Chapter 3 - THE NAME EMILY HAD NOT SAID IN NINETEEN YEARS
“My father’s name was Matthew Davis.”
The sentence seemed to rearrange the room.
Dante said nothing.
Tommy quietly stepped backward.
I looked at the payment screen again.
Matthew Davis.
Recipient contact.
Clara Marino’s handwritten authorization.
Nine years of payments.
“I haven’t spoken to him in nineteen years,” I said.
Dante’s face remained unreadable.
“Why?”
“He left.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“It’s the only one I have.”
My father had disappeared six months after my mother died.
No goodbye.
No forwarding address.
No explanation.
My brother Ethan had been five.
I had been twelve.
One day Matthew Davis existed.
The next day, he did not.
Our aunt raised us afterward.
I had spent years being angry.
Then tired.
Then indifferent.
Or at least I told myself I was indifferent.
Dante pointed at the screen.
“Clara knew him.”
“Apparently.”
“You didn’t know that?”
“No.”
“You expect me to believe your father received millions from my organization for nine years and you somehow ended up at my desk by coincidence?”
There it was.
The accusation.
Not shouted.
Dante did not shout.
That made it worse.
I folded my arms.
“I applied through an employment agency.”
“Which one?”
“Harper Executive.”
“Who referred you?”
“No one.”
Dante looked toward Tommy.
“Pull her hiring file.”
Tommy hesitated.
I looked at him.
“Go.”
He went.
Dante and I stood alone near my desk.
Rain streaked the windows.
I could hear the elevator machinery down the hall.
“You think I came here because of my father?”
“I think I don’t know what to think.”
“That makes two of us.”
He stared at me.
“Where is Matthew Davis now?”
“I don’t know.”
“Did he know Clara?”
“I said I don’t know.”
His jaw tightened.
“And Ethan?”
My entire body changed.
“What about my brother?”
“Does he know?”
“No.”
“You’re sure?”
I stepped toward Dante.
“You can question me. You can investigate my father. You can tear apart every financial record I’ve ever touched.”
I pointed toward his office.
“But you stay away from Ethan.”
Something moved in his expression.
Not anger.
Recognition.
Family.
“He lives in a residential facility?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“That is none of your business.”
Dante let the silence stretch.
Then nodded.
“All right.”
That surprised me.
Tommy returned carrying a thin personnel file.
He handed it to Dante.
Dante opened it.
My application.
References.
Background check.
Offer letter.
Then he stopped.
“What?”
I asked.
He pulled out a yellow sticky note attached to my original résumé.
No signature.
Three handwritten words.
HIRE THIS ONE.
Tommy frowned.
“That wasn’t there when I handled onboarding.”
Dante looked at me.
“I’ve never seen it.”
He turned the note over.
Nothing.
“Who had access?”
Tommy thought.
“Human resources. Luca. Mr. Marino. Maybe Carlo.”
Dante’s eyes sharpened.
“I never saw her file before she started.”
Tommy nodded slowly.
“Then Luca.”
As if summoned by the thought, Luca stepped off the elevator ten minutes later.
Dante held up the sticky note.
“Did you put this in Emily’s file?”
Luca looked at it.
“No.”
“Did Clara know Matthew Davis?”
That question stopped him.
Not for long.
But long enough.
Dante saw it.
So did I.
“You knew,” Dante said.
Luca lowered his voice.
“Not here.”
Dante’s office door closed behind the three of us.
Tommy remained outside.
Luca stood near the fireplace.
Dante placed Clara’s authorization note on the desk.
“Talk.”
Luca looked at me.
“I didn’t know she was his daughter.”
“You knew Matthew.”
“Yes.”
“How?”
Luca took a breath.
“Your father used him.”
I frowned.
“Used him for what?”
“Logistics.”
Dante’s face hardened.
“What kind?”
“Unofficial.”
That could mean anything in the Marino world.
Luca continued.
“Matthew drove for one of our trucking companies twenty years ago. He was good. Quiet. Reliable. He learned routes, warehouses, union schedules.”
Dante leaned against his desk.
“And Clara?”
“She met him later.”
“When?”
“The year before she died.”
I felt cold.
“Why?”
Luca looked at me.
“Because your father had information.”
“About what?”
“Someone inside the Marino organization was moving against Dante.”
Dante’s expression went dead calm.
“Who?”
“We never proved it.”
“Then why was Clara paying him?”
“She wasn’t paying Matthew for himself.”
I frowned.
“Who was she paying for?”
Luca hesitated.
Dante stepped closer.
“Uncle.”
Luca looked at him.
“For a witness.”
Silence.
“What witness?”
“A woman who saw who prepared the car used in the bombing.”
Every muscle in Dante’s body tightened.
For nine years, the official story had been that the Rinaldi family arranged the bomb.
It led to years of retaliation.
Territory disputes.
Broken alliances.
Men imprisoned.
Families displaced.
And now Luca was saying there had been a witness.
“Where is she?” Dante asked.
“I don’t know.”
“Matthew did?”
“Yes.”
Dante’s voice dropped.
“Did Clara?”
“Yes.”
I looked between them.
“You said the payments continued after Clara died.”
Luca nodded.
“She left instructions.”
“To you?”
“No.”
“Then who?”
Luca looked at the floor.
“That’s the problem.”
Dante’s eyes became dangerous.
“Luca.”
“I only learned Bellweather existed after Clara died.”
“Who handled the payments?”
“Your father at first.”
Dante’s father, Enzo Marino, had died five years ago.
“After him?”
“I don’t know.”
“You expect me to believe twelve million dollars left this organization without you knowing who approved it?”
Luca looked older.
“Yes.”
Dante turned away.
For a moment, grief seemed to replace anger.
Nine years.
His wife had died knowing something about the attack.
Something she never told him.
I looked again at Clara’s note.
KEEP PAYING HIM. DANTE MUST NEVER KNOW.
“Maybe she wasn’t hiding the witness from you,” I said.
Dante looked at me.
“Then what was she hiding?”
“The reason.”
Luca’s face changed.
I caught it.
“What?”
He shook his head.
“Nothing.”
“You are terrible at lying too.”
Dante looked at him.
“Reason for what?”
Luca sat down.
That frightened me more than anything.
“Clara believed if you knew the witness existed, you would tear Chicago apart finding her.”
Dante did not deny it.
“And?”
“She was afraid of what you would learn.”
“Who did the witness name?”
Luca looked at Dante.
Then at me.
“I never heard the full name.”
Dante’s patience broke.
“You heard something.”
“Yes.”
“What?”
Luca swallowed.
“The witness said the order came from inside the Marino family.”
The room went absolutely silent.
Dante’s expression disappeared.
No anger.
No shock.
Nothing.
That was when I understood why men feared him.
“Who?” he asked.
Luca shook his head.
“I don’t know.”
Dante looked at Clara’s note.
“Find Matthew Davis.”
I spoke before I could stop myself.
“If he’s alive.”
Dante’s eyes met mine.
Luca slowly stood.
“There is one person who may know where he is.”
“Who?”
Luca looked toward the window.
“Your brother.”
Dante stared.
“I don’t have a brother.”
Luca’s expression tightened.
May you like
“Yes, Dante.”
“You did.”
