Chapter 4 – THE PADLOCK

We drove back to Chicago at ninety miles an hour.

The silence in the SUV wasn’t empty this time; it was loaded, vibrating with a terrifying kind of hope.

Luca had lost his mother, his brother, and his past to a lie. Now, he was racing toward a nephew he never knew existed.

I was reeling. My sister. My quiet, studious sister was hiding a child in our basement.

We pulled up to my small, run-down house in the South Side suburbs just before 2:00 AM.

The porch light was broken. The front yard was covered in a fresh layer of snow.

“Stay behind me,” Luca said, pulling a sleek black handgun from the glove compartment.

“You can’t take a gun in there,” I panicked. “My dad is sick. Chloe will be terrified.”

“If the Bellinis figured out who you are, they might already be here.”

He was right.

I unlocked the front door. The house was dead quiet.

“Chloe?” I called out.

No answer.

I rushed to her bedroom. Empty. The bed hadn’t been slept in.

Panic seized my chest. “Dad?”

I ran to the kitchen. The door leading to the basement was closed. The heavy metal padlock was still in place.

Luca examined the lock. He didn’t ask for the key. He simply raised his gun and brought the heavy steel butt down violently on the mechanism. Three strikes and the padlock snapped.

He kicked the door open.

We descended the wooden stairs, the ancient steps groaning beneath us.

The basement was usually dark, damp, and smelled of old oil.

Now, it was softly lit by string lights.

Rugs covered the concrete floor. A space heater hummed warmly in the corner.

And sitting on a small cot, wrapped in a faded quilt, was a little boy.

He had wild dark hair and massive, frightened brown eyes. He looked exactly like the six-year-old version of the man standing next to me.

Beside him, clutching a baseball bat with trembling hands, was my sister, Chloe.

“Emma?” she gasped, lowering the bat.

“Chloe, what have you done?” I asked, tears spilling down my face.

She looked at Luca. Her eyes went wide. She had clearly seen pictures of Julian, and seeing Luca was like seeing a ghost.

“He’s safe,” Chloe whispered to the boy. “It’s okay, Leo. This is the man your papa told us about.”

Luca slowly lowered his weapon. He tucked it into his waistband.

He dropped to his knees on the dusty rug so he was at eye level with the child.

The feared mafia boss. The ruthless businessman.

He looked completely fragile.

“Hello, Leo,” Luca said, his voice breaking.

The boy pulled the quilt tighter. “Are you Uncle Luca?”

“Yes.”

“Papa said you would come when the snow got deep.”

Luca’s jaw tightened as he fought back a sob. “Where is your Papa, Leo?”

The boy reached under his pillow. He pulled out a worn, heavy leather wallet.

He handed it to Luca.

Luca opened it. Inside wasn’t money.

It was a stack of train tickets. And a single photograph.

Not of Julian.

Of Vanessa Bellini. Handing a massive duffel bag to a man with a scarred face.

“He said the bad lady took him,” Leo said simply. “He said he had to go away so she wouldn’t hurt me.”

Luca stared at the photograph. His expression shifted from grief to something much darker. Pure, absolute vengeance.

“She didn’t just fake his death,” Luca said quietly. “She’s been holding him hostage to keep the trust money.”

Before I could process that, heavy footsteps sounded on the wooden floorboards upstairs.

Men’s boots. Multiple pairs.

Chloe screamed softly.

Luca stood up, pulling his gun again.

“Emma, take them to the storm cellar out back,” he ordered, his eyes fixed on the basement stairs.

“What about you?”

“I’m going to have a word with my fiancée’s father.”

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