34. Lilly
Chapter 34
Lilly
“ O h, no, not the peppermint!” Noah exclaims after he draws the card.
Nellie cackles at his plight.
“I was almost going to win. I was right there!” He groans and moves his game piece all the way back to the beginning of the board while Nellie continues to giggle. Noah narrows his eyes at her. “Are you laughing at me, Baby Bee?”
She covers her mouth, eyes shining with laughter. Her little head shakes back and forth.
“It sure looks like you’re laughing at me.” He reaches out and digs his fingers into her ribcage to tickle her.
“No, Daddy, no!” she squeals.
He pulls back just as quickly as he reached out. “You’re such a little turkey. Laughing at your dad losing the game.”
“You could make a comeback,” she says. “There’s still one more special card to draw.”
“Yeah, but you’re right there! You’re almost to the end!” Noah turns to me. “How is it that she wins this game every time we play?”
I shake my head. I have no idea. “That’s why I go into it knowing I’m going to lose every time.”
Noah drops his head back and groans again. “Fine. It’s your turn, Baby Bee.”
Her grin is mischievous when she flips over her card. “Two reds!” She moves her game piece and hits the rainbow bridge. “I win!” She throws her hands up in the air with a cheer. Then she starts dancing in her chair, wiggling back and forth.
Noah grins at her. “Good game. As usual.”
My phone dings from the kitchen where I left it on the counter. I get up to check it, and there’s a text from Cooper asking if I’m home.
“Cooper just messaged me,” I say to Noah. I quickly respond, telling him we are. He lets me know he’s going to be here in a few minutes. He has something he needs to discuss with us.
“What did he want?” Noah asks.
“He was asking if we were home. You included.”
“And he didn’t say what he needed?”
“No, just that he needed to talk to us.” Knots tighten in my stomach as my thoughts spiral around.
“What could he possibly need to talk to us about?”
“That’s kind of a dumb question.” I raise an eyebrow at Noah. “There are two very big things he could have information on, and I’m not sure which one I would rather it be.”
Noah rubs my arm before heading back to the table to help Nellie clean up the board game,
I start picking up the house, not that it needs it. I just can’t sit still.
True to his word, about five minutes later, Cooper knocks on the door. Noah answers, welcoming him inside. He’s in jeans and a T-shirt today, which makes me wonder what he’s been up to. Then I frown as another man walks in behind Cooper.
“Lilly, this is Dan. He’s a US Marshal. This is who your parents were meeting the day they were murdered.” Cooper’s eyes fly to Nellie, realizing he said that in front of her.
Nellie’s already asked all the questions about what happened to my parents. And while I wish I could protect her from this, it’s better if she knows. For a while, I tried to keep her out of the loop, but after the break-in, I knew we needed to have a talk.
She may not understand the nuances, but it is important to me that she understands the situation we’re in as best as she can at eight years old.
Maybe that wasn’t the right choice. Maybe I’m being a bad mom and not protecting my daughter from the evil of the world. But at this point, I feel like she should know the potential dangers rather than walk through this life as if there are no bad things in the world.
“Do we need to go somewhere else?” Noah asks, his hand on Nellie’s shoulder.
“No, I think you need to be here for this conversation,” Cooper says.
I invite both men into our house and lead them over to the dining table before getting Nellie set up on the couch with her headphones and a show. Not knowing what Cooper needs to talk to us about, I figure it would be better for her to not be able to listen to our conversation. I can explain things in a way she’ll understand later on if needed.
I sit next to Noah, who’s at the head of the table, and Cooper and Dan are across from me.
Cooper starts. “What I have to tell you may be a little hard to believe.” We all wait in silence as Cooper gathers his thoughts. “Before you moved to Sonoma, your father testified against the Farina crime family in New York. He made a deal with the DA to give them everything he knew in exchange for immunity.”
“What the hell could he have known about some mob family?” I ask.
“This is what might be harder to believe.” Cooper pauses. “He was their accountant. He worked for them.”
I gasp. “No. No way. I cannot imagine my father working for the mob. It doesn’t fit.”
Cooper’s understanding facial expression tells me he’s right and I’m wrong. But that doesn’t make it any easier for my brain to wrap around this information.
“So, what? My dad testifies, and he goes free while the mob goes to jail?”
“Sort of.” Cooper turns towards Dan. “Your family went into witness protection afterward.”
I stand up, my whole body practically rejecting this idea. I pace away from the table, trying to digest what Cooper has told me. This is too much. How is one person supposed to take all of these hits and not explode?
Suddenly, Noah’s by my side. His hands settle on my shoulders, and his thumbs press into the side of my neck. The gentle pressure grounds me.
My thoughts begin to slow as I take him in.
