Chapter 9
Detective Hall broke the lock.
The door swung inward.
A woman stood in the corner holding a metal pipe in both hands.
Her hair was streaked with gray.
Her red scarf was missing.
Her face was thin.
But when she saw Rocco, the pipe fell.
He stepped inside like a man walking into a dream he feared would vanish.
“Alina.”
She covered her mouth.
“You’re alive.”
“So are you.”
They reached each other at the same time.
I turned away because the sound they made felt too private for strangers.
Fifteen years of stolen life collapsed in one embrace.
Then Alina pulled back.
“The girl,” Rocco said. “Our daughter.”
Alina’s face changed.
Fear returned.
“They took her.”
Rocco closed his eyes.
“Who?”
“Your brother first. Then Dominic after he died.”
Dominic shouted from the hallway, “Liar!”
Alina flinched.
Rocco turned.
One look silenced Dominic.
Detective Hall stepped closer to Alina.
“Do you know where your daughter is now?”
Alina shook her head.
“They moved her when she was six. I only saw her once after that.”
“What is her name?”
Alina’s lips trembled.
“Serena.”
My stomach dropped.
I knew that name.
Serena Vale.
Dominic’s fiancée.
The woman who floated through the club in diamonds and never looked at staff.
“She’s upstairs,” I whispered.
Everyone turned to me.
“She came in with Dominic earlier.”
Alina gripped Rocco’s arm.
“She doesn’t know. They told her I abandoned her.”
Rocco looked toward the stairs.
May you like
“Then we tell her now.”
But before we could move, a gunshot cracked from above.
