Chapter 4 - The Mafia Boss Who Terrified Chicago Took Me to the Hospital Where My Mother DisappearedWe traveled before sunrise.

No convoy.

Just Dante, me, and one driver.

The hospital was outside Chicago.

Abandoned.

The windows were boarded.

The building had been closed for years.

"Why here?"

"Your mother came here."

"When?"

"The week she disappeared."

I stared.

"How do you know?"

"Your father told my father."

Inside, the hallway smelled like dust and disinfectant.

Room 214.

That number had been written on my mother's photograph.

We entered.

Nothing.

Then Dante touched the wall.

A loose panel.

Behind it—

a metal box.

Inside was a tape.

And a letter.

My hands shook.

I opened it.

My mother's handwriting.

Elena,

If you are reading this, then I failed to come home.

I cried.

Dante stood quietly.

The letter continued.

Do not trust Raymond Vale.

Do not trust your father's business partners.

And never trust the man who says he loves you while asking for the ledger.

I looked at Dante.

He said nothing.

There was more.

The ledger is not what they think.

It does not contain money.

It contains proof.

And the proof can destroy everyone.

I kept reading.

I am alive.

My breath stopped.

Dante took the letter.

He read.

He looked at me.

"She survived."

"But where?"

A noise came from the hallway.

We turned.

A man ran.

Dante chased him.

I followed.

We reached the parking lot.

The man escaped in a car.

But he dropped something.

A key.

On it was a symbol.

A black rose.

Dante stared.

"I know that."

"What is it?"

"Vale's private network."

We returned to the mansion.

Dante questioned one of his oldest men.

The symbol meant one thing.

An old warehouse near the river.

We went there at night.

Inside were dozens of files.

Names.

Photos.

My mother.

My father.

Dante's father.

And a man I didn't recognize.

"Who is that?"

Dante stared.

"My uncle."

I froze.

"He's alive?"

"He was supposed to be."

"What happened?"

"He disappeared twenty years ago."

I looked at the photographs.

He had been working with Vale.

Then another image.

My mother.

Holding a baby.

Me.

The date was wrong.

Twenty-five years ago.

I was six.

My mother had been holding me.

But the photo was taken three years later.

Someone had been following us.

Watching.

Tracking.

I felt sick.

Then I saw another photograph.

Dante.

As a boy.

My mother standing beside him.

I stared.

"She knew you."

"Yes."

"How?"

"My father trusted her."

"Then why didn't you know me?"

"I didn't."

I touched the photograph.

"She helped your family."

"Yes."

"She might have known what happened to your father."

Dante went silent.

Then:

"Maybe."

A door slammed.

Someone had entered.

We hid.

Two men walked in.

One spoke.

"Vale wants the girl alive."

The other replied:

"Moretti is getting too close."

Dante's jaw tightened.

The men left.

I looked at him.

"They're afraid of you."

"They should be."

Then he looked at me.

"But I'm afraid of something too."

"What?"

"Losing you."

I didn't know what to say.

He turned away.

I realized then that something between us had changed.

Not trust.

Not yet.

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Something more dangerous.

Something neither of us was ready to name.