Chapter 6 - The Test Result Made Leo More Dangerous Than Money

I returned to the hospital with smoke in my clothes.

Leo was awake, sitting cross-legged on Mia’s bed while a cartoon played without sound. The fake nurse had escaped down a service stairwell after spraying one of my guards with pepper spray. Security footage showed only a mask, scrubs, and a hospital badge stolen that morning.

But she had known Leo’s full name.

That meant the threat was older than our reunion.

Mia watched me approach.

“You heard me on the phone.”

“Yes.”

“I gave him your name before I knew whether I would ever tell you.”

“Why?”

Her expression hardened.

“Because I was angry enough to leave you, not cruel enough to erase you.”

That sentence stayed with me.

Nora had arranged a private paternity test using a laboratory whose owner owed her several favors and feared subpoenas more than me. The result arrived just after midnight.

Probability of paternity: 99.99 percent.

Numbers should have made it simple.

They did not.

I stared at the page until the words blurred.

Leo looked up from the television.

“Is that about me?”

Mia said, “Leo—”

“It’s okay.”

I sat beside him.

“Yes. It’s about you.”

“Am I in trouble?”

“No.”

“Mom says grown-ups make papers when there’s trouble.”

I almost smiled.

“This paper says I’m your father.”

He went completely still.

Then his eyes widened.

“For real?”

“For real.”

He threw his arms around my neck.

I had been stabbed once near the lung. I had been shot through the shoulder. Neither took the air from me the way that small body did.

I did not know where to put my hands.

Finally I held him.

Mia turned away, wiping her face.

Leo pulled back.

“Do I have to call you Dad?”

“No.”

“Can I?”

My throat closed.

“If you want.”

He considered this with the gravity of a treaty negotiation.

“Maybe later.”

“Fair.”

He climbed down to retrieve his truck.

The moment he was out of reach, Mia whispered, “Do not make promises you can’t keep.”

“I’m not leaving.”

“You don’t know what this becomes.”

“I know what he is.”

“A child.”

“My child.”

“And that makes him a target.”

Her voice cracked on the last word.

I stood.

“You think I don’t understand that?”

“I think you understand targets better than children.”

That hit where she intended.

I lowered my voice.

“Then teach me.”

Mia looked surprised.

For years I had solved problems by giving orders. I could not order my way into being the father Leo needed. I could not buy six lost years back.

But I could learn.

Before Mia could answer, Nora entered with photographs from the warehouse fire.

The shooter had escaped, but a traffic camera caught a motorcycle leaving the area. Its plate belonged to a shell company connected to Dorne Capital Advisory.

Rafael.

Mia saw the name and shook her head.

“Too obvious.”

“I agree.”

Nora looked at us. “There’s more.”

She placed the single ledger page from the cashbox inside a plastic sleeve.

The payment to A. Dorne appeared incriminating until she traced the account.

“The money did not go to Anton Dorne,” she said. “It went to a trust for his widow and son.”

“Rafael.”

“Yes.”

“So Salvatore paid the family after the fire.”

“Maybe.”

“Or he paid for silence.”

Nora nodded.

Mia stared at the handwriting.

“Your father wrote this?”

“Yes.”

She reached for the page.

Then she pointed to the lower corner.

A tiny symbol had been drawn beside the payment line: a square divided diagonally.

“What is that?” Nora asked.

Mia looked at me.

“My mother used that mark.”

I felt another floor disappear beneath me.

“For what?”

“She worked for your mother after the fire. When they needed to show a document had been copied, they drew that symbol.”

Nora leaned closer.

“So this page is not original.”

“No.”

Mia traced the edge without touching it.

“It’s bait.”

My phone buzzed.

Rafael Dorne.

I answered on speaker.

“Adrian,” he said calmly. “I hear you had an eventful afternoon.”

No one spoke.

He continued.

“Before you decide I burned your warehouse, ask Marco why he owns the company that rented the motorcycle.”

Nora’s eyes narrowed.

Rafael gave me an address.

“Come alone if you want to know what Salvatore did to both our fathers.”

The call ended.

Mia caught my wrist before I could move.

“No.”

“I’m not going alone.”

“He told you to.”

“I stopped following instructions from suspicious men when I was twenty.”

For the first time that night, she almost smiled.

Then Nora’s phone chimed.

She looked at the screen.

The motorcycle shell company did belong to Marco.

Not directly.

Through three layers of holdings.

But the signature authorizing its formation was unmistakable.

May you like

[COMPLETED] “GET YOUR HANDS OFF MY DRESS! YOU’RE NOTHING BUT AN OLD SEAM...

[COMPLETED] At the Mafia Boss's Engagement Party, I Served His Hungry So...

[COMPLETED] The Mafia Boss’s Fiancée Tried to Dismiss His Father’s Loyal...

Marco Vale.

And it was dated two weeks before Salvatore died.