Chapter 6 - THE BLOOD TIE
The air in the warehouse seemed to vanish. Lydia knelt on the blood-stained concrete, her silk dress soaking up the freezing rainwater, staring at the little boy.
"Daddy?" Lydia whispered, the word feeling foreign on her tongue. She reached out a trembling hand. "Who... who are you, sweetheart?"
The boy clutched the wooden rosary so tightly his small knuckles turned white. "I'm Sammy. Daddy told me to hide when the bad men came. He said if he didn't come back, I had to find my big sister."
Lydia’s mind spun violently. A brother. She had a six-year-old half-brother. Her father had vanished six months ago, claiming he was going to Vegas to win back his debts, but he had been hiding this boy. Hiding him from the mob. Hiding him from her.
Dominic stepped forward, moving with a surprising, deliberate gentleness. He holstered his weapon and knelt beside Lydia, putting himself at eye level with the terrified child.
"Sammy," Dominic said, his gravelly voice softened to a quiet hum. "My name is Dominic. I'm a friend of your sister. Can you tell me what the bad men looked like?"
Sammy sniffled, wiping his nose with the sleeve of his oversized pajama top. He looked at Dominic, then pointed a trembling finger at the blood on the floor. "There was a lot of yelling. Daddy fought them. But the leader... he had a snake on his neck. A red snake."
Leo cursed under his breath behind them. "Paul. The club manager. He’s got a red viper tattooed behind his ear."
Lydia felt a fresh wave of nausea. Paul had handed her the poisoned tray tonight. Paul had orchestrated the hit on Dominic’s father. And Paul had just abducted her father.
"Did Paul say where they were going, Sammy?" Dominic asked patiently.
Sammy shook his head, fresh tears spilling over his dirty cheeks. "He just laughed. He told Daddy that the 'Onyx Room was closed for renovations.' Then they put a bag on Daddy’s head and dragged him away."
Dominic’s jaw set into stone. He stood up, shrugging off his heavy, bespoke Brioni overcoat. He draped it gently over Sammy’s shivering shoulders. The coat swallowed the boy whole, but the warmth of it made Sammy instantly cling to the luxurious fabric.
"Leo," Dominic commanded, his eyes burning with a cold, lethal fire. "Call the family. I want every single one of our men heavily armed and moving to the Onyx Room. Now."
"Dom, the Onyx Room is neutral territory. We hit it with an army, the Commission will go to war with us," Leo warned, pulling out his encrypted phone.
"Paul broke the neutrality the moment he poisoned my drink and took Arthur Bennett," Dominic said coldly. "Tonight, we burn the Onyx Room to the ground."
Dominic turned back to Lydia. She was still staring at Sammy, tears streaming down her face, overwhelmed by the crushing weight of the night. She had lost her normal life, found a brother she never knew existed, and was now standing at the epicenter of a mafia war.
Dominic reached down and offered her his hand.
Lydia looked at his large, scarred hand, then up into his icy blue eyes. They weren't cold anymore. They were fiercely protective.
She took his hand. He pulled her to her feet with effortless strength, pulling her slightly closer than necessary. For a second, the chaos of the world faded into the warmth radiating from his chest.
"I won't let them hurt him," Dominic murmured, a promise sworn in blood. "Either of them."
They rushed Sammy into the armored Escalade, cranking the heat. Lydia held the little boy against her chest, wrapping him in Dominic’s coat. Sammy buried his face in her neck, exhausted, the wooden rosary pressed between them.
As the SUV tore back toward Manhattan, Dominic’s encrypted phone buzzed.
He looked at the caller ID. The blood drained from his face.
He answered, putting it on speaker.
"Hello, Dominic," a raspy, wheezing voice echoed through the cabin. It wasn't Paul. It was older, darker.
It was Don Castellano.
"Castellano," Dominic said, his voice dropping to a dangerous whisper.
"I hear my rat of a manager made a mess of things tonight," Castellano rasped, followed by a wet cough. "Paul got greedy. Thought he could kill you, frame Bennett, and take my chair while I’m dying of lung cancer. He failed."
"Where is Paul?" Dominic demanded.
"Dead," Castellano replied casually. "I don't tolerate ambition in my ranks. But Paul was useful for one thing. He brought me Arthur Bennett. The accountant who stole my ledger."
Lydia gasped, clutching Sammy tighter.
"Let him go, old man," Dominic warned. "Your war is with me."
"My war is with the man who holds my secrets," Castellano corrected. "Bennett tells me his lovely daughter has my micro-chip. And that she’s currently riding in your backseat."
Lydia’s blood turned to ice. She looked at Dominic, panic rising in her chest.
"Here is the deal, Russo," Castellano said, the smile evident in his raspy voice. "You bring me the chip to Pier 40 in one hour. Just you, the girl, and the chip. You give me my ledger, I give you Bennett. You try to bring your army, and I mail Bennett to the girl in pieces."
A muffled scream echoed in the background of the call—Arthur Bennett.
"Dad!" Lydia screamed at the phone.
"One hour, Dominic. Or the girl is an orphan." The line went dead.
The silence in the SUV was absolute. Leo slammed his fist against the dashboard. "It’s a trap, Dom! A suicide mission. He gets the chip, he shoots you both, and he wins the war."
Dominic stared out the rain-streaked window, his jaw clenched so hard a muscle twitched in his cheek. He looked at Lydia. Her eyes were wide, begging him silently. She couldn't ask him to trade his life for her father's. But she couldn't lose her father.
"Marcus," Dominic finally said, his voice chillingly calm. "Change course. Pier 40."
Leo spun around. "Dom, you can't!"
"I’m not going in blind, Leo," Dominic said, pulling the black micro-SD chip from his pocket. He held it up to the dim cabin light. "Castellano wants his ledger to protect his empire. But what he doesn't know is... I don't give a damn about his empire."
Dominic rolled down the window of the speeding SUV.
Lydia screamed as Dominic casually tossed the micro-chip out the window. It bounced once on the wet asphalt and disappeared into the storm drains.
"Dominic, no!" Lydia cried, her heart shattering. "That was our only leverage! How do we save him now?"
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Dominic rolled the window back up, turning to her with a smile that was completely devoid of mercy.
"We aren't going to Pier 40 to make a trade, Lydia," Dominic said, drawing a secondary weapon from his ankle holster. "We’re going to end the Castellano family forever."
