Chapter 6 - The Ghost from the Ohio River
The scarred man writhing on the wet concrete of the dockyard was someone I prayed I would never lay eyes on again in this lifetime.
Vince Russo.
A low-level enforcer and debt collector from my hometown outside Cleveland, a man who had made my life a living hell before I packed a single suitcase, took my infant daughter, and ran across state lines into the protective anonymity of New York City.
Through the tinted window of the Maybach, I watched in frozen horror as Marco Bellini pinned the struggling man's arm behind his back with brutal efficiency, pressing his boot heel firmly into the back of Vince’s jacket.
“Who sent you?” Marco demanded, his voice carrying clearly across the cold dockyard air. “Talk, or your next breath will be your last.”
“I didn't work for nobody!” Vince spat out, his voice cracking with panic and pain as blood dripped from his split lip onto the oil-slicked asphalt. “I was just tracking her! The boss wants what she took before she skipped town!”
My blood ran instantly cold. The breath vanished from my lungs.
What I took?
I had never stolen a single penny from anyone in my life. I had fled Ohio with nothing but the clothes on my back, my savings account drained down to thirty-two dollars, and a heart full of terror.
Unless...
My mind flashed back frantically to the final night I spent in my old apartment—the night I found my late father’s old ledger hidden in the floorboards of our crumbling family workshop.
A ledger containing detailed financial records, extortion receipts, and signed confessions linking half the corrupt politicians and loan sharks in the Midwest to local syndicate operations—including Vince Russo and his associates.
I thought I had left it behind in the rush of escaping.
Had I accidentally packed it inside the bottom lining of my old canvas suitcase?
Before my racing thoughts could spiral further, the rear door of the Maybach clicked open.
I flinched violently as a large, warm hand grasped the edge of the doorframe.
Dominic Moretti wasn't on the comms anymore. He had arrived.
He stood in the freezing rain, refusing an umbrella, his dark wool coat draped loosely over his broad shoulders, his white shirt collar slightly damp. His piercing dark eyes swept over Lily, who was still clutching her stuffed rabbit, before locking entirely onto my terrified, pale face.
“Clara,” Dominic said, his voice terrifyingly quiet, devoid of all warmth. “It seems your little girl wasn't just imagining things after all. Care to tell me why a low-level muscle from an Ohio loan shark outfit has been tracking my household for the past fourteen days?”
I opened my mouth to speak, but no words came out. My throat was completely dry, choked by the crushing weight of the secret I had carried for four agonizing years.
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If Dominic found out I had brought a war straight to his doorstep—if he realized I had hidden a stolen syndicate ledger inside his pristine, untouchable estate—he wouldn't just throw me out.
He would destroy me.
