Chapter 8 - THE EMPIRE HIS FATHER LEFT BEHIND
Dominic disappeared for six hours.
Nobody knew where he went.
Nico claimed not to.
Clare knew he was lying.
She let him.
Some grief needed privacy.
Especially grief for a person who had already been dead seventeen years.
Clare spent the morning with Tommy.
He had improved enough to sit upright.
When she told him about Michael Romano’s signature, Tommy stared through the window for almost a minute.
“Our father?”
“Yes.”
“He hated drugs.”
Clare said nothing.
“He used to throw people out of his clubs for selling anything.”
“People can have rules and still break different ones.”
Tommy looked at her.
“You sound like Dominic.”
“I’m choosing not to be offended.”
Tommy smiled faintly.
Then his eyes filled.
“He worshipped Dad.”
“I know.”
“No.”
Tommy shook his head.
“You don’t.”
He looked toward the door.
“After our parents died, Dominic stopped being seventeen overnight.”
Clare listened.
“He quit school. Took over the company. Slept three hours a night. Checked my homework even when he had armed men waiting downstairs.”
Tommy laughed softly.
“I hated him for years because he became controlling.”
“I’m shocked.”
Tommy smiled.
“He was scared.”
Clare understood that now.
Control was how Dominic translated fear.
Rules.
Security.
Locked doors.
Five vehicles around one unemployed nurse.
Tommy continued.
“Everything Dominic did was about becoming the man he thought our father had been.”
That made Michael Romano’s ledger worse.
Dominic returned shortly after noon.
No coat.
No tie.
His knuckles were bruised.
Clare noticed immediately.
“What happened?”
“Nothing.”
“Your hands disagree.”
“I hit something.”
“Was it alive?”
“No.”
“Good.”
She took his wrist.
Dominic looked down.
“You’re examining me?”
“Occupational hazard.”
“You were fired.”
“Thank you for reminding me.”
His mouth almost moved.
Then he became serious.
“I went to my father’s old warehouse.”
“Why?”
“I needed to remember him.”
“And?”
“I remembered a myth.”
Clare released his hand.
Dominic looked toward Tommy’s room.
“My father started Northline Medical ten years before he died.”
“He may not have known about counterfeit medication.”
“He signed the payments.”
“That proves involvement. Not every detail.”
“Don’t defend him.”
“I’m not.”
Clare stepped closer.
“I’m saying evidence matters.”
His eyes met hers.
“You sound like a prosecutor.”
“I sound like somebody who got fired because evidence didn’t matter.”
That reached him.
Dominic nodded once.
Rebecca arrived an hour later.
Federal investigators had confirmed Margaret’s files were authentic.
They had also found something unexpected.
Michael Romano did establish the scheme.
But three years before his death, he tried to shut it down.
“Why?” Tommy asked.
Rebecca placed documents on the table.
“People started dying.”
Clare looked at the papers.
Michael’s original fraud had involved billing manipulation and diverted legitimate supplies.
Criminal.
Profitable.
Dangerous.
But the counterfeit medication began later, when Kathryn Davis’s husband joined the operation with Dr. Weber and several distributors.
Michael discovered the substitution.
He ordered it stopped.
Then began gathering evidence.
Dominic stared at Rebecca.
“My father was going to cooperate?”
“We found correspondence with a federal attorney.”
“What happened?”
Rebecca hesitated.
“Your parents died before the meeting.”
Nobody spoke.
Dominic finally whispered, “The bomb.”
Rebecca nodded.
“We believe your father wasn’t killed by a rival family.”
Tommy’s face drained.
“Who?”
“We don’t know yet.”
Clare did.
Or at least she suspected.
“The people running Northline.”
Rebecca looked at her.
“That’s our working theory.”
Dominic stood.
For seventeen years, he had built his entire understanding of his parents’ deaths around a false enemy.
Wars.
Retaliations.
Decisions.
Maybe blood.
All because somebody had needed Michael Romano silent.
Then Nico entered.
“We found Victor.”
Dominic turned.
“Where?”
“He turned himself in.”
Rebecca’s phone rang simultaneously.
She answered.
“Yes.”
Her eyes shifted toward Dominic.
“Bring him.”
Victor arrived under federal escort.
Without his expensive coat and polished confidence, he looked older.
Tired.
Dominic didn’t embrace him.
Tommy didn’t either.
Victor looked at both brothers.
“I should have told you.”
Dominic’s voice was quiet.
“Which part?”
“All of it.”
“You let me believe the Marconi family killed my parents.”
“I believed it too at first.”
“For how long?”
“Three years.”
Dominic’s face turned cold.
“And after?”
Victor looked ashamed.
“By then you had already retaliated.”
Clare felt the weight of the word.
She didn’t ask what Dominic had done.
She didn’t want details.
Dominic did.
“How many years did you let me hate the wrong people?”
“Fourteen.”
Tommy looked sick.
Dominic moved toward Victor.
Nico stepped forward instinctively.
Clare did not.
Dominic stopped inches from his uncle.
“You made me into something I didn’t have to become.”
Victor’s eyes filled.
“No. I failed to stop it.”
Dominic’s fist clenched.
Clare said his name.
Just once.
“Dominic.”
He looked at her.
She didn’t tell him not to be angry.
He had the right.
She didn’t tell him Victor deserved forgiveness.
That wasn’t hers to decide.
She simply held his gaze.
Whatever Dominic saw there was enough.
His hand opened.
Victor exhaled.
Then he said, “Kathryn’s husband ordered the bombing.”
Rebecca stepped forward.
“Thomas Davis?”
Victor nodded.
“He died nine years ago, but Kathryn continued everything.”
Clare stared.
Kathryn.
The woman who had calmly pushed a termination packet across a desk.
The woman who had helped protect an organization connected to multiple deaths.
Victor continued.
“Michael wanted out. Thomas Davis refused. Weber handled the hospital side. After Thomas died, Kathryn became more ruthless than he ever was.”
“Where is she?” Dominic asked.
Victor looked at Rebecca.
“She has one place left.”
“What place?”
“The original Northline warehouse.”
Nico frowned.
“That property burned down years ago.”
“Part of it.”
Victor’s expression hardened.
“There’s an underground archive beneath the east section.”
Rebecca was already calling agents.
Victor looked at Clare.
“Your mother found it.”
Clare’s heartbeat quickened.
“What?”
“She found the archive. That’s why Kathryn had her killed.”
Dominic’s eyes turned lethal.
Then Victor said the words that stopped everyone.
“And Kathryn knows Clare has Margaret’s files now.”
Clare’s phone rang.
Unknown number.
Nobody moved.
It rang again.
Rebecca nodded.
“Speaker.”
Clare answered.
Kathryn’s voice came through.
“You’ve been busy.”
Clare felt Dominic move closer.
“What do you want?”
“To finish something your mother interrupted.”
“You killed her.”
Silence.
Then Kathryn said, “Margaret should have minded her own business.”
Dominic’s hand tightened around the back of a chair.
Clare’s entire body went cold.
“You’re going to prison.”
Kathryn laughed softly.
“Only if your friends find the archive before it burns.”
A distant alarm sounded through the call.
Then Kathryn added, “You have twenty minutes.”
The line went dead.
Nico checked his phone.
“Fire alarm at the old Northline property.”
Rebecca cursed.
Dominic headed for the door.
Clare followed.
He turned.
“No.”
She kept walking.
“Dominic.”
“No.”
“My mother died because of what’s in that building.”
“I know.”
“Then get out of my way.”
He stared at her.
May you like
And this time, after everything they had been through, Dominic Romano did something almost nobody in Chicago had ever seen him do.
He moved aside.
