Chapter 7 - THE MAN BEHIND THE COUNTER
Frank Delaney had hired Dora seven years earlier.
He had complained when she arrived four minutes late.
Docked her pay when the register came up short.
Made her work through fevers.
He had also known exactly where she was every night.
The realization made Dora sick.
“He wasn’t managing me.”
Leonardo understood.
“He was watching you.”
Dante uncovered the rest within hours.
Frank Delaney was not Frank Delaney.
His real name was Francis Costas.
Carlo’s younger half brother.
Leonardo’s uncle.
A man officially dead for twenty-three years.
“He stayed close to Helen’s daughter,” Isabella said. “Waiting for Helen’s evidence to surface.”
Dora stared through the hospital window.
“He burned Rusty’s.”
“Yes.”
“He destroyed my apartment.”
“Probably.”
“And every time I begged for an extra shift because I couldn’t pay rent…”
Her voice failed.
Leonardo’s expression hardened.
“He knew.”
Dora laughed bitterly.
“All those years, he knew I owned the building.”
Leonardo swung his legs from the hospital bed.
“What are you doing?” Dora demanded.
“Getting dressed.”
“You were shot yesterday.”
“I noticed.”
“Get back in bed.”
Leonardo looked at her.
Dora pointed.
“Bed.”
Dante coughed to hide a laugh.
Leonardo Costas, feared by half the criminal world, silently returned to bed.
“Thank you.”
The satisfaction lasted five seconds.
Then Dora’s phone rang.
Frank.
She stared at the screen.
Leonardo nodded.
“Answer.”
Dora did.
“Hello?”
“Dora.”
Frank sounded exactly as he always had.
Tired.
Annoyed.
Familiar.
“You didn’t come to work.”
“You burned down my workplace.”
A pause.
“So you know.”
“Apparently I know a lot of things.”
“Not enough.”
Dora’s grip tightened.
“What do you want?”
“The original ledger.”
“Victor had it.”
“No. Leonardo gave Victor a fake. I want the real one.”
Leonardo mouthed, Keep him talking.
Dora walked toward the window.
“Why?”
“Because your mother stole something that belongs to me.”
“She exposed criminals.”
“She stole my future.”
“Sounds like a you problem.”
Leonardo looked almost proud.
Frank’s voice hardened.
“You always did talk too much.”
“And you always paid too little.”
“Bring me the ledger.”
“No.”
Frank laughed.
“You think Costas can protect you?”
Dora looked at Leonardo.
He was wounded, exhausted, and staring at her like she mattered more than his entire empire.
“Yes.”
“Then ask him where his father kept the bodies.”
The call ended.
Leonardo’s face changed.
Dora noticed.
“You know what he meant.”
Leonardo nodded.
“Atlantic Crown Pier 9.”
That evening federal agents searched the abandoned pier.
They found six bodies beneath a concrete foundation.
One belonged to Victor Salerno’s eldest son.
The man Leonardo believed he had killed.
Dora stared at the report.
“You didn’t kill him?”
“No.”
“I thought—”
“So did I.”
Leonardo sat quietly.
“I beat him. Badly. Carlo’s men took him afterward. My father told me he died.”
“And your father finished it.”
“Yes.”
Another manipulation.
Another crime Leonardo had carried as his own.
Then agents identified the sixth body.
Dante read the name twice.
“Frank Delaney.”
Dora frowned.
“What?”
The body had been there for twenty years.
If the real Frank was dead—
“Then who has been my boss?”
Isabella answered.
“Francis.”
Leonardo’s uncle had stolen a dead man’s identity.
And he was still out there.
Two days later, Helen remembered something.
“Francis hated Carlo.”
They sat inside a federal safe apartment.
“He believed the organization should have been his. Carlo was older, but Francis thought he was smarter.”
Leonardo leaned forward.
“Did my father know he survived?”
“Yes.”
“Why let him?”
“Because they needed each other.”
Helen explained that Carlo controlled the streets.
Francis controlled the money.
When Isabella found the books, Francis had wanted her killed immediately.
Carlo refused.
For all his cruelty, Carlo would not murder his daughter.
So Francis arranged her disappearance.
“Then Francis started the war,” Leonardo said.
Helen nodded.
“He wanted you and the Salernos destroying each other.”
The entire architecture became visible.
Leonardo had inherited not an empire, but a trap.
That night Dora found him alone on the balcony.
“You okay?”
“No.”
She stood beside him.
“Good answer.”
He looked at her.
“I spent my entire adult life becoming a man I hated because I thought strength meant never questioning anything.”
“And now?”
“Now a waitress threatens me regularly.”
“Character development.”
He laughed.
Then became serious.
“When this ends, Dora—”
“No.”
“You don’t know what I was going to say.”
“You were going to push me away because you think you’re dangerous.”
“I am dangerous.”
“So is diner coffee if you make me angry.”
“Dora.”
She turned toward him.
“I know what you are.”
His eyes searched hers.
“Do you?”
“I know you’ve hurt people. I know you have things to answer for. I’m not romanticizing that.”
He went still.
“But I also know what you’re doing now.”
She touched his hand.
“You’re choosing differently.”
Leonardo lowered his forehead to hers.
Neither moved.
Then his phone rang.
Dante.
Leonardo answered.
“What?”
His face hardened.
“Where?”
He ended the call.
Dora already knew.
“Francis?”
Leonardo nodded.
“He just walked into the federal building.”
“To surrender?”
“No.”
Leonardo showed her the message Francis had sent.
COME ALONE OR I RELEASE EVERYTHING.
Beneath it was a photograph.
Not of Dora.
Not Helen.
Not Isabella.
It was Leonardo at age nine, standing beside his father.
May you like
On the back was written:
ASK YOUR MOTHER WHO YOUR REAL FATHER WAS.
