**THE MAFIA BOSS’S FIANCÉE ORDERED ME TO SEND HIS MOTHER’S SISTER HOME THROUGH THE SERVICE HALL BEFORE THEIR ENGAGEMENT DINNER—BUT WHEN I WALKED HER INTO THE DINING ROOM STILL WEARING THE CORSAGE LUCA HAD SENT HER, HE STOOD UP AND SAID, “AUNT TERESA? I WAS TOLD YOU WERE SICK.”**

The marble hallway spun around me.

“What?” I breathed, staring at the tiny photograph on the floor. “How is that possible?”

Teresa leaned against the wall, her legs giving out. She slid down to the floor, her hands buried in her face.

“Elena was forced into an arranged marriage with Luca’s father,” Teresa wept quietly. “But before that... before she was married off to secure the families, she was in love with Carlo Morello.”

I sank down next to her. “They had a child?”

Teresa nodded, tears spilling through her fingers.

“A little girl. The families found out. They took the baby the night she was born. They told Elena the child died.”

“But Carlo took her,” I realized, the pieces locking into place with sickening clarity. “He raised her in secret.”

“Elena never knew,” Teresa sobbed. “She mourned that baby her whole life. She wore that watch every day until she died because she hid the only picture she ever took of the baby inside it.”

I picked up the watch with shaking hands.

Vanessa was Luca’s half-sister.

And she didn’t know.

Or did she?

“Does Vanessa know?” I asked urgently.

Teresa shook her head violently. “No! Carlo hated Elena for marrying another man. He raised Vanessa to hate the Moretti family. He told Vanessa her mother was a woman named Bellini who died in childbirth. He used his own daughter as a weapon to destroy her brother.”

My blood ran cold.

Vanessa was at the harbor right now, setting a trap to kill Luca. She thought she was avenging her father. She didn’t know she was about to murder her own brother.

“We have to tell him,” I said, scrambling to my feet. “We have to stop them.”

“Emma, no!” Teresa grabbed my skirt. “It’s too dangerous! The harbor is a war zone!”

“If Luca kills her, it will destroy him when he finds out the truth,” I said firmly. “I won’t let that happen.”

I ran to Leo’s room.

I opened the door quietly. The boy was fast asleep, clutching his teddy bear.

I locked the door from the outside using the master key on my housekeeping ring.

Then I looked at Teresa.

“Stay in the hallway. Guard this door. Don’t move until we get back.”

Before she could argue, I turned and sprinted down the stairs.

I ran through the ruined dining room, out the glass doors, and into the driveway. The air smelled like burnt rubber and gasoline from the exploded cars.

I found a black SUV still parked near the gates, the keys dangling in the ignition where one of the guards had abandoned it.

I jumped in, slammed it into gear, and sped toward the South Side harbor.

The drive took twenty minutes. It felt like hours.

When I arrived at the shipping yards, the rain had started again, slicking the massive metal containers in cold, dark water.

I turned off the headlights and rolled to a stop near the edge of Sector 4.

I crept out of the car.

The sound of the ocean hitting the docks masked my footsteps.

I ducked behind a stack of wooden pallets and peered into the clearing between the towering rows of shipping containers.

I saw container 404.

The heavy metal doors were swung wide open.

Inside, tied to a chair under a harsh work light, was Mateo, the teenage bakery boy. He was terrified, gagged with duct tape.

Standing in front of the container was Vanessa.

She was holding a gun, pointed directly at the boy.

And twenty feet away, stepping out of the shadows with his hands raised empty, was Luca.

“You came alone,” Vanessa smiled, her red dress plastered to her body by the rain. “How heroic. And stupid.”

“Let the boy go, Vanessa,” Luca said calmly. “He has nothing to do with this.”

“He has everything to do with this!” she screamed over the wind. “He’s family to Teresa. And Teresa is family to you. I’m going to make you watch him die, Luca. Just like you made my father die.”

Luca took a slow step forward. “Carlo used you, Vanessa. He threw you under the bus in my dining room. You know he did.”

“Shut up!” she shrieked, cocking the gun.

I couldn’t wait any longer.

I stepped out from behind the pallets.

“Vanessa, stop!” I screamed.

Both of them snapped their heads toward me.

Luca’s face contorted in panic. “Emma! Get out of here!”

Vanessa laughed. “Oh, perfect. The little maid came to die too.”

She swung the gun away from the boy and pointed it at my chest.

I didn’t stop walking. I walked directly toward her, holding my hand out in the rain.

Clutched in my palm was the silver watch.

“Vanessa,” I shouted, my voice echoing off the metal containers. “Carlo wasn’t avenging your mother. He was lying to you about who your mother was.”