The Mafia Princess Facade

Danica

The cigar smoke hangs in the air so thick I can taste the bitter ash on my tongue. It clings to the velvet curtains, the dark mahogany of the long table, the very fibers of my dress. A dozen men, my father’s most trusted capos, sit around the table. Their faces are stone, their suits are expensive, and their loyalty is absolute. But today, the air is not just thick with smoke. It’s thick with something sharp and ugly. Fear.

My father, Antonio Blakewood, stands at the head of the table. His hands are flat on the polished wood, his knuckles white. He hasn’t moved in ten minutes. He just stares at the men who have served him for decades.

“The Vargas Cartel has taken the northern warehouses,” he says. His voice is quiet, but it cuts through the silence like a razor. “They burned three of our trucks last night. The drivers… they were inside.”

A low growl rumbles through the room. Someone curses in Sicilian. My brother, Lorenzo, shifts in his seat beside me. He is a bull, all muscle and pride, and he hates showing weakness.

“We should have hit them weeks ago, Father,” Lorenzo says, his voice a low challenge. “I told you. A show of force. We burn two of their warehouses for every truck they take.”

“And start a war that would bleed us dry while our true enemies watch from the sidelines?” Father’s eyes snap to Lorenzo. “You think with your fists, not your head.”

“Our fists are what built this family,” Lorenzo bites back.

“And our heads are what kept it from being buried.”

The silence returns, heavier this time. I keep my eyes down, my hands folded primly in my lap. I am a ghost in this room, a decorative piece of furniture. Danica Blakewood, the daughter, the princess. My role is to be seen, to be silent, to one day be married off to seal an alliance. That’s all they see. That’s all they’ve ever wanted to see.

Father takes a deep breath. “The Vargas Cartel is not our only problem. They are merely the symptom. The disease is our division. While we fight the Falcones for scraps of territory, the Vargas vultures pick our bones clean.”

The name Falcone lands like a grenade on the table. The men stiffen. The Falcones are our oldest, most bitter rivals. Blood has been spilled between our families for generations. A feud that runs deeper than memory.

“What are you saying, Don Blakewood?” asks Silvio, one of the oldest capos, his face a roadmap of scars and suspicion.

“I am saying the fighting stops,” Father declares. The words echo in the cavernous dining room. “Today.”

Lorenzo laughs, a short, ugly sound. “You cannot be serious. Stop fighting the Falcones? We might as well hand them the keys to the city.”

“We are handing them something,” Father says, his gaze unwavering. “A partnership.”

The room explodes. Not in shouts, but in a wave of tense, angry murmurs. Men shift, chairs scrape against the floor. I can feel the shock, the outrage radiating from them.

“A partnership?” Lorenzo slams his hand on the table. The crystal water glasses jump. “With those snakes? After what they did to Uncle Paolo?”

“Dante Falcone and I met last night,” Father continues, ignoring my brother’s outburst. “His family is feeling the same pressure from the Vargas Cartel. We are bleeding. Both of us. The cartel knows this. They are using our war to swallow us whole.”

He lets that sink in. The murmurs die down, replaced by a grim understanding. He is right. We all know it. Our profits are down thirty percent. Our territory shrinks by the week.

“So what is the deal?” Silvio asks, his voice cautious.

Father nods to Luca, our family’s consigliere, who stands silently by the wall. Luca steps forward and unrolls a massive set of blueprints across the table, covering the polished wood in a sea of white and blue lines. My breath catches in my throat. I know these schematics better than I know the layout of my own bedroom.

Port Fortuna.

The lifeblood of our entire operation. And the Falcones’. It’s the largest shipping port on the coast, the gateway for everything coming in and everything going out. For decades, our families have carved it up, a constant, bloody struggle for control of the docks, the cranes, the shipping lanes.

“The city council, under pressure from the governor, has given us an ultimatum,” Father explains, his finger tracing a line that bisects the port. “The violence at the docks is disrupting legitimate business. Either we learn to work together, or they will revoke our licenses and award the entire port contract to a third party. A third party an informant tells me is a front for the Vargas Cartel.”

The final piece clicks into place. It’s not a choice. It’s a threat. Cooperate or lose everything.

“We are to co-manage the port,” Father says. “The Blakewoods will control the eastern docks, the Falcones the west. We share security. We share logistics. We present a united front, and we squeeze the Vargas Cartel out of our city.”

