Chapter 6
Lorenzo threw himself in front of me before the second shot.
The sound exploded through the crypt.
Stone dust fell from the ceiling.
I grabbed his arm.
“Are you hit?”
“No.”
Another shot cracked above.
Marco shouted.
Then Rosa screamed Lorenzo’s name.
He moved toward the stairs.
I grabbed the back of his jacket.
“If you die dramatically before explaining the trafficking route, I will haunt you.”
He looked back.
Even in the dark, I saw the corner of his mouth move.
“Motivating.”
We climbed fast.
At the top, chaos had swallowed the chapel.
Candles overturned.
Guards shouting.
Dominic Romano on the floor with blood on his sleeve.
Marco wrestling a man in a gray suit.
Rosa standing near the pew with a small pistol in both hands.
I froze.
Rosa Duca looked seventy-nine until she did not.
The man on the floor groaned.
Lorenzo kicked the weapon away.
“Who sent you?”
The man spat blood.
“Old family.”
Lorenzo crouched.
“I am the old family.”
Rosa’s voice shook.
“Vittorio’s council.”
Lorenzo turned.
“What council?”
Dominic sat up, clutching his arm.
“The men who kept the routes alive after your father died.”
I stared at him.
“Routes for what?”
Dominic looked at me.
“People. Money. Evidence. Whatever paid.”
My stomach turned.
“And Bianca?”
“My daughter found out. She tried to leave. They staged her breakdown and used her to scare Lorenzo’s brides away.”
Bianca’s warnings.
The photos.
The call.
She had not been my enemy.
She had been the first woman trapped.
Lorenzo’s phone rang.
Marco answered, then held it out.
“It’s Ethan.”
Lorenzo put it on speaker.
Ethan was breathing hard.
“Your ex is annoying,” he said.
“Where is Bianca?” I demanded.
“She ran.”
Relief hit me so hard I almost sat down.
Ethan continued.
“But she left something behind.”
A video came through.
Bianca was in a storage room, crying into the camera.
“If this reaches Amelia, I’m sorry. I sent the photos because I thought leaving would save you. It didn’t save me.”
She lifted a file.
“My father helped Vittorio. Rosa paid to hide victims. Lorenzo was kept ignorant because ignorance kept him controllable.”
The camera shook.
“Ethan is not working alone. He was hired by Amelia’s ex-client records. Someone from her bakery.”
I stopped breathing.
“My bakery?”
Ethan laughed through the phone.
“Guess who introduced me to the buyer, sweetheart.”
The answer hit before he said it.
“Tessa,” I whispered.
My assistant.
My friend.
The woman who cried in my office.
The woman who told me Ethan took the red ledger.
The woman who handed me the apron key.
Ethan said, “She always did hate being second to frosting.”
The line went dead.
I sat on the pew because my legs stopped cooperating.
Lorenzo knelt in front of me.
“Amelia.”
“She was with me for five years.”
“I know.”
“She held my hand when Dad died.”
His face softened.
“Sometimes betrayal enters through the door grief leaves open.”
I hated that sentence.
Because it was true.
We raced back to Milwaukee.
This time Rosa stayed behind under guard, not because Lorenzo trusted her, but because he did not.
Dominic went to the hospital.
Marco drove.
Lorenzo sat beside me, the metal case between us like a bomb.
My bakery lights were on when we arrived.
Tessa stood inside by the counter.
Ethan stood beside her.
So did two men I had never seen.
Tessa held my father’s red ledger in her arms.
Her face crumpled when she saw me.
“Amelia.”
I walked in before Lorenzo could stop me.
“Don’t.”
She flinched.
“Please let me explain.”
“Did you sell my father’s records?”
Her eyes filled.
“I didn’t know what they were at first.”
“At first?”
Ethan smiled.
“She knew enough.”
Tessa turned on him.
“You said nobody would get hurt.”
“Oh, sweetheart. That’s what people say when they want permission to hurt someone.”
I stared at her.
“Why?”
Her mouth trembled.
“My brother owed money. The men who came said your father had stolen from the Ducas. They said if I found the ledger, they’d forgive the debt.”
“You could have told me.”
“They had photos of him.”
I closed my eyes.
Pressure points.
Always pressure points.
Lorenzo stepped forward.
“Who hired you?”
One of the men reached into his coat.
Lorenzo moved first.
Fast for someone his size.
He slammed the man into the pastry case.
Glass cracked.
Ethan grabbed Tessa and pulled a knife.
I went cold.
Of course he hid behind a woman.
He always did.
“Back up,” Ethan snapped.
Tessa sobbed.
“I’m sorry.”
I looked at her.
“Then step on his foot.”
Her eyes widened.
Ethan looked confused.
Tessa drove her heel down.
Hard.
Ethan shouted.
Lorenzo crossed the room and hit him once.
Ethan crashed into the display rack.
Cookie tins scattered everywhere.
Marco and the guards took the other men down.
Tessa collapsed behind the counter.
I stood over Ethan.
For years, he made me feel small.
Now he looked small on my bakery floor, surrounded by broken biscotti.
He glared up at me.
“You think he loves you? Men like Lorenzo don’t love women like you.”
I knelt.
“No, Ethan. Men like you don’t.”
Police sirens screamed outside.
Then Rosa called.
Her voice was shaking.
“Lorenzo. Bianca came to the estate.”
Lorenzo went still.
May you like
Rosa continued.
“She brought a child.”
