Chapter 4
The next morning Rocco suspended Grant from every Bellandi-controlled business.
It caused immediate trouble.
Grant managed club vendors, private security schedules, several restaurant accounts, and dozens of relationships Rocco had allowed him to build over fourteen years.
Three managers called within an hour.
Two suppliers refused deliveries until someone clarified who could authorize payment.
A private driver disappeared without returning a company vehicle.
Grant had made himself useful enough that removing him hurt.
Rocco accepted the damage.
Michael arrived at the Bellandi townhouse just before noon carrying a small external hard drive.
“The main garage cameras overwrite after thirty days.”
Rocco looked at it.
“Then what is this?”
“Backup footage.”
Michael explained that the club’s insurance company required one parking camera to store footage separately after a vehicle theft six months earlier.
Grant apparently did not know.
The camera faced the service ramp.
They watched three weeks of accelerated footage.
Nothing.
Then Michael stopped the video.
Bianca’s car entered at 11:42 p.m.
Grant arrived twelve minutes later.
A black SUV followed.
Nobody exited within camera view because the storage-room door was outside the angle.
Forty-eight minutes later, the SUV left.
The same pattern appeared five more times.
Different vehicles.
Bianca.
Grant.
Late at night.
Rocco leaned closer.
“Can we identify them?”
“Maybe.”
Michael enlarged one frame.
The license plate was partially visible.
Rocco recognized the vehicle before the image sharpened.
He had seen it parked outside a restaurant whose owner had recently asked Bellandi associates for protection.
Rocco had refused.
The owner was reckless, indebted, and connected to men Rocco wanted nowhere near his business.
Yet his SUV had been entering Rocco’s club at midnight.
Michael looked at him.
“You knew him?”
“Yes.”
“Did you approve these meetings?”
“No.”
For the first time, Michael looked genuinely frightened.
May you like
Because whatever Grant and Bianca were doing—
they had begun doing it with people Rocco had specifically rejected.
