Chapter 4 - The Palermo Shipment
By the second week of December, the Rossy Corporation had become an entirely different enterprise.
The previous six secretaries had treated Lorenzo Rossy like a ticking landmine, trembling whenever his leather shoes clicked across the hardwood, offering stuttered apologies and fleeing the office at the stroke of five.
Chloe Bennett treated him like a brilliant, stubborn contractor who had terrible handwriting and an alarming disregard for digital backup protocols.
She had color-coded the entire corporate archive. The legal shipping manifests were cataloged in navy folders; the port authority licenses were organized in emerald binders; and the confidential communications from the commission in Palermo were filed under dark crimson tabs that sat inside a fireproof safe behind Lorenzo’s desk.
She still tripped over the Persian runner at least twice a day. She still dropped her pen caps into the heating vents. But the books of the Rossy syndicate were cleaner than an audited Swiss bank.
On a freezing Tuesday morning, the private elevator chimed.
Don Carmine Bellini, the aging patriarch of the Northside syndicate and a man who had controlled the Chicago River docks since nineteen seventy-five, stepped onto the fortieth floor. He was accompanied by two massive bodyguards with broken noses and bulges beneath their woolen overcoats.
Carmine didn't look at the reception desk. He marched toward Lorenzo’s double oak doors with the unearned arrogance of a dinosaur that didn't know the meteor had already landed.
THWACK.
A thick, leather-bound accounting ledger slammed down onto the counter directly in front of Carmine’s nose.
The old mobster blinked, recoiling half a step in pure, unadulterated shock.
Chloe stood behind the desk, her glasses perched crookedly on her nose, a yellow highlighter tucked behind her ear, her oversized beige cardigan buttoned unevenly.
"Can I help you, sir?" she asked, her voice crisp and entirely professional.
Carmine stared at her as if she were a talking parrot. "Who the hell are you? Where is the receptionist?"
"I am the Executive Assistant of Strategic Compliance," Chloe said, not blinking. "And Mr. Rossy is currently on a conference call with the maritime licensing board. If you don't have an appointment on the Outlook calendar, you'll need to take a seat in the waiting vestibule."
Carmine’s face flushed an alarming shade of eggplant. His hand twitched toward his lapel, his two bodyguards taking half a step forward with snarls on their scarred faces.
"Do you know who I am, little girl?" Carmine hissed, leaning over the counter. "I am Carmine Bellini! I don't need a calendar to see Lorenzo Rossy!"
The heavy oak doors of the master office swung open with a concussive, silent glide.
Lorenzo stood in the threshold. He wore a bespoke three-piece charcoal suit, his hands resting in his pockets, his flint-gray eyes sweeping over Carmine and his two goons with the absolute, chilling detachment of an executioner checking his instruments.
"The girl asked you a question, Carmine," Lorenzo said softly.
The entire fortieth floor went dead silent.
Carmine stiffened, his bluster evaporating beneath the weight of Lorenzo’s presence. "Lorenzo... your girl here is being disrespectful. She put a ledger in my face!"
"Miss Bennett runs my schedule, Carmine," Lorenzo replied, walking slowly across the carpet until he stopped beside Chloe’s desk. He reached down, his fingers lightly brushing the back of her chair in a motion so casually possessive it made Carmine’s eyes widen.
May you like
"And if Miss Bennett says you don't have an appointment on the Outlook calendar..." Lorenzo leaned down, his voice dropping an octave into pure, unvarnished death:
"...then you don't exist in this building until she decides to type your name."
