The Chefs Obsessive Don

The Serpent’s Circle

Three days after the meeting, they tried to kill me.

I was in the vineyard one of mine now, though the thought still felt foreign inspecting the early Nebbiolo grapes with the estate manager, a grizzled man named Giovanni who had worked the land for forty years. The sun was warm on my shoulders. The air smelled of earth and ripening fruit. For one perfect hour, I forgot about Salvatore, about the Colonnas, about the target painted on my back.

Then the bullets started flying.

Giovanni went down first a crimson flower blooming on his chest, his eyes wide with shock. I dropped to the ground behind a row of vines, my heart slamming against my ribs, my hands clawing at the dirt.

Two men emerged from the tree line. Black suits. Dark glasses. Guns raised.

They were looking for me.

I crawled through the vines, thorns tearing at my dress, my breath coming in ragged gasps. The shots continued pop, pop, pop each one closer than the last. I tasted blood where a branch had cut my lip.

"Sofia!" A voice. Not one of the shooters. Dante.

I looked up. He was running across the vineyard, gun drawn, Enzo and two other soldiers behind him. His face was a mask of cold fury, the Don in full force.

One of the shooters turned toward him. Dante fired twice. The man crumpled.

The second shooter ran. Enzo gave chase.

Dante reached me, dropping to his knees in the dirt, his hands running over my body, checking for wounds. "Are you hurt? Did they hit you?"

"I'm fine." My voice shook. "Giovanni”

Dante glanced at the old man. Then he looked away. "He's gone. I'm sorry."

I closed my eyes. Another death. Another person dead because of me.

"We need to get you out of here." Dante pulled me to my feet. "Now."

Dante’s POV

The safe house was a farmhouse in the hills outside Corleone, abandoned for years, recently purchased through a shell company that left no trail. I had prepared it for exactly this kind of emergency though I had hoped never to use it.

Sofia sat on a cot in the corner, her hands wrapped around a mug of cold coffee she hadn't touched. Her dress was torn, her hair tangled with leaves and dirt. There was a cut on her cheek that I had cleaned and bandaged, and bruises forming on her arms where she had fallen.

She hadn't spoken since we arrived.

"Sofia." I knelt in front of her, taking her hands. "Look at me."

She looked up. Her eyes were dry, but I saw the cracks spreading behind them.

"Giovanni is dead because of me," she said. "He was showing me the grapes. He was telling me about his grandchildren. And now he's dead."

"Salvatore killed him. Not you."

"It's the same thing." She pulled her hands from mine. "I claimed my inheritance, and now people are dying. How many more, Dante? How many more before you tell me this was a mistake?"

"It wasn't a mistake."

"You don't know that."

"I know that if you had walked away, if you had signed everything over to the Colonnas, Salvatore would still be coming for you. Because you exist. Because your father named you his heir. Because you are a threat to his ambition just by breathing." I cupped her face in my hands. "This is not your fault. Do you understand me? None of this is your fault."

She closed her eyes. A single tear slipped down her cheek.

"I want to go home," she whispered.

"Soon. But first, we need to end this."

"End it how?"

I stood and walked to the window. The sun was setting, painting the hills in shades of orange and red. Blood colors.

"Salvatore declared war when he sent those men. We need to respond. Decisively."

"What does that mean?"

I turned to face her. "It means we stop defending and start attacking. It means we find Salvatore's weaknesses and exploit them. It means we remind every Colonna who doubted you that you are not a target. You are a predator."

She was quiet for a long moment. Then she set down her coffee and stood.

"Teach me," she said.

"Teach you what?"

"How to be a predator." She crossed to me, her bare feet silent on the stone floor. "I've spent my whole life learning how to create. How to nurture. How to build something beautiful out of raw ingredients. Now I need to learn how to destroy."

I looked at her at the fire in her eyes, the set of her jaw, the way she held herself like a woman preparing for battle.

"Once I teach you," I said, "you can't unlearn it. This changes you, Sofia. It changes everything."

"I know." She took my hand. "But I'm already changed. I'm not the woman who walked into your restaurant three months ago. I'm not even the woman who signed those documents. I'm something new. Something I don't have a name for yet."

