The Father's Pain

The Father's Pain
Tony's POV

Isabella's scream tore through my heart.
She was staring at the phone screen, watching her father being beaten again. His face was bloody and swollen, but he kept trying to look strong for her.
"Please stop," Isabella whispered to the phone, as if the people hurting him could hear her. "Please don't hurt him anymore."
I wanted to take the phone away from her, but I couldn't. We both needed to see what Sarah was doing to our families.
"Papa, I'm going to save you," Isabella said to the screen, tears streaming down her face.
That's when Vincent Russo looked up at the camera and spoke. His voice was weak but clear.
"Isabella, my princess. Don't trust them. Whatever they promise you, don't believe them. They're going to kill me no matter what you do."
Someone off-camera yelled, and Vincent got hit again. This time he didn't get back up.
Isabella was shaking so hard she dropped the phone. I caught it before it hit the ground.
"He's right," I said quietly. "Sarah's going to kill them all whether we give her the evidence or not."
"Then what do we do?" Isabella asked desperately.
Before I could answer, the phone rang. It was Sarah.
"Did you enjoy the show?" Sarah's voice was cold and mean.
"You're sick," I said.
"I'm practical," Sarah replied. "Your families are suffering because you're being stubborn. Give me what I want, and their pain stops."
Isabella grabbed the phone from me. "What do you want exactly?"
"Everything. All the evidence you collected about Morrison. All the files about Vincent Senior. All the recordings. All the photographs. Everything."
"And if we give it to you, you'll let them go?" Isabella asked.
"I'll consider it," Sarah said.
"That's not good enough," I said, taking the phone back. "We need guarantees."
Sarah laughed. "You're not in a position to make demands, Tony. But fine. Give me everything, and I'll let your mother go first. Then Isabella's father. Then Sofia."
"How do we know you won't just take the evidence and kill them anyway?" Isabella asked.
"You don't," Sarah said. "But it's the only chance they have. You have four hours to decide. Call me back when you're ready to make the trade."
She hung up.
Isabella looked at me with desperate eyes. "We have to give her what she wants."
"Isabella, think about this. If we give Sarah all our evidence, Morrison goes free. Vincent Senior goes free. They'll just find new ways to hurt people."
"I don't care about other people right now!" Isabella yelled. "I care about my father! I care about your mother and sister!"
I understood how she felt. Seeing our families hurt was killing me too. But I also knew Sarah was lying about letting them go.
"There has to be another way," I said.
"What other way? We don't have an army. We don't have weapons. We don't even have allies."
That's when I remembered the mysterious message from Chapter 31. "What about the resistance? The message about meeting at the cathedral?"
Isabella wiped her tears. "You really think they can help us?"
"I think we need to find out."
We drove toward the cathedral, but I kept thinking about something. The message had asked Isabella to bring her father's ring. That meant the resistance knew something about her family that we didn't.
"Isabella, what's special about your father's ring?" I asked.
She touched the chain around her neck where she kept it. "I don't know. He gave it to me when I was little and said it belonged to my grandfather."
"Which grandfather?"
"Not Vincent Senior," she said quickly. "My mother's father. He died when I was a baby."
When we reached the cathedral, it looked empty and dark. But as we walked up to the front door, someone stepped out of the shadows.
It was Marcus.
"Marcus!" Isabella ran to him. "How did you get away from Sarah?"
"I didn't get away," Marcus said grimly. "I escaped."
He looked tired and hurt, with cuts on his face and hands.
"Are you okay?" I asked.
"I'll live," Marcus said. "But we need to talk. There are things about your families you don't know."
"What things?" Isabella asked.
Marcus looked around nervously. "Not here. Too dangerous. Follow me."
He led us to a small room behind the cathedral. Inside were three other people I didn't recognize.
"Who are they?" I asked.
"Allies," Marcus said. "People who have been fighting Vincent Senior for years."
One of the people, an older woman with gray hair, stepped forward.
"Isabella Russo," she said. "I knew your mother."
Isabella looked confused. "My mother died when I was born."
"No," the woman said gently. "Your mother didn't die. She was murdered. By Vincent Senior."
The room went quiet. Isabella stared at the woman with wide eyes.
"That's impossible," Isabella whispered.
"I'm sorry to tell you this way," the woman said. "But your father has been lying to protect you. Your mother discovered that Vincent Senior was planning to take over both crime families. She tried to stop him."
"How do you know this?" I asked.
The woman pointed to Isabella's ring. "May I see that?"
