Chapter 3 - THE FILE WITH MY NAME
My father died when I was eleven.
That was the truth I had carried for fifteen years.
A construction accident in Newark.
A steel beam.
Wrong place, wrong time.
My mother received a settlement that barely paid the funeral bills.
We moved to Cleveland before the first anniversary because she could not stand passing the highway exit that led to his old job site.
I remembered my father in pieces.
His hands smelled like coffee and machine oil.
He sang badly in the car.
He called me Mouse because I used to hide crackers in my pockets.
He had a tattoo of a compass on his left shoulder.
I had never doubted the accident.
Until Isabella Rossi sat beside my hospital bed and told me it was a lie.
“My father was murdered?” I asked.
She did not flinch.
“Yes.”
My mother stood at the window.
She had come up from cardiology twenty minutes earlier after Isabella requested a family conversation.
Now she looked smaller than I had ever seen her.
“Mama?”
Tears filled her eyes.
“I wanted you safe.”
“From what?”
She looked at Dominic.
He had entered behind Isabella and remained near the door.
I hated that he was there.
I needed him there.
Both feelings existed at once.
“Tell me,” I said.
My mother sat.
“Your father’s name wasn’t Daniel Bennett when I met him.”
My skin went cold.
“What was it?”
“Daniel Moretti.”
Dominic lowered his eyes.
The name meant something to him.
Of course it did.
Everything did.
My mother continued.
“He worked for the Rossi family.”
I looked at Isabella.
“How?”
“Accounting,” she said.
I almost laughed.
“My father was an accountant for the mafia?”
Isabella’s expression tightened.
“He was an accountant for Rossi Shipping.”
“That's not an answer.”
“No,” Dominic said. “It isn’t.”
He stepped forward.
“Your father handled legitimate books and private books.”
My mouth went dry.
“What are private books?”
“No.” My mother turned toward him. “You don't need to—”
“Yes,” I snapped. “I do.”
Dominic held my gaze.
“Records of payments, debts, favors, bribes, and agreements people did not want written down.”
I stared at him.
“Criminal records.”
“Yes.”
The room seemed to tilt.
My father.
The man who taught me long division with jelly beans.
The man who built my science fair volcano.
Private books.
“Why was he killed?”
Dominic looked at Isabella.
She answered.
“Victor Costa.”
I closed my eyes.
Of course.
The same name.
Again.
“Costa was younger then,” Isabella said. “Hungry. Impatient. He was stealing from one of our port businesses through shell contractors. Your father found it.”
“What did he do?”
“He copied the records.”
“Why?”
“Insurance.”
Dominic moved closer to the bed.
“Daniel planned to take your mother and you away.”
My mother began crying silently.
“He promised me Florida,” she whispered. “He said we would disappear somewhere warm.”
“He never made it,” I said.
“No.”
The word broke her.
I wanted to reach for her, but my arm hurt too badly.
Isabella did it for me.
She took my mother's hand.
That gesture told me there was history between them too.
“How much did you know?” I asked Isabella.
“Not enough soon enough.”
“Did your family kill him?”
“No.”
The answer came from Dominic.
Flat.
Immediate.
I looked at him.
“How can you be certain?”
“Because my father spent three years trying to find the man who did.”
“And?”
“He found the driver.”
My mother made a small sound.
Dominic continued.
“The construction accident was staged. The driver confessed he was paid by a Costa intermediary.”
“What happened to him?”
Dominic did not answer.
I understood anyway.
I looked away.
This was the world I had been dropped into.
No court dates.
No headlines.
Confessions that ended men.
I hated it.
And my father had lived inside it.
“Why did you have a file on me?”
Dominic's face tightened.
Finally.
The question beneath every other question.
He reached for the brown folder on my table.
Opened it.
Inside were photographs.
Me at nineteen outside a courthouse.
Me graduating from community college.
My mother leaving a cardiology clinic.
Our old apartment.
A copy of my birth certificate.
Bank records.
Employment history.
I felt violated.
“How long?”
“Seven years.”
The answer knocked the air out of me.
“You've watched me for seven years?”
“Not continuously.”
“That is not better.”
“No.”
“Why?”
He removed one photograph from the folder.
My father.
Younger than I remembered him.
Standing beside a man I recognized from old newspapers.
Antonio Rossi.
Dominic's father.
Between them was a metal lockbox.
“Your father left something behind,” Dominic said.
“The private books?”
“Part of them.”
“Where?”
“That is what everyone wants to know.”
I stared at the photograph.
“Everyone?”
“Costa believes Daniel hid a ledger containing enough evidence to destroy half his organization and expose several public officials.”
“And you?”
“I believe it too.”
“So you watched me because you thought I knew where it was.”
His silence answered.
My anger burned cleaner than pain.
“You used my mother's medical records to search for clues?”
“No.”
“They're in the file.”
“Because when Ellen’s heart condition worsened, Costa's people began asking questions around Cleveland.”
My mother looked up sharply.
“You knew?”
Dominic nodded.
“I had men watching from a distance.”
“Why didn't you tell us?” I demanded.
“Because if I approached you openly, Costa would know the ledger mattered.”
“And instead you just stalked me.”
“Yes.”
I hated how honestly he said it.
No excuses.
No softening.
Just yes.
“Did you know I would be at the Aster Crown?”
“No.”
“Did you put me there?”
“No.”
“Was the shooting connected to me?”
“No. Isabella was the target.”
“Then my saving her was coincidence.”
“Yes.”
I leaned back against the pillow.
Seven years watched from the shadows.
One accidental shift.
Seven bullets.
One marriage I never approved.
My life suddenly looked less like a life and more like a board someone else had been moving pieces across.
“I want out,” I said.
Dominic's eyes hardened.
“Out of what?”
“Your protection. Your marriage. Your file. All of it.”
My mother whispered, “Mara.”
“No.”
I looked at her.
“I love you. But no more lies.”
Then I looked at Dominic.
“You want the ledger? Find it without me.”
He nodded once.
“Fine.”
I blinked.
“Fine?”
“I'll annul the marriage.”
Isabella turned sharply.
“Dominic.”
He ignored her.
“And when the doctors release you, if you still want to leave, I won't stop you.”
I searched his face.
There was something there I did not understand.
Not anger.
Not relief.
Fear.
“What's the catch?”
“No catch.”
“That's a lie.”
He moved closer.
“Costa sent a message this morning.”
My stomach tightened.
“What message?”
Dominic took a phone from his pocket.
On the screen was a photograph.
My mother's old Cleveland apartment.
The front door painted red.
Across it, in black spray paint, were four words.
BRING ME DANIEL'S LEDGER.
May you like
Under the photograph was another sentence.
OR I FINISH HIS FAMILY.
