Chapter 3 – THE MISSING KEY
The room shifted. Uncle Carmine, sitting near the window, suddenly sat up straighter.
I stared at the empty silver locket in Nonna’s trembling hand.
“There was a key in there?” I asked. “My mother never told me about a key.”
“She didn’t know,” Nonna said. “Your father hid it there before he died. A safety deposit key. A vault containing the original deeds to the Chicago territory.”
Vincent’s face was completely drained of color.
“And my grandson,” Nonna continued, her voice echoing off the high ceilings, “stole the key before Sarah went to the pawnshop.”
I felt physically sick. “You stole from me? While I was crying over selling my mother’s memory, you were emptying it?”
“Sarah, listen to me,” Vincent stepped toward me, his hands raised. “The council was going to kill us. I needed the territory deeds to secure our safety. I didn’t do it to hurt you. I did it to keep you alive.”
“Oh, please,” Madeline rolled her eyes. “You did it for power.”
“Shut up, Madeline!” Vincent roared, a sudden, terrifying sound that made half the table flinch.
But I was looking at Madeline’s designer purse. When she had jerked her arm away from Vincent, the clasp had popped open.
Something slipped out and fell onto the Persian rug.
A piece of crumpled construction paper.
I stepped forward and picked it up. It was a child’s drawing. Crayon figures of a man, a woman, and a little boy holding hands in front of a house.
At the top, written in messy, uneven letters: I love you, Daddy Vincent.
The air left my lungs.
I looked up at Madeline. Then at my husband.
“Daddy?” I whispered.
Madeline didn’t smile this time. She looked terrified.
“Sarah,” Vincent breathed, his voice cracking. “Don’t look at that.”
I flipped the drawing over. On the back, in the same childish scrawl, it said: To my new Mommy Madeline.
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