Chapter 2
I moved Nora and Sophie into a private upstairs sitting room.
No guests.
No capos.
No Helena.
For the first ten minutes, Sophie did nothing except stare at me.
I let her.
Three years is a long time when you are only three.
Finally she asked:
“Are you really Daddy?”
My throat tightened.
“Yes.”
“Not a ghost?”
Nora covered her mouth.
I crouched.
“No.”
Sophie touched my beard with two fingers.
Apparently confirmation required physical evidence.
Then she looked at Nora.
“He’s warm.”
I almost laughed.
Nora cried instead.
I waited until Sophie found a plate of strawberries before asking the question that mattered.
“What did Helena tell you?”
Nora sat across from me.
“That you were killed.”
“When?”
“Three years ago.”
Sophie had been only weeks old.
Nora continued.
“Your mother came to my apartment with two D’Angelo guards. She said there had been an attack.”
My jaw tightened.
“She said your last instruction was that Sophie and I stay away from the family.”
“And you believed her.”
Nora looked at me.
“She had your ring.”
I went still.
“What ring?”
“The black signet you wore when we met.”
I looked down at my hand.
Different ring.
My original signet had disappeared during an ambush three years ago.
I had assumed it was lost when my car was destroyed.
Helena had somehow gotten it.
Nora continued.
“She gave me an envelope with money and said it was the final amount you arranged.”
“How much?”
“Twenty thousand.”
One payment.
Then nothing.
I had sent fifty thousand every month for thirty-six months.
More than $1.8 million.
Nora swallowed.
“When I asked about the monthly support you promised, Helena said you never created it.”
I leaned back.
“And after that?”
“I called the number your office gave me.”
“Who answered?”
“Usually your mother.”
Of course.
Nora looked down.
“Eventually she told me if I kept calling, I was putting Sophie in danger.”
May you like
My mother had not only built a lie.
She had guarded every exit from it.
