Page 284 of Marcello

“You think Cesare’s at the Amatos’ place?” he asked derisively.

“…yes?”

“Then why don’t we just go in, guns fuckin’ blazing?”

Niccolo gave his brother a condescending smile. “Do you remember when we went to Luciano Amato’s wedding over a decade ago?”

“Yeah?” Adriano said belligerently.

“Do you remember the Amatos’ castle?”

Adriano suddenly went glum. “…yeah.”

“It’s a fucking fortress.”

Adriano had realized his mistake. “Yeah, fine.”

“There’s no way we’re getting in with a frontal assault – ”

“ALRIGHT, ALRIGHT!” Adriano yelled. “We grab the fuckin’ mole! Got it – moving on!”

“Who’s going to grab him?” Lars asked.

“I’m the only one who’s ever seen him,” Niccolo answered, “so it should be me.”

Adriano snorted again.

Niccolo turned to him, incensed. “Now what?”

“You, single-handedly take down a Camorra thug? Yeah, right.”

“Fine,” Niccolo seethed. “I’ll identify him, and you can do it.”

“Gladly,” Adriano shot back.

“Then it’s settled. We all go to Naples, and the rest of you lie low somewhere safe while Adriano and I grab the mole.”

“Do you think he’ll help us?” Dario asked.

“If we offer him enough money, he’ll do anything we want.”

Dario narrowed his eyes. “So he was a traitor who was only in it for the money?”

Niccolo shifted uncomfortably. “Not exactly.”

“Then what?”

“His father was a judge on our payroll who screwed us over. Fausto recruited the son as payback, but he didn’t want to go along with the plan… so Fausto threatened his mother and siblings.”

Dario immediately looked angry.

“I know you don’t like that sort of thing,” Niccolo said hastily, “but you have to remember, the mole has been in Cesare Caproni’s crew for seven years. Which means he’s probably extremely high in the organization… which means he probably helped Cesare kill Amato. In the process, they got all the intel they needed to attack us, probably by torturing it out of him.”

“Not if I know Don Amato,” Dario said grimly. “My guess is he gave us up to try and save his own skin.”

“Maybe,” Niccolo conceded. “But if Amato told Cesare and the mole everything they needed to know to destroy us, then Amato must have mentioned that we killed Fausto. Why wouldn’t he? Amato was in Rome when it all happened! What would be the fucking point of leaving that part out if he told them everything else?”

It was true – Don Amato had been at the Council in Rome when Niccolo and Sofia plotted the double-cross that had let the brothers kill Fausto. As soon as it happened, every single Don in the Cosa Nostra knew about it.