Chapter 2 - The Handle from the Inside
The brass handle of the front door turned slowly, deliberately.
It was turning from the inside.
Matteo’s men immediately drew their weapons, the sharp metallic clicks echoing across the silent dining room. I backed away, my heart hammering against my ribs, my eyes locked on the heavy mahogany door.
We had watched two of Matteo’s guards lock that door three minutes ago. Neither of them was standing near it now.
Instead, a man in a perfectly tailored charcoal suit stepped out of the shadows near the coat check. He wasn't one of the guards. He was a customer who had been sitting quietly in the corner booth all evening. He reached out, disengaged the deadbolt, and pulled the door open.
A rush of cold Chicago air swept into the restaurant.
A man walked in.
He looked like an older, sharper version of Matteo. His hair was completely silver, his eyes a pale, piercing blue. He wore a cashmere overcoat and leaned slightly on a silver-handled cane.
"Put the guns away, Luca," the man said. His voice was smooth, carrying a dangerous kind of warmth. "You know better than to aim at family."
Luca didn't lower his weapon. He looked at Matteo.
Matteo stood perfectly still, his jaw clenched so tightly a muscle feathered beneath his ear. "What are you doing here, Domenico?"
Domenico De Luca smiled. It didn't reach his eyes. "I own half this restaurant, little brother. I go where I please. Especially when I hear someone tried to poison you over the veal."
I looked between the two brothers. The tension in the room was thick enough to choke on.
Domenico’s eyes drifted past Matteo and landed on me. His smile vanished.
"Well," Domenico murmured, stepping further into the light. "I suppose ghosts don't stay buried forever."
"Don't look at her," Matteo commanded, his voice dropping to a lethal register.
Domenico ignored him. He walked toward the table, his cane clicking rhythmically against the hardwood floor. He stopped and looked down at the photograph lying next to the untouched plate of food. The picture of my mother, twenty-four and pregnant, standing next to a young Matteo.
Domenico picked it up. He turned it over and read the three words written on the back.
He let out a dry, humorless laugh.
"Did you read this, Matteo?" Domenico asked, tossing the photo onto the white tablecloth.
"I was about to," Matteo said coldly.
"It says, 'He is yours,'" Domenico announced, looking directly at me.
My breath caught. He is yours.
"But that's impossible," Domenico continued, stepping closer to me, his pale eyes searching my face. "Because Isabella didn't have a son. She had a daughter."
I stared at him, my mind spinning. My mother had raised me alone. There was no brother. There was no son.
"She only had me," I whispered, my voice trembling.
Domenico tilted his head. "Are you sure about that, sweetheart? Because twenty-six years ago, Isabella vanished from this city heavily pregnant. If you are twenty-five, the math doesn't quite work, does it?"
My blood ran cold. The math. My mother was heavily pregnant twenty-six years ago. I was twenty-five.
Answer One, Open Two. I wasn't the baby in the photograph.
Matteo grabbed Domenico’s shoulder, turning him roughly. "Get away from her. If you had anything to do with what was put on that plate tonight—"
"I didn't," Domenico interrupted, his voice turning vicious. "But whoever did wanted to send a message. Not to you. To her."
Domenico pointed his silver cane at my chest. Specifically, at the small, tarnished silver locket resting against my collarbone.
"Where did you get that?" Domenico demanded.
"My mother gave it to me," I stammered, covering the metal with my hand.
"Open it," Domenico ordered.
May you like
"No," Matteo said, stepping between us.
"Open it, Matteo!" Domenico shouted, losing his polished composure. "Because if that locket holds what I think it does, this girl isn't Isabella's daughter at all. She's the reason our father is dead."
