Chapter 9 - THE BURNED PHOTOGRAPH
Don Carlo’s face turned to stone. The New York boss looked from Luca’s defiant eyes down to our intertwined hands, then finally at me.
"A maid?" Don Carlo scoffed, his voice dripping with venom. "You refuse the blood of my family for a girl who scrubs floors?"
"I refuse it for a woman who has more honor than your entire syndicate," Luca replied, his grip on my hand tightening.
Answer One: Luca rejected the ultimate power alliance, risking an all-out mafia war, simply to claim me.
Don Carlo didn't scream or draw a weapon. He simply reached into his heavy wool coat and pulled out a small, old photograph. He struck a match against his cane, lit the corner of the photo, and dropped it onto the wet driveway between them.
The paper curled and blackened in the damp air.
"You have twenty-four hours to change your mind, Luca," Don Carlo whispered. "Or Chicago burns. Just like this."
He turned and got back into his limousine. The black car reversed out of the gates, disappearing into the mist.
Luca stared at the smoldering photograph.
I dropped my duffel bag and stepped on the burning paper, stomping the fire out. I picked up the charred remains. It was a picture of Luca’s father and Don Carlo, shaking hands decades ago. A broken pact.
"You can't do this," I said, looking up at Luca. My heart was pounding frantically. "He has an army. You’re inviting a war. You have to marry her."
"I don't love her," Luca said simply.
"You don't even know if you love me!" I cried. "We've known each other for seven months, and we've barely spoken until three days ago!"
"I watched you," Luca corrected softly, taking a step closer. "I watched how you treated my staff. I watched you sew the hem of a coat for the gardener when he was freezing. I watched you protect my nephew with a pair of scissors against a man with a gun. I know exactly who you are, Sophie."
He reached out and took the velvet box from my hand. He closed my fingers around it.
"I'm not asking you to stay," Luca said, his voice breaking slightly. "Go to Paris. Be safe. I will handle Don Carlo."
The reversal in my own heart shattered the last of my doubts. He wasn't trapping me. He was willing to die to protect my freedom.
I looked at the velvet box. Then I looked at the man standing in front of me.
I opened my hand and let the box fall onto the driveway.
"I'm not running," I said fiercely. "My mother told me to fix things. We're going to fix this."
Open Two: How does a maid fix a mafia war?
I picked up the charred photograph again. I looked closer at it. The edges were burned, but the back was intact.
"Luca," I said, squinting at the back of the photo. "Look at this."
He leaned in. Scrawled on the back of the picture, in faded ink, was a series of numbers. 04-11-92-B.
"That's my father's handwriting," Luca frowned. "It looks like a vault combination."
"Or a locker," I suggested. "Don Carlo didn't just leave a threat. He left a message. He said, 'You have twenty-four hours to change your mind.' What if he wasn't talking about the marriage? What if he was talking about something your father left behind?"
Luca’s eyes widened. "My father had a private safety deposit box at the Continental Bank downtown. He never told me what was in it. He said it was an insurance policy."
"Let's go get it," I said.
An hour later, we stood in the sterile, steel-lined vault of the Continental Bank. Luca used his father's master key, and I read the numbers from the back of the photo to align the dial.
The heavy metal drawer clicked open.
Inside was a single, black leather ledger.
Luca pulled it out and opened it. His eyes scanned the pages, and a slow, dangerous smile spread across his face.
"Sophie," Luca breathed. "Do you know what this is?"
"Money?" I guessed.
"Better," Luca said. "It's proof that Don Carlo has been informing on his own capos to the FBI for twenty years to keep himself out of prison. It's the ultimate betrayal."
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