THE MAFIA BOSS’S FIANCÉE CALLED ME “A STUPID LITTLE MAID”

Claire felt the floor tilt beneath her feet.

The man in the photograph, smiling with a cigar clamped between his teeth and his arm slung possessively around a younger Vanessa, was easily recognizable. His face had been splashed across the Chicago Tribune for months after the fatal crash.

Dominic Falcone. The youngest son of the rival syndicate.

The man who claimed his brakes had failed at the intersection. The man who had walked away from the crash with a bruised rib while Sofia Moretti bled to death in the crushed wreckage of her sedan.

“She knew him,” Luca breathed, the words barely making it past his lips. His thumbs clamped down on the edges of the photograph so hard the glossy paper began to tear. “She’s been with him this entire time.”

The crash had been ruled a tragic accident by a judge deeply embedded in the Falcone payroll. Luca had spent the last eight years systematically destroying the Falcone empire’s legitimate businesses in retaliation, nearly bankrupting them.

Now, the horrifying truth was staring him in the face. It wasn’t an accident. It was a hit. And Vanessa was the inside agent sent to finish the job by infiltrating his home, marrying him, and claiming half his empire.

“Dad?” Matteo’s small voice broke the silence.

Luca snapped out of his trance. He quickly shoved the photograph into his breast pocket, hiding it from his son. The darkness that usually lurked at the edges of Luca’s eyes had consumed them entirely.

“Claire,” Luca said, his voice devoid of all emotion. It was the voice of the mob boss the city feared. “Pack a bag for Matteo. A big one. Pack your things too.”

“Sir?”

“You are taking him to the safe house in Lake Geneva. Tonight. Elias will drive you. You don’t tell anyone where you are going, you don’t use your cell phone, and you do not open the door for anyone except me.”

“Dad, I want to stay with you!” Matteo cried, grabbing Luca’s arm.

Luca knelt and pulled his son into a fierce, suffocating hug. “You have to go with Claire, buddy. Just for a little while. I have to clean up a mess here.”

“Will you fix the garage?”

“I will fix everything,” Luca promised.

Ten minutes later, Claire and Matteo were in the back of an armored SUV speeding away from the mansion. The rain had started to fall, blurring the city lights. Claire looked at her burned hand, now tightly wrapped in white gauze courtesy of the estate nurse.

Her heart was hammering against her ribs. She was just a housekeeper. A girl from the Southside trying to pay off her mother’s medical debts. Now, she was fleeing into the night with a mafia heir.

Matteo fell asleep against her shoulder, exhausted by the trauma of the evening.

Claire rested her head against the cool glass of the window, trying to process the madness. Vanessa was a Falcone spy. She had orchestrated the destruction of Antonio’s garage to find the metal tin.

Why the tin? Claire thought. Why was Sofia’s watch in the workbench?

She gently shifted Matteo’s weight. As she did, something hard pressed against her hip. She reached into the pocket of her housekeeping apron.

It was the half-burned wooden box. Luca must have slipped it into her pocket when he hugged Matteo goodbye.

Claire carefully opened the singed lid.

Inside, in the narrow slot meant for a fountain pen, was a small, tightly rolled piece of parchment. It hadn’t been there before. Luca must have hidden it inside before handing it over.

She unrolled it under the dim reading light of the SUV.

It was a handwritten note from Luca.

Claire. Trust no one. Not even Elias. When you reach the safe house, check the false bottom of the box. Protect him. - L.

Claire’s blood ran cold. She looked at the back of Elias’s head in the driver’s seat. The big man was driving silently, his eyes flicking to the rearview mirror every few seconds.

If Luca didn’t trust Elias, why did he send them with him?

Because Luca didn’t have a choice. He was surrounded by enemies in his own home.

Claire pressed her fingernail into the corner of the wooden box, right where Matteo had used the scrap wood from the workbench. With a soft click, the false bottom popped loose.

Inside rested a heavy iron skeleton key and a child’s drawing.

Claire recognized the drawing instantly. It was a crude map Matteo had drawn in crayon years ago, showing the layout of the Lake Geneva safe house. But there was a giant red ‘X’ marked over the old boat house on the property.

She looked up. Elias was staring at her in the rearview mirror.

“Everything alright back there, Claire?” Elias asked, his voice entirely too casual.

“Fine,” Claire lied, slipping the key into her bra and closing the box. “Just cold.”

“We’ll be there in twenty minutes,” Elias said. He reached down and locked the rear doors from the master console. The heavy metallic clunk echoed in the cabin. “Then we can all finally get some rest.”

Claire looked out the window. They were no longer on the highway heading north toward Lake Geneva.