Chapter 1 – THE COAT POCKET HELD A ONE-WAY TICKET
Dante couldn’t breathe.
He stared at his seven-year-old daughter.
“He said next time, I wouldn’t be coming home.”
The words echoed in the quiet study.
Dante had built an empire by anticipating his enemies’ moves. He had crushed rival syndicates, bought politicians, and secured his family’s legacy.
But the enemy was sleeping in his bed.
“Sophie,” Dante kept his voice perfectly steady. “When Caroline took you to that house, did she pack a bag for you?”
Sophie nodded slowly.
“A small one. Miss Harper helped pack it.”
Dante’s blood ran cold.
If Harper had packed the bag, why was she fighting Caroline tonight?
“Daddy?” Sophie whispered, rubbing her eyes. “Am I going away?”
Dante scooped her into his arms, holding her so tightly she squeaked.
“Never. Nobody is taking you anywhere.”
He carried her to the hidden adjoining room in his study—a secure suite nobody but Rocco knew about. He tucked her into the heavy blankets.
“Stay here. Do not open this door for anyone but me or Rocco. Understand?”
“Yes, Daddy.”
Dante locked the reinforced door.
Then he walked upstairs.
The master bedroom was dark. Caroline was asleep, her breathing slow and even.
Dante didn’t turn on the lights.
He walked silently to her massive walk-in closet.
He moved past the designer dresses and expensive shoes he had bought her.
He stopped at the heavy winter coat she had worn last Tuesday.
He reached into the left pocket.
Empty.
He reached into the right pocket.
His fingers brushed against stiff paper.
He pulled it out and turned on his phone’s flashlight.
It was a private charter ticket.
One way. Chicago to Palermo, Italy.
Departing this Friday at 6:00 AM.
But it wasn’t the destination that made Dante’s heart stop. It was the name printed on the passenger manifest.
It didn’t say Sophie Moretti.
It said Sophie Thorne.
Thorne.
The surname of Julian Thorne, the ruthless underboss Dante had driven out of Chicago five years ago.
Dante stared at the ticket.
Caroline wasn’t sending Sophie to a psychiatric facility. She was trafficking his daughter to his oldest enemy.
But why would Julian Thorne want a seven-year-old girl?
Dante reached deeper into the coat pocket.
His fingers snagged on something cold and metallic.
He pulled it out.
It was a delicate silver bracelet.
Dante stopped breathing.
It was his late wife’s bracelet. The one she had worn the night she died in a car accident. The police had told Dante the jewelry was lost in the wreckage.
Why was Caroline hiding a dead woman’s jewelry?
Suddenly, a floorboard creaked behind him.
Dante spun around, hiding the ticket and bracelet behind his back.
Caroline was standing in the doorway of the closet.
She wasn’t wearing her cream silk robe anymore.
She was fully dressed in black jeans and a turtleneck, and she was holding a suppressed pistol aimed directly at his chest.
“I was hoping you’d just go to sleep, Dante,” she said coldly.
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