"What do you want to be called?"

She thought about it. Then she smiled a cold, sharp smile that reminded me of a blade.

"Don Sofia," she said. "And I want them to fear me."

Sofia’s POV

That night, Dante taught me how to hold a gun.

We stood in the farmhouse's back courtyard, the moon overhead, the only light spilling from the windows. He placed a pistol in my hands small, lightweight, designed for a woman's grip and positioned my fingers on the trigger.

"Eyes on the target," he said, his voice low in my ear. His body was warm against my back, his arms around mine. "Breathe in. Breathe out. Squeeze, don't pull."

I aimed at the empty wine bottle he had set on the stone wall. My hands were shaking.

"You're afraid of the gun," he said.

"I'm afraid of what it represents."

"The gun doesn't represent anything. It's a tool. Like your knives. It can create or destroy, depending on who's holding it."

I took a breath. Then another.

I squeezed the trigger.

The bottle exploded.

I stared at the shards of glass glittering in the moonlight. I had done that. I had taken something whole and made it fragments.

"Again," Dante said.

I aimed at the next bottle.

By the time we finished, I had shattered a dozen bottles and learned the weight of a weapon in my hand. My ears were ringing. My arm ached. But I wasn't shaking anymore.

"You're a natural," Dante said, taking the gun from me.

"I'm a quick study." I looked at the broken glass. "How many men have you killed?"

He was quiet for a moment. "I stopped counting."

"Do you remember the first?"

"Yes." His voice was flat. "He was a traitor. He sold information to our enemies. Five of my men died because of him."

"Did you feel anything? When you killed him?"

"I felt relief." He holstered the gun. "And then I felt nothing. For a long time."

I turned to face him. "And now?"

"Now I feel everything." He touched my face, his thumb tracing my cheekbone. "Because of you."

I leaned into his touch. "I don't want to become numb, Dante. I don't want to lose myself in this war."

"You won't. You feel too much. That's your strength." He kissed my forehead. "That's why you'll be a better don than any of them. Because you understand that power is not about destroying. It's about protecting."

I closed my eyes and let him hold me.

Tomorrow, we would go back to the fortress. Tomorrow, we would plan our counterattack. Tomorrow, the war would continue.

But tonight, I was just Sofia.

And he was just Dante.

And we were together.

Dante’s POV

After she fell asleep, I made the calls.

Enzo first. "Find Salvatore's mistress. The one in Catania. She knows where he hides when he's scared."

"Already found her," Enzo said. "She's willing to talk. For a price."

"Pay it."

Next, Franco. "I need a list of every business Salvatore owns. Legitimate and otherwise."

"Already working on it," Franco said. "The man is dirty in ways that would surprise even you."

"Nothing surprises me anymore."

Finally, Matteo. The old consigliere answered on the first ring, as if he had been waiting.

"Don Gallo," he said. "I heard about the vineyard. Is Don Sofia safe?"

"She's safe. But Salvatore won't stop. I need to know his weaknesses."

Matteo was silent for a moment. Then he said, "Salvatore has a son. Marco. He's not in the life. He runs a bookshop in Palermo. Doesn't speak to his father. Hasn't for years."

"You're suggesting I go after an innocent?"

"I'm suggesting that every man has a weakness. Salvatore's is his son. He loves the boy, even though the boy wants nothing to do with him." Matteo's voice was careful. "I'm not telling you to hurt Marco. I'm telling you that Salvatore knows you could. And that knowledge may be enough."

I looked at Sofia, sleeping in the cot, her face peaceful in the moonlight.

"I don't threaten innocents," I said.

"Then don't threaten. Just… let Salvatore know that you know. That's usually enough."

I ended the call and stood at the window, watching the stars wheel overhead.

Salvatore had tried to kill the woman I loved. He had killed a good man a man with grandchildren, a man who had done nothing but show Sofia his grapes.

He would pay for that.

But I would not become him. I would not threaten children. I would not hurt the innocent.

I would find another way.

There was always another way.

I just had to be smart enough to see it.