Chapter 2 - THE LAST NIGHT OF MRS. ROMANO
Carmela kept one hand on the taxi door.
“Tell him I'm going home.”
Tommy glanced at the driver.
“Mr. Romano would prefer that you return to the restaurant.”
“Then Mr. Romano can learn to survive disappointment.”
Tommy looked genuinely startled.
For three years, Carmela had been polite to the men who guarded her husband's doors, carried his messages, and treated her movements like appointments on his calendar.
She had never raised her voice.
Never contradicted an instruction in public.
Never asked why her husband needed to know where she went.
Tonight, however, something inside her had gone terribly quiet.
“Mrs. Romano,” Tommy said, stepping closer, “don't make this difficult.”
Carmela turned toward him.
“Is that a request or an order?”
He hesitated.
The taxi driver watched through the open window.
Carmela understood that Tommy would not drag her into the car with a witness present.
She climbed into the taxi.
“Brooklyn Heights,” she told the driver.
Tommy's expression darkened.
“Your husband won't like this.”
She looked at him through the window.
“He doesn't like me anyway.”
The taxi pulled away.
For several blocks, Carmela watched the lights smear across the wet pavement.
Then she took out her phone and opened the message from her father.
There's something about the ports you need to know.
She called him.
He answered on the first ring.
“Carmela?”
“Dad, what is happening?”
A long silence followed.
“Where are you?”
“In a taxi.”
“Is Silas with you?”
“No.”
“Good.”
The word frightened her more than any warning could have.
“Dad?”
“Come to the old house. Tonight. Don't tell anyone.”
“Why?”
“Because I made a mistake.”
Vincent Costello had never admitted making a mistake.
Not when a warehouse burned.
Not when a business partner vanished.
Not when Carmela's mother died and he sent his daughter to boarding school because he could not bear to look at the empty chair across the breakfast table.
“What mistake?” she whispered.
“I trusted the wrong man.”
The call ended.
Carmela stared at the screen.
Then she leaned forward.
“Change of address, please.”
The driver glanced at her in the mirror.
“Where to?”
She gave him the address of her childhood home.
Forty minutes later, she stood outside the old Costello mansion.
Most of the windows were dark.
The wrought-iron gates stood open.
That was the first thing wrong.
Her father never left the gates open.
The second was the broken glass beside the front steps.
Carmela stopped.
A faint smell reached her.
Smoke.
She pulled out her phone.
Then someone grabbed her from behind.
A hand covered her mouth.
She twisted violently, striking backward with her elbow.
“Quiet,” a familiar voice hissed.
Her father's longtime driver, Gabriel Moretti, pulled her behind a stone column.
“It's me.”
Carmela fought for breath.
“Where's my father?”
Gabriel's face was gray.
“Inside.”
“What happened?”
“Someone got here before you.”
A sharp cracking sound came from the house.
Gunfire.
Carmela froze.
Gabriel gripped her shoulders.
“Listen carefully. Your father gave me instructions if anything happened tonight.”
“What instructions?”
“To get you out.”
“No.”
“Carmela—”
“I'm not leaving him.”
Gabriel looked toward the mansion.
His eyes filled.
“You don't understand.”
Another shot echoed.
Then silence.
Gabriel swallowed.
“Your father knew Silas was planning to take the ports.”
Carmela felt the world tilt.
“He told you?”
“He found documents. Transfers. Shell companies. Agreements he never signed.”
“Then we call the police.”
Gabriel shook his head.
“We already did. Someone intercepted the call.”
Carmela stared at him.
“Who?”
“I don't know.”
A car engine roared somewhere behind the mansion.
Gabriel seized her hand.
“We have seconds.”
He pulled her toward a narrow garden path.
Carmela stumbled after him, her velvet gown catching on wet branches.
At the rear gate, Gabriel stopped beside an old maintenance truck.
He opened the passenger door.
“Get in.”
She looked back toward the house.
“Dad!”
No answer came.
Gabriel's voice broke.
“Carmela, please.”
She climbed into the truck.
As they drove away, flames appeared behind an upstairs window.
Carmela pressed her palm against the glass.
The home where she had grown up was burning.
And somewhere inside it was the man who had just called to warn her.
Her phone rang.
Silas.
She watched his name flash across the screen.
Then another message arrived.
Where the hell are you?
A moment later:
Answer me.
Gabriel glanced at the phone.
“Turn it off.”
Carmela looked at her wedding ring.
For three years, she had worn it as proof that somebody had chosen her.
Now she understood that she had been selected like a piece of property.
She removed the ring.
It left a pale mark on her finger.
“Where are we going?” she asked.
Gabriel looked straight ahead.
“Somewhere your husband can't find you.”
May you like
Behind them, the Costello mansion disappeared into the rain.
And by sunrise, Carmela Romano would be missing.