Lorenzo is staring at the blueprints, his jaw tight. He sees territory. He sees power. He sees a chessboard where he can finally outmaneuver Dante Falcone. I see something else entirely.

While the men around the table start to argue logistics, their voices rising in a cacophony of ego and strategy, my eyes are tracing the lines of the port’s infrastructure. For three years, while they thought I was taking online art history courses and learning floral arrangement, I was earning a masters degree in logistical management from MIT. Online, under an assumed name. My secret rebellion. My only escape from the gilded cage of being a Blakewood daughter.

I know every crane’s weight limit, every container route, every forgotten access tunnel beneath the tarmac. I have run thousands of simulations. I know this port’s strengths. And I know its weaknesses.

My gaze snags on a section of the blueprints for the shared security hub. It’s new, a state of the art facility they must have just designed for this truce. And it’s a disaster.

“Their traffic flow model is wrong,” I whisper, almost to myself.

Lorenzo, who is leaning over the table right next to me, hears. “What did you say?” He looks at me, not with curiosity, but with annoyance. Like a fly has just buzzed past his ear.

I clear my throat, my heart starting to pound. This is not my place. I know that. But men will die if this is not fixed. Our men. Falcone men. It doesn’t matter. It’s a slaughter waiting to happen.

“Here,” I say, my voice a little stronger. I lean forward, my finger hovering over the blueprints. The scent of Lorenzo’s expensive cologne is suffocating. “The main security checkpoint for incoming cargo. They’re funneling all trucks from both sides through a single inspection point. It creates a bottleneck. A fatal funnel.”

Lorenzo stares at the spot I’m indicating, but he isn’t seeing the logistics. He’s just seeing his little sister speaking out of turn.

“During peak hours, trucks will be lined up for half a mile,” I press on, the simulations running through my head. “They’ll be stationary targets. One man with a bomb, a single RPG… he could take out a dozen trucks, block the entire port entrance for days, maybe weeks. It’s a catastrophic vulnerability.”

The room has gone quiet. Everyone is looking at me. Not with consideration. With confusion. My father’s face is a thundercloud. I feel a hot flush of shame creep up my neck, but I can’t stop.

“You should have two separate checkpoints,” I say, my voice gaining confidence. “And use the old service tunnels on the south side for overflow. They’re not on the main schematic, but they lead directly to the secondary loading bays. It would increase efficiency and eliminate the security risk entirely.”

Silence. Utter, complete, and humiliating silence.

Then Lorenzo laughs. It’s a loud, dismissive bark that echoes in the room. He straightens up and puts a heavy hand on my shoulder, pushing me back into my chair.

“Danica, my sweet, darling sister,” he says, his voice dripping with condescension. He turns to address the room, a smug grin on his face. “Forgive her. She gets these little ideas in her head. She’s been very busy planning the Unity Gala for next month. Her mind is full of seating charts and flower arrangements.”

My face burns. My entire body feels like it’s on fire. He isn’t just dismissing me. He is erasing me. He is reducing years of secret, painstaking study into a flight of fancy. A woman’s silly whim.

“Stick to the flowers, little sister,” he says, his voice dropping to a low hiss meant only for me. “Let the men handle the business.”

He turns his back on me, leaning back over the blueprints. “Now, as I was saying, Father, if we control the eastern cranes, we control the flow of all high value goods…”

The conversation resumes as if I had never spoken. The men follow Lorenzo’s lead, their eyes sliding away from me, dismissing me as easily as he did. I am invisible again. A ghost in a pretty dress.

I look at my father. I search his eyes for any sign of support, any flicker of acknowledgment. He avoids my gaze. He turns to Luca, his expression grim, and starts talking about patrol schedules. He is ashamed of me for speaking up. For breaking the rules.

Something inside me, something that has been dormant for years, cracks. It is not a loud shatter, but a quiet, clean break. The hope I secretly held that one day they would see me, truly see me for what I am capable of, turns to dust. Fine, I think, my hands clenching into fists beneath the table, my nails digging into my palms. Let them see the princess. Let them see the flowers.

But they will not see the thorns until it is too late.

I stare at the blueprints, at the fatal flaw I pointed out. The one they all ignored. I burn the image into my mind. The men continue to talk, their voices a meaningless drone. They are planning a truce, but they are laying the groundwork for a massacre. And my arrogant, foolish brother is leading the charge, completely blind. They think they are in control.

They have no idea what’s coming.