Chapter 24: Domenico - Marrying the Mafia Daddy

The warehouse Paolo told me to come to sits on a stretch of industrial road where the streetlights flicker and die halfway down the block. I park beside Gio’s SUV and kill the engine. The silence follows me inside.

Concrete floor. Metal shelving. The sharp, chemical smell of cleaning products that don’t quite mask the underlying must of old cardboard and dust. Paolo’s set up at a folding table in the back, his laptop casting a blue glow across his face. Gio stands beside him with his arms crossed.

Neither of them smiles when I walk in.

“What do you have?” I ask as soon as I reach them.

Paolo turns the laptop toward me. The screen is split—bank records on the left, a timeline on the right. Dates. Amounts. Names. My son is nothing if not efficient.

“Harry opened an account at Citizens Bank in May of last year,” Paolo explains.

As he continues to talk, I notice his cockiness is gone. The version of him that returned from spending time with family in Chicago is a lot more mature and confident.

“The first transfer from NovaGen Pharmaceuticals was almost five thousand.”

I lean forward, bracing my hands on the edge of the table, making it creak.

“After that, there’ve been monthly transfers. It started out as five grand every month, but then it increased—”

“Let me guess,” I interject on a growl. “The payments increased when Paige Adams got worse?”

Paolo taps at the screen. “Exactly. It was ten grand for a few months, then eleven, twelve…”

The numbers crawl across the screen in neat rows. Dates. Amounts. A trail so fucking obvious it’s almost insulting.

“Do you remember when he came to see you?” Gio asks.

I shrug