Chapter 32 #2
“You haven’t lost either of us.” I take her hand from her lap and squeeze. “I’m here, and I know Luciano is alive somewhere.” We just need to find him.
“I think so too.”
I blink in surprise. “Really?” It’s the first time she’s said that since he went missing.
“Before he disappeared, one of my clients had been grumbling about him losing his men, but I didn’t pay it any mind.
It was no skin off my nose.” She shrugs.
“But when your brother got made and joined the Petrov family, it felt like someone had thrown a bucket of hot water in my face.
I told him to stop, and he said he would if I stopped too.
Stop my work, the alcohol, the drugs. All of it.
" Her lips twist. “I was furious that he dared give me an ultimatum, so I walked away. But when my anger cooled, I realized I would do anything to save my son. I would have quit everything—even if it meant spiraling down the dark hole I’d been avoiding.”
She draws in a breath before continuing.
“Two days later, Joan, a colleague at work, told me she overheard one of her clients talking on the phone while she pretended to be asleep. The man was telling someone that he had captured two Petrov soldiers and was holding them in a safe house with the other men he’d taken.
” She pauses, shifting in her seat. “At the time, it meant nothing to me. But then your brother didn’t come home.
Not the first night. Not the second. As the days turned into a week, I started wondering if he might have been one of the Petrov soldiers Joan’s client mentioned.
So I kept working… hoping I’d cross paths with that man. ”
I gasp. She was doing exactly what I tried to do by getting a job at Zvezda. “You shouldn’t have, Mamma. That was dangerous. You could have gotten seriously hurt.”
All this time, I've been so consumed with my mission to find Luciano that it never even occurred to me that my mother might have one of her own.
“No more dangerous than what landed you here.” She gives me a pointed look, and I can’t argue with that.
“But my research paid off. I got Joan’s client alone, slipped something into his drink, and once he passed out, I went through his phone.
” Her expression shifts, a thread of satisfaction running through it.
“There was a message. It mentioned a meeting with their boss. An address, a date, and a time. This could be our chance to find Luciano.”
Excitement flares through me. Yes, this could be our chance.
But unease follows on its heels. After my conversation with Vanya, I was inclined to believe Luciano wasn’t kidnapped with the rest of Vanya’s men.
That he might have disappeared on his own to try to get revenge on Papa and Emilio Sciarra.
Earlier I told Vanya I hoped that was the case, but now I’m having second thoughts.
He’s a hothead and can be so impulsive. If he went after them alone, with no backup and no plan—
“The meeting is this weekend, and I’m going there,” Mamma’s words snap me out of my thoughts. “I want to see this boss of theirs myself. Maybe I can find another lead on where they’re holding the Petrov men hostage.”
“No, you can’t go. The man you got the information from—if he’s at that meeting and he recognizes you—" I stop myself before I finish the thought. A man like that wouldn’t handle a liability the way Vanya handled me.
There would be no library, no necklace, no rooftop in the rain…
nothing. “I’ll go instead. None of them knows my face. ”
“You?” She frowns. “You’re held hostage here, Melani. How exactly do you plan to walk out of this hotel?”
She doesn’t mean it as a dig, but it still stings. My chin lifts stubbornly. “I’m not a prisoner anymore. Remember how I got caught in the rain earlier?” I point at my still-damp hair.
“You were outside today? Has Ivan decided to let you go?”
“I was outside.” The rooftop counts as outside. “I’ll talk to Vanya about it. He’ll let me go.”
Her frown deepens. “You mean you’ll ask his permission?”
“Why do you hate him so much? Judging by what you just told me, you knew all along that he wasn’t involved in Luciano’s disappearance, and yet you let me believe he was.”
Her face closes off. “He’s a mafioso. Even if he’s not involved in Luciano’s disappearance, I’m sure he’s made many other men disappear. That’s just their nature. I don’t want that for you.”
My lips thin, though I know she’s right. Hell, I saw him kill a man right before my eyes, didn’t I? But still I say, “Vanya isn’t what you think. There’s more to him than that. You can’t box him into one category and call it understanding. He’s like an onion. He has layers.”
My mind drifts back to the small things.
The way he had a whole library built for me just because I mentioned liking books.
The little note he left because I asked for one.
The mountain of food he had prepared for me.
The necklace burning a hole in my throat.
And the softness in his eyes when he wrapped those towels around me earlier.
“Look at you smiling. You’ve gone and fallen in love with him.”
I can’t deny it this time, but I don’t want to admit it to her either. Not when I haven’t even told the man himself yet. “Everything isn’t black and white,” I say cryptically, and Mamma just shakes her head, a strange expression crossing her face.
For a brief second, I consider telling her what Vanya discovered about Luciano, but decide against it. He told me that in confidence. I’m not going to break his trust. I’ll ask him first, and if he agrees, I’ll tell her then.
“Promise me you won’t go to that meeting,” I say instead. “Promise me, Mamma. Please. I can’t lose you."
Her face softens the slightest bit. “It’s dangerous for you too.”
Not if I can get Vanya to go with me. If anything, he’ll want to be there. These are the people responsible for taking his men off the streets. “It’s safer for me than for you,” I insist. “Promise me, Mamma.”
She’s quiet for a long moment—long enough that I start preparing my argument for the second round. Then she sighs, “If you can actually leave this hotel, I’ll let you go in my place.” She says it like she doesn’t believe that would be possible.
I let her believe it and ask her for the details of the message she saw.
After a moment of hesitation, she grabs a piece of paper and writes everything down—the address, the date, and the time. Then she hands it to me.
I close my fingers around it carefully, feeling the weight of every hope and fear it carries.