Chapter 6 - THE CHILD CARLO THOUGHT NOBODY WOULD MISS
I wanted Sienna and Elsie moved immediately.
Sienna refused.
“Moved where?”
“Secure property.”
“No.”
“Hotel.”
“No.”
“Sienna.”
Her eyes hardened.
“You do not get to tell me where my daughter sleeps because your cousin put her name in a file.”
I stopped.
Old instinct.
Protect by deciding.
She was right.
“What do you want?”
That changed everything.
Sienna considered.
“My sister’s house in Milwaukee.”
“Can security accompany you?”
“Outside.”
“Yes.”
“No men inside.”
“Agreed.”
“Elsie doesn't know why.”
“Agreed.”
Good.
They left that afternoon.
Nero tried to follow the car.
Elsie cried.
I nearly sent the dog with them.
Dr. Levin said absolutely not.
Nero still needed treatment.
So Elsie knelt beside him.
“Stay with Mister Alessio.”
Then she kissed his head.
Nero watched the car disappear.
Then looked at me as though I had personally ruined his life.
“I know.”
He sighed.
I had never heard a dog sigh with judgment before.
The “witness removal” document was not an explicit murder order.
Carlo was smarter than that.
A staffing memo proposed terminating Sienna immediately after the gala for “security violations.”
Another note recommended she and Elsie be relocated through a company housing program.
Relocated.
Then a payment to a private investigative contractor.
Task:
Determine Brooks family vulnerability and out-of-state contacts.
They had been mapping where Sienna might go.
Why remove her?
Elsie had seen Owen with the injectors.
Maybe more.
A child was not a reliable legal witness.
But criminals do not always distinguish between evidence and fear.
Carlo couldn't risk what she might repeat.
Sienna’s husband already died because he knew too much.
Now his daughter had accidentally walked into the next chapter.
That enraged me more than the plot against myself.
I authorized full cooperation with prosecutors.
Not selective.
Everything involving the medical shipments.
Including old Romano freight routes.
Including my father's illegal corridor system.
My attorneys objected.
“This exposes the company.”
“Yes.”
“Potentially you.”
“If evidence supports it.”
“Alessio.”
I looked at them.
“I am not asking investigators to distinguish between crimes that embarrass me and crimes that do not.”
That ended it.
Romano Freight lost contracts.
Regulators arrived.
Media discovered the investigation.
Headlines called it an empire crisis.
Fine.
Employees feared closures.
That mattered.
I met with them.
Not as mafia boss.
As owner.
“We are not shutting legitimate freight operations.”
“Independent management is being appointed.”
“Anything dependent on illegal routing ends.”
Someone asked:
“Will jobs be lost?”
I answered honestly.
“Some.”
People hated honest answers.
Still better.
We created transition pay.
Sold two luxury properties to fund restitution and compliance costs.
Damian watched me sign.
“Your father would hate this.”
“I know.”
“Carlo too.”
“Better.”
He smiled faintly.
Owen Gray faced charges related to animal cruelty, unauthorized drugging, evidence tampering and obstruction.
His cooperation mattered.
It did not erase what he did.
I paid Nero’s treatment bills.
Obviously.
I also funded an animal-welfare program afterward.
Sienna mocked me when she heard.
“You don't need to turn every guilty feeling into a foundation.”
She was right.
We kept it small.
No name.
No gala.
Especially no gala.
The winter event was permanently moved out of my estate.
When Sienna returned from Milwaukee two weeks later, Elsie ran straight past me.
“Nero!”
The dog nearly injured himself trying to reach her.
Dr. Levin shouted.
Elsie stopped.
Remembered.
Walked slowly.
Nero reached her anyway.
Head in lap.
Same as before.
Sienna watched.
Then looked at me.
“He missed her.”
“Apparently I am worthless.”
“You feed him.”
“Transactional.”
She laughed.
That sound felt new.
Sienna was no longer merely my housekeeper after the investigation.
Not because I promoted her.
Because she resigned.
The letter arrived one Monday.
I read it twice.
Then called her to my office.
“You're leaving.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
She looked almost offended.
“Because I don't want Elsie growing up in the house where someone photographed her for an assassination contingency plan.”
Fair.
“I can increase security.”
“That sentence is exactly why.”
I stopped.
She continued.
“I also don't want my livelihood tied to the family whose systems helped kill my husband.”
Pain.
Fair again.
“What will you do?”
“I found a position at a property-management company.”
“Pay?”
She glared.
“None of your business.”
“Right.”
I hated how often she was right.
Then:
“What about Nero?”
Her expression softened.
“Elsie will want to visit.”
“If you want.”
“I do.”
I wanted to say something else.
Stay.
Not as employee.
Not because of Elsie.
Because the estate had felt less empty with Sienna’s voice in it.
I did not.
A man who employed someone, housed someone and controlled most of the space around her did not get to blur that line because he suddenly became lonely.
So I signed the resignation paperwork.
No penalty.
Full unused leave paid.
Nothing extra disguised as obligation.
Sienna looked surprised.
“That's it?”
“What did you expect?”
“Negotiation.”
I smiled.
“I’m learning.”
She left the estate three weeks later.
Elsie cried.
Nero refused dinner.
I pretended neither affected me.
Poorly.
Then the criminal case produced a final piece of evidence.
Victor Kane accepted a plea agreement and agreed to testify.
He admitted helping Carlo divert medical shipments.
Admitted participating in Michael Brooks’s death.
Not by driving the car.
By tampering with a dispatch route and arranging for another vehicle to force Michael off the road.
Sienna finally had the truth.
But Victor also said something about my father.
Angelo Romano had discovered Victor’s role before his stroke.
He planned to turn him over to federal investigators.
The night before he could—
My father collapsed.
Officially stroke.
Now investigators reopened his medical records.
I stared at the report.
“Are you saying Victor poisoned my father?”
The detective shook his head.
“We don't know.”
Finally, something nobody could confidently answer.
Tests from two years earlier could not establish a cause beyond the documented stroke.
Victor denied involvement.
No evidence contradicted him.
For once, the mystery did not produce a secret murderer behind every death.
My father may simply have died.
Life does that too.
I found the uncertainty almost harder.
But I let it remain uncertain.
No invented enemy.
No revenge without evidence.
That was new.
Then Sienna called.
First time since leaving.
“Alessio?”
“Yes?”
“It’s Elsie.”
My heart stopped.
“What happened?”
“She won't sleep.”
I blinked.
“What?”
“She says Nero is lonely.”
I almost laughed from relief.
Sienna sounded embarrassed.
“She wants to video call the dog.”
I looked at Nero sleeping beside the fireplace.
“Put her on.”
Elsie appeared.
“Mister Alessio?”
“Yes?”
“Show me Nero.”
I turned the phone.
Nero heard her voice.
Immediately stood.
Tail moving.
Elsie smiled.
“Friend!”
The dog pressed his nose against the screen.
For five minutes, a mafia boss held a phone so his dog could video chat with a three-year-old.
May you like
My father would have disowned me.
I had never felt less concerned about his opinion.
