Chapter 4 - ONE FAMILY AT A TIME
The second phone vibrated again.
Nico unlocked it using Serafina’s thumb before she could pull away.
There were almost no messages.
Whoever had configured the device knew how to erase history.
But one encrypted note remained in temporary storage.
Rafael read it over Nico’s shoulder.
Then stopped.
“What?”
Nico asked.
Rafael did not answer immediately.
“Read it.”
Rafael’s voice went flat.
“Old man completed.”
Teresa gripped the table.
Nico’s father had died four years earlier.
Heart failure.
Sudden.
Unexpected.
Rafael continued.
“Lucia completed.”
Nico stopped breathing.
His sister.
Three years earlier.
The crash.
“Boy unresolved.”
Tomas.
My skin turned cold.
Then Rafael read the last line.
“Groom after ceremony.”
Nobody spoke.
Nico looked at Serafina.
She did not deny it.
He walked toward her slowly.
“My father.”
Silence.
“My sister.”
Silence.
“My nephew.”
Her eyes flickered.
“And me.”
Serafina finally spoke.
“Your family has been destroying mine since before either of us was born.”
Nico’s voice dropped.
“So you came here to kill us.”
“I came here to finish something.”
Teresa slammed her hand against the table.
“You lived under this roof.”
Serafina looked at her.
“Yes.”
“You ate with us.”
“Yes.”
“Tomas called you Aunt Serena.”
For the first time, something cracked in Serafina’s expression.
But it disappeared.
Nico saw it too.
“Was my father murdered?”
Serafina looked at him.
“He had a heart condition.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
She leaned forward.
“Your father took medication every morning. For six months, one of those pills wasn’t what he thought it was.”
Teresa made a choking sound.
Nico became frighteningly still.
“Lucia?”
Serafina’s mouth tightened.
“She was supposed to die alone.”
Nico lunged forward.
Three men moved instinctively.
Not to protect Serafina.
To stop Nico from killing her before she could speak.
He stopped himself.
Barely.
“Tomas was in the car.”
“We didn’t know she had picked him up early.”
“You tried to kill my sister and almost killed a three-year-old boy.”
Serafina looked away.
That was the first thing she had not been able to face.
Nico spoke through clenched teeth.
“Who ran her off the road?”
Serafina said nothing.
“Tomas drew him.”
Nothing.
“Who is he?”
She looked toward the doorway.
Toward Rafael.
Only for half a second.
But I saw it.
And so did Nico.
Rafael’s hand moved toward the inside of his jacket.
I looked at his gloves.
Black leather.
Every day.
Every season.
Tomas’s drawing.
The red scars at the wrist.
My mouth went dry.
“Sir.”
Nico turned toward me.
I could barely speak.
“Why does Mr. Conti always wear gloves?”
Rafael’s face changed.
Nico froze.
Slowly, everyone looked toward the head of security.
Rafael smiled.
May you like
It was the first time I had ever seen him do it.
Then he locked the dining-room doors.
