Shadow Storm (Shadow Riders 6)

“That’s good, baby. No matter what the council tells us, we stand together.”

Valentino knew the council wanted to hear about the Saldi myth. They wouldn’t be any happier than he was that they didn’t have all the information, but they would understand. They would most likely put their best historians on attempting to find the portions lost.

The Saldis had attacked the Ferraro family, nearly wiping them out. Those remaining, mostly riders, had scattered, leaving Sicily and separating to make it much more difficult to be tracked down and murdered. It also made it more difficult for any Saldi to ever find a woman who had a particular shadow that matched with the myth handed down from father to son. In a millennium, it was easy, over all those years, to change the wording, for the story to become twisted and even forgotten.

Valentino was aware that the council was in Chicago because an Archambault sat on it. With the members came others to look after them. In the case of Marcellus Archambault, head of the International Council of Shadow Riders, several family members had come with him. They had supposedly come to speak with Elie about his application for an arranged marriage. They were there for other, more important reasons, and it was a relief to him.

Elie had made a promise to Valentino, and he was keeping it. In the last week, Stefano had made it clear to Henry to watch Eloisa every minute—that she would attempt again to put a contract killer on Emme’s trail. Val wasn’t certain Henry was up to that task, and waiting that week had been endless, especially since he couldn’t stay home, which meant there was no keeping his wife home.

He was head of the Saldi famiglia. It was necessary to carry on with business as usual. He had to support Dario in weeding out the worst of Miceli’s supporters and bring his capos back in line. Dario was as tough as nails and ruled with an iron fist. If anything, he was much scarier than Valentino, and no one wanted to cross him. Dario, however, made it clear he didn’t want to oversee the territory. He continued to push Valentino to appoint someone else to the position.

Val had a bad feeling he might have to give up and allow Dario his way, which meant he would have to take over completely. He had explained his reasoning to Dario a hundred times, but Dario just shrugged and walked off. Valentino could swallow the entire territory—it was his right; it had belonged to Giuseppi before he had given part of it to his brother—but it would be easier if Dario stepped up.

Val and Dario met with all the capos and went over the businesses, legitimate and not. Fortunately, they had Bernado to check the books of every business before each meeting to ensure everyone was paying what they owed. Traitors met with the same fate that Valentino had bestowed on those he found in his father’s organization. Dario was the one who took care of those considered traitors in Miceli’s organization. They had sworn a blood oath to Giuseppi first. They were his men before his brother’s.

The businesses that had been destroyed needed to be rebuilt from the ground up, and that had begun immediately. Men loyal to the famiglia were placed in positions where the most money would flow to them. The others had to work harder to earn their place. Women who had been treated badly were offered jobs with good wages, benefits and protection in place.

Through it all, Emmanuelle stood in the shadows to make certain those saying they were swearing allegiance to Valentino and Dario meant what they said. She could hear lies and before and after the two entered a room, she listened to the conversations that took place. She made it much easier and faster to weed out those who had been working closely with Miceli and his sons. There were few of those men left. Most had tried to stay away from Miceli and had kept their heads down, working at their businesses and paying the money owed as quickly as possible to keep Miceli from demanding they join his newer ventures.

Valentino wasn’t willing to wait longer than a week before he would indicate to both Stefano and Elie that he was done waiting. He couldn’t take a chance that Eloisa would put out another hit on Emmanuelle, so he was more than happy to hear that she had been summoned before the council the following day at her brother’s hotel. Nothing would keep him away.

Representatives came from all over the world to attend the passing of a shadow rider. Eloisa Ferraro’s funeral was held in the church where her children were christened and married. The building was huge, and right now it was filled to capacity with mourners. Her sons sat in the front rows, dressed in their immaculate suits, their wives beside them. Her daughter was there, husband on one side, his cousin on the other. Henry sat with the family, looking grief-stricken, not looking up through the entire service.