“No,” he said quietly. “You asked for discipline.”
Leah let her head rest back against the pillow. “You’re supposed to be terrifying. Figure it out.”
A strange expression passed across his face then—part pain, part reluctant admiration, part recognition.
“Rest,” he said.
As he turned to leave, Leah called after him.
“Nico.”
He stopped.
“Tell Sophie,” Leah murmured, “I still expect her book report by Friday.”
He looked at her over his shoulder, and for the first time she saw something almost human enough to trust.
“She’ll do it,” he said.
The next two weeks changed Chicago.
Not with gunfire.
With restraint.
Nico froze shipments. Closed gambling routes. Canceled collections. Pulled his men off corners where they’d stood for years. He shut down three shell companies and moved half his liquid assets into trusts nobody could trace in real time. On the street, the effect was immediate. The usual undercurrent of organized pressure that shaped so much of city business simply… paused.
Rivals mistook the silence for weakness.
Roman D’Angelo did not.
Roman understood Nico too well. Silence meant he was building a cleaner blade.
One evening, Deputy Commissioner Raymond Keane was leaving a private club downtown when he found Nico sitting in the back of his own SUV.
Keane nearly reached for his weapon before remembering that any weapon he touched in that moment would feel theatrical and late.
“Jesus Christ,” Keane muttered, getting into the seat opposite him. “You trying to get us both killed?”
Nico sat with one ankle over the opposite knee, hands loose, expression unreadable. “You were at the estate the week before the party.”
Keane said nothing.
“You walked the grounds under the excuse of reviewing external security concerns for a charity event.”
Still nothing.
“You sold the layout.”
Keane looked out the window, then back. “You can’t prove that.”
