Chapter 4 - The Shadow of the Past
Three days passed. The atmosphere inside the estate shifted dramatically.
Dr. Evans and his team worked tirelessly, fitting Elena with a state-of-the-art motorized chair, administering specialized pain relief, and treating the chronic nerve damage that had tormented her for fifteen years. For the first time in over a decade, Elena sat by a warm fireplace, wrapped in cashmere, eating hot, nutritious meals prepared by top chefs.
Clara, however, struggled to adjust. She was used to survival, to fighting for every breath and every dollar. Seeing her mother cared for brought her tears of joy, but the grand hallways of my mansion made her uneasy.
Late one evening, I found her standing on the second-floor balcony, watching the snow fall over the dark expanse of Lake Michigan. She wore a simple cream sweater I had bought for her, her dark hair blowing softly in the chilly breeze.
I stepped out onto the stone terrace, draped my heavy woolen coat over her shoulders, and stood beside her at the railing.
“You should be inside,” I said softly. “You’ll catch cold.”
“I’m not used to feeling warm, Dominic,” she admitted, using my first name for the very first time. She looked out at the dark water. “In the old apartment, we used to sleep with three layers of blankets and keep the oven open just to survive the nights. I keep waking up thinking this is a dream. That I’m going to wake up and hear Mom coughing in the dark.”
“It’s not a dream, Clara,” I said, looking down at her side profile. The moonlight caught the delicate curve of her jaw, highlighting a beauty that months of dirt and exhaustion had hidden. “I give you my word. As long as I draw breath, you will never freeze again.”
Clara turned to look at me, her brown eyes shining with raw emotion. “Mom told me what happened that night. She told me about the car crash.”
I frowned slightly. “What about it?”
“She said it wasn’t an accident,” Clara whispered, leaning closer so the wind wouldn’t carry her words. “She said before your car went over the embankment, she saw two dark SUVs ramming your vehicle repeatedly. She said she saw a man with a ring—a ring with a silver falcon—standing at the edge of the bridge, watching your car burn.”
My blood ran ice cold.
A silver falcon.
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That was the crest of the Marcone family—our former rivals who had supposedly been wiped out twelve years ago. But more importantly, the man who handled our family’s security during that era, the man who knew my exact travel route that night... was Lorenzo’s late father, Arthur.
The car crash that killed my father’s driver and nearly took my life wasn’t a random hit. It was an inside job. And the people responsible were still walking among us.
