Chapter 4 – THE GIRL IN THE PHOTOGRAPH

I stared at the photograph until my vision blurred with tears.

The rain beat a steady rhythm against the tin roof of the garage.

Nico stepped closer, shining the flashlight over my shoulder to look at the picture.

He was quiet for a long time.

“I remember that day,” he finally said, his voice thick with an emotion I couldn’t place. “It was my tenth birthday.”

I looked up at him.

“I don’t remember it at all.”

Nico pointed to the little girl with pigtails.

“You followed me everywhere. You told everyone you were going to marry me when you grew up.”

A fresh wave of shock washed over me.

“My mother… she was holding your father’s hand.”

Nico looked at the adults in the background.

“My mother died when I was six,” Nico said quietly. “My father never remarried. But Elena… she was different. She wasn’t just his accountant.”

“They were in love,” I whispered.

The realization hit me like a physical blow.

My mother, the exhausted waitress who counted pennies to keep the heat on, had once loved one of the most powerful, dangerous men in Boston.

“If they were in love,” I asked, my voice shaking, “why did she leave? Why did she take this ledger and hide for twenty years?”

Nico took the ledger from the bag.

He opened it carefully.

The pages were filled with handwritten numbers, dates, and accounts.

But as he flipped toward the back, the numbers stopped.

Instead, there were names.

Hundreds of names.

And next to each name, a specific amount of money.

“This isn’t an accounting ledger,” Nico said, his eyes scanning the pages. “It’s an extortion list.”

He looked up at me.

“It’s a list of every politician, judge, and police captain my father was paying off.”

I gasped.

“If the feds had found this during the audit…”

“My father would have died in federal prison. And the entire Ferraro family would have collapsed.”

Nico closed the book gently.

“Your mother didn’t steal money, Tessa. She stole the evidence. She took the ledger to protect him.”

“Then why did Marcus say she owed his family money?”

Before Nico could answer, a small, terrified voice echoed from the doorway of the garage.

“Uncle Nico?”

We both spun around.

Standing in the rain, wearing a pink nightgown and clutching a stuffed rabbit, was Mia.

Nico’s six-year-old niece. Julian’s daughter.

She lived at the estate because Julian was too reckless to raise her.

Nico dropped the ledger and ran to her, sweeping her up into his arms.

“Mia, what are you doing outside? It’s freezing.”

Mia buried her face in his shoulder, shivering.

“A man came into my room,” she whimpered.

Nico froze.

“What man?”

“He said he was Laurel’s friend. He told me to come outside to see my daddy.”

My blood ran cold.

Marcus was in the basement with Frank.

Which meant Marcus hadn’t come alone.

Suddenly, the security lights above the garage shattered, plunging us into darkness.

The heavy garage doors began to rattle as someone tried to force them open from the outside.

Nico set Mia down behind him, shielding her with his body.

He reached under his jacket and pulled a sleek, black handgun from his waistband.

He didn’t look like an architect of a legitimate business empire anymore.

He looked exactly like his father’s son.

“Tessa,” Nico whispered, his eyes scanning the darkness. “Take Mia. Get into the house through the service stairs. Lock yourselves in the panic room behind my office.”

“What about you?”

“I’m going to kill whoever woke up my niece.”

The side door of the garage crashed open.

Three men in dark clothes stepped in, holding suppressed weapons.

Nico didn’t hesitate.

He fired twice.

The first man dropped instantly.

“Go!” Nico shouted.

I grabbed Mia’s hand, scooped up the ledger from the workbench, and ran.

We burst through the service door into the kitchen.

The house was eerily silent.

No guards. No staff.

Marcus’s men had bypassed security.

I ran toward the back staircase, pulling Mia tightly against me.

We reached the second floor hallway.

Nico’s office was at the end of the corridor.

Just a few more feet.

But as we reached the door, someone stepped out of the shadows.

It was Laurel.

She wasn’t crying anymore.

She was holding a small silver revolver, and it was pointed directly at my chest.

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