Chapter 14
The next year cost Matteo almost everything Helena claimed she was trying to preserve.
Several Bellini businesses were sold.
Others were seized or placed under court-supervised financial agreements.
Senior associates were charged.
A few cooperated.
Others disappeared from Matteo’s life the moment he stopped protecting them.
Dominic lost his position permanently.
He cooperated enough to reduce his own exposure but not erase it.
The legal consequences were real.
So were Matteo’s.
His attorneys negotiated a plea covering conduct he could no longer justify as something that belonged to an older generation.
He would serve a federal sentence.
Not the rest of his life.
But enough years that Ava would change while he was gone.
That was the part Helena had once tried to prepare for without him.
Now Matteo prepared for it himself.
He moved Ava permanently out of the estate.
Teresa became her temporary legal guardian for the period of his incarceration.
Matteo transferred legitimate funds into a court-reviewed structure for Ava’s education, care, and ordinary living expenses.
No criminal lieutenant controlled it.
No Bellini family vote could change it.
No successor gained power through his daughter.
Before sentencing, Matteo spent one final evening alone with Ava in Teresa’s house.
She was four now.
She understood that Daddy was going away.
Not why.
Not fully.
“When you come back?”
“A while.”
“Tomorrow?”
“No.”
“After my birthday?”
Matteo swallowed.
“After more than one birthday.”
Her face crumpled.
Matteo pulled her into his arms.
He did not tell her he was traveling.
He did not tell her business required him somewhere else.
He gave her the simplest truth a child could carry.
“Daddy did things he has to take responsibility for.”
Ava touched his face.
“Bad things?”
“Yes.”
She thought about that.
“Grandma too?”
Matteo closed his eyes.
“Yes.”
Ava leaned against him.
Then she asked the question he had known was coming.
“Uncle Dominic be Daddy?”
Matteo held her tighter.
“No.”
“Why?”
May you like
“Because you already have one.”
For the first time, there was no rehearsal waiting behind the answer.