Isabella pulled the ring out from under her shirt. It was a simple gold band with a small symbol carved into it.
When the woman saw the symbol, she smiled sadly. "Just as I thought. This isn't just your grandfather's ring, Isabella. It's the seal of the original crime families' alliance."
"What does that mean?" Isabella asked.
"It means you're not just Vincent Russo's daughter," the woman said. "You're the rightful heir to all the crime families in this city. Not Vincent Senior. Not the Morettis. You."
I felt like someone had punched me in the stomach. Isabella was the true leader of all our families?
"That's crazy," Isabella said. "I'm nobody special."
"You're everything special," Marcus said. "That's why Vincent Senior has been trying to control your family for so long. He knows that if you ever claimed your birthright, you could unite all the families against him."
Isabella sat down heavily in a chair. "I don't want to be a crime boss."
"You don't have to be," the woman said. "But you have the power to stop Vincent Senior forever. And we have the evidence to help you do it."
"What evidence?" I asked.
Marcus pulled out a small recording device. "Everything that happened in that house when Maria was arrested. Including Sarah admitting that the FBI is working with Vincent Senior."
"And," he added, pulling out a laptop, "I have copies of all Isabella's evidence files. The real ones. Hidden where Sarah will never find them."
Isabella looked up with hope in her eyes. "You mean we don't have to choose between saving our families and exposing the truth?"
"That's exactly what I mean," Marcus said.
But before anyone could say anything else, my phone rang.
It was Sarah calling back early.
"Hello, Tony," Sarah's voice was different now. Meaner. More dangerous.
"What do you want?" I asked.
"I want you to know that your time is up," she said. "Your families are out of time."
"We still have two hours left," Isabella said.
"Not anymore," Sarah replied. "You see, Vincent Russo tried to escape. We had to stop him."
The phone buzzed with a new video message.
Isabella opened it with shaking hands.
The video showed her father in the prison cell, but this time he wasn't moving. He was lying on the floor, and there was blood everywhere.
"Papa!" Isabella screamed.
On the video, someone checked Vincent's pulse and shook their head.
"He's dead," a voice said off-camera.
Isabella collapsed, sobbing. "No, no, no. This can't be happening."
I held her while she cried, feeling my own heart break for her.
"I'm sorry for your loss, Isabella," Sarah's voice came through the phone. "But don't worry. Your father's death wasn't for nothing. It's a message. Give me the evidence in the next hour, or Tony's mother dies next."
The call ended.
Isabella was crying so hard she could barely breathe. "He's gone. My father is gone."
I didn't know what to say. How do you comfort someone who just watched their father die?
But then Marcus did something strange. He was staring at the video on the phone, and he was smiling.
"Marcus, what's wrong with you?" I asked angrily. "This isn't funny."
"You're right," Marcus said. "It's not funny. But it's not real either."
"What do you mean?" Isabella asked through her tears.
Marcus pointed to the video screen. "Look at the timestamp. This video was recorded three days ago."
I looked closer. He was right. The date on the video was from before Vincent was even arrested.
"But how..." Isabella started.
"It's fake," Marcus said. "The blood, the injuries, all of it. Vincent Senior's people are experts at making fake videos."
Isabella wiped her tears. "You mean my father might still be alive?"
"I mean Sarah just made a big mistake," Marcus said. "She showed us that she's desperate enough to use fake evidence. Which means we're winning."
The older woman stepped forward again. "This is our chance. While Sarah thinks she's broken your spirit, we can strike back."
"How?" I asked.
"By using Isabella's real power," she said. "By calling together all the crime families and showing them who their true leader is."
Isabella looked at her father's ring in her hand. "What if I'm not strong enough?"
"You are," I said, taking her hand. "You're the strongest person I know."
But even as I said it, I was worried. Because I could see something in Isabella's eyes that scared me.
She was planning something. Something dangerous.
And I had a feeling she was going to try to save everyone by sacrificing herself.
"Isabella," I said quietly. "Whatever you're thinking, don't do it alone."
She looked at me with sad eyes. "Some things can only be done alone, Tony."
That's when I knew.
She was going to offer herself to Sarah in exchange for everyone else's freedom.
And there was nothing I could do to stop her.
The phone buzzed again.
This time the message was from Isabella's father's real phone.
"If you can see this, I'm alive. But not for long. Sarah is moving us tonight. This is your last chance. Find us before midnight, or we're all dead for real."
Below the message was a location.
And below that, four words that made my blood freeze:
"Isabella, come alone. Please."