Chapter 4
Rocco asked me to wheel the empty chair upstairs.
I didn’t understand why until we reached Dominic’s office.
The walls were covered in photographs.
Dominic shaking hands with politicians.
Dominic beside celebrities.
Dominic smiling beneath the portrait of Rocco.
The portrait looked nothing like the man beside me.
In the painting, Rocco was young, sharp, untouchable.
In real life, his face carried years of pain.
But his eyes were stronger than anything on that wall.
“Lock the door,” he told me.
I did.
Dominic slammed his palm against it from the hallway.
“Uncle! Open this door!”
Rocco ignored him.
He crossed to the desk and pressed his thumb beneath the brass nameplate.
A hidden drawer clicked open.
My mouth fell open.
Inside was an old key, a black ledger, and a photograph.
Rocco picked up the photo first.
His face changed.
A woman stood beside him in front of the club.
She was beautiful.
Warm-eyed.
Pregnant.
“This was my wife,” he said.
“What happened to her?”
He swallowed.
“Dominic’s father told the world she left me. Then he told me she died.”
My chest tightened.
“Did she?”
“I don’t know.”
Outside, Dominic shouted for security.
No one came.
Rocco opened the ledger.
His fingers moved over the pages.
“Fifteen years ago, I discovered my brother was laundering money through the club. I planned to turn everything over to federal investigators. That night, I was hit by a car.”
“Your brother?”
Rocco looked at the door.
“He was too polished to drive the car himself.”
My stomach twisted.
“Dominic?”
“He was young then. Old enough to know. Young enough to obey.”
Dominic stopped banging.
That scared me more.
Rocco pulled a recorder from the drawer.
Old.
Dusty.
He pressed play.
May you like
A woman’s voice filled the room.
“Rocco, if you find this, they took our baby.”