His steady gaze continues to bring me back down to reality.
Then, everything hits me all at once. “It all makes sense,” I murmur. Then louder, “How could I have been so stupid? Everything that happened after Oliver’s death… I thought it was all part of my parents’ grief. In reality, they were just cutting all ties to him and forcing us away from the disaster of my father’s creation.”
My words are met with silence until Dan’s voice makes me turn.
“I was the agent assigned to your family’s case.”
I narrow my eyes at him. “And where have you been all this time?” Anger, mainly at my parents, starts to seep out, and I want to take it out on him. This agent was supposed to protect us, right? Isn’t that what they do?
Noah’s arm around my back guides me to the table. I sit down, my pointed gaze at Dan. “So you were meeting my parents in Greensboro the day they died?”
“Yes,” he replies. “It was a regular check-in. We haven’t heard anything out of the Farinas in a long time, and I thought your family was safe.”
I snort in derision. “Obviously not. My parents were killed.”
Dan sighs. “Yes, they were. And it’s a tragedy.”
I ignore his awful attempt at apologizing. “Where were you? Aren’t you supposed to do something about this stuff?” I press.
Dan stammers as if my questions are tripping him up. I’d imagine he thought I’d be too shocked to put him to rights. Did he even know that I’ve been kept in the dark all this time? It doesn’t really matter now. What’s done is done.
“I’m really sorry, Lilly. We got the notification that your parents died in the car crash. Given that it seemed like it was an accident, we just filed it away and thought nothing more about it. We haven’t heard anything from the Farinas; half of them have died in prison anyway. The other half haven’t had any communication outside of their prisons in years.”
“Well, somebody’s after me and my family.” I look over at Nellie, who’s still on the couch, her headphones on and her tablet on her lap.
Is she safe?
Will I be able to keep her safe?
Not knowing the answer to that question is going to keep me up at night. I look back at Dan. “Tell me everything. I need to know all the details, right now.”
So he does. He starts with our life in New York and explains how my father worked as the bookkeeper for the Farinas. I’ll have a hard time wrapping my brain around that for a while yet.
He explains how the FBI had been closing in on this family for some time, and when they learned about my father, they managed to flip him.
From that point on, he worked with the FBI, feeding them all the necessary information to put the Farinas away for as long as possible.
It wasn’t a huge organization. The family had been on the verge of dying out before the FBI got involved. The only reason they were interested in the Farinas was because they’d murdered an undercover agent, and the feds weren’t able to prove it.
The sad part is my brother getting cancer was just another thread in the shitty things that happened to our family.
While Oliver was in treatment, Dad was getting ready to testify. The FBI moved us into a safe house that I believed was bought because we couldn’t afford the house we were living in during Oliver’s medical treatments.
In reality, my parents were liars who had no qualms about keeping something this serious from me.
Our move to Sonoma happened once the trial was over. And our name changed because of this, as well.
God, I was so na?ve.
The only logical explanation is that I was too busy grieving for Oliver. I was grieving for what used to be my life. Everything had changed so rapidly, and I didn’t want to listen to my parents. I didn’t really care what they had to say.
Apparently, I should have.
“Did you know about my aunt Christine living in Greensboro?”
He shakes his head. “No, Christine was never on our radar. It’s unclear if your mom did that on purpose or not.”
“I’m assuming she didn’t.” She either didn’t believe she had a say in where we went or didn’t think our connection to Christine was important enough. She never liked her much in the first place. “What does this mean going forward?” I ask Dan.
“We’ll be doing a deep dive into the family again to ensure that no other communications have slipped through the cracks. Maybe there’s somebody trying to revive the family traditions again. We’re not sure.”
“We don’t know anything at this point,” Cooper adds. “But what we do know is you’re not safe.”
“I have nowhere else to go. Nellie isn’t capable of just packing up and moving at the drop of a hat. The only place we could go is Greensboro, and I’ll be damned if I put Aunt Christine or her business in danger.”
“Even if it would keep you safe?” Noah asks.
“If they already know about me and where I live, that means they’re watching me. If I go to Greensboro, they’ll know about her. I don’t see how that would protect anyone.” I look at Cooper. “Here, I have people I can trust to watch out for us.”
Determination fills Cooper’s face. “As much as I would love to ship you out, I agree with you. The control freak in me wants you to stay. We can wire up the house completely. We’ll get the best security system installed.”
“I can pay for it. I’ve done well on my own, but my parents left me a hefty sum, as well.”
“We can work that out later,” Cooper says. “For now, we need you to be vigilant, and we need you to make sure you’re doing everything you can to keep yourself safe.”
“Trust me,” I respond, “not a single person is going to get in my way of protecting my daughter.”