Angelo’s here, a guest at his big brother's farewell party.”

         He looked at Luca. 

“We’re done here. Shoot that one, then untie this piece of shit and let him crawl back to light.”

         Manfredi groaned like a wounded beast.

“Fratellino… I’m here! I’ll save you!”

         Luca pulled out his gun and pointed it at Angelo, who seemed already dead.

“Luca… Don’t…”

         His old friend had a moment of hesitation. Settimo came near Luca.

“It’s his brother or your family,” he said coldly. “Choose wisely!”

         Those words had the same effect on Luca as a punch in the gut. He turned, his blank stare fixed on Manfredi’s face.

“I’m sorry, Manfredi,” he murmured, then shot Angelo.

         A deep groan and then silence. Manfredi watched the scene in complete shock. In front of him was now the lifeless body of his little brother, killed by the man whom he once called a friend. Quite satisfied, Settimo gave Luca a pat on the back.

“Perfect! The Fustuarium is now over!” he exclaimed and turned to look at Manfredi. “Killing a Chiaramonte is so fulfilling… Maybe I should pay a visit to Gia and your little bastards…”

“You useless piece of shit… Stay away from my family, or I swear to God, I’ll hunt you down, and I’ll kill you with my bare hands.”

         In a blink, Settimo drew back his arm, his fist connecting with Manfredi's face, pain exploding through his skull. Then he took the gun from Luca’s hand and pointed it at Manfredi.

“Perhaps I cannot kill you, Chiaramonte, but I can damn sure put you in a wheelchair,” he said, and shot Manfredi twice. 

         ‘Gia… Amore…’ was Manfredi’s last thought as the blackness swallowed him.