Chapter 7 – THE FAMILY HEIRLOOM

The silence in the small apartment was heavy enough to crush us both.

Luca slowly stood up from the floral couch, ignoring his exhaustion. He walked over to me, carefully stepping around the broken glass, and knelt on the floor.

“Hannah,” he said, his voice incredibly gentle but firm. “What are you saying?”

I handed the rosary back to him, my hands shaking violently.

“My mother’s name is Sophia,” I repeated, the tears falling freely now. “She grew up in an orphanage in Italy. She told me she had an older sister who was forced to marry a dangerous man, and that her sister faked her death to protect her from his world.”

Luca stared at the engraved silver cross.

The pieces were slamming together in his mind, reshaping his entire reality for the second time in one night.

“My mother,” Luca whispered, his eyes widening. “My mother staged the accident.”

I nodded, hugging my knees to my chest.

“She did it to save my mom. She knew that if your father found out he had a sister-in-law, he would use her as leverage. He would have married her off to one of his capos to secure an alliance.”

Luca closed his eyes, a look of profound sorrow crossing his face.

His mother had sacrificed her only sister to keep her safe. She had lived her entire life in a mansion in Chicago, pretending to be an only child, while her sister worked as a waitress just a few miles away.

“That’s why I took the job at your estate,” I confessed, the shame burning my throat.

Luca opened his eyes. “You knew?”

“I found old letters in my mom’s closet a few years ago,” I said, wiping my cheeks. “Letters from your mother. They never met, but they wrote to each other through a P.O. Box. When your mother died… I wanted to know the family she left behind. So I applied for the maid position. I just wanted to see what kind of man my cousin was.”

Luca looked at me, truly looked at me, for the first time.

He saw the shape of his mother’s eyes in mine. The stubborn tilt of her chin.

“You’re my family,” he whispered.

Suddenly, the front door of the apartment burst open.

My mother, Sophia, stood in the doorway, wearing her pink diner uniform.

She took one look at the broken glass, at me crying on the floor, and at the imposing man in the ruined suit kneeling beside me.

“Hannah!” she screamed, dropping her purse and running toward me.

She pushed Luca away with surprising strength and pulled me into her arms.

“Don’t touch my daughter!” she yelled at him.

Luca held up his hands, taking a slow step back.

“Aunt Sophia,” Luca said softly.

My mother froze.

She slowly turned her head, looking at Luca’s face.

She saw her sister’s dark hair. Her sister’s kind, heavy eyes.

“Luca?” she breathed, the anger instantly dissolving into shock.

Before anyone could say another word, the apartment window shattered inward.

A heavy tear gas canister bounced across the linoleum, spewing thick, blinding white smoke into the small room.

“Get down!” Luca roared, tackling both of us behind the kitchen counter.

The front door was kicked off its hinges.

Through the stinging smoke, heavy boots stomped into the apartment.

“Find them!” a harsh voice barked.

It was Carmine Bellini. Vanessa’s father.

He hadn’t just burned down the mansion. He had tracked us here.

Luca pulled his gun from his shoulder holster, checking the chamber.

“They followed the hospital transport van,” Luca whispered, coughing against the smoke.

He looked at me, his eyes fierce and protective.

“Hannah, take your mother out the fire escape window in the bedroom. Do not look back.”

“I’m not leaving you!” I cried, grabbing his arm.

“You are my family,” Luca said, pressing the rosary into my palm. “I am not losing my family tonight. Go!”

He stood up from behind the counter and fired two blind shots into the smoke to cover our escape.

Carmine’s men returned fire, the sound deafening in the tiny apartment.

My mother dragged me by the hand toward the bedroom. We scrambled out the window onto the rusted iron fire escape just as the bedroom door splintered open behind us.

We climbed down the metal stairs into the dark alley, coughing and stumbling.

When we reached the bottom, I looked up.

Flames were licking out of our apartment window.

And Luca hadn’t followed us down.

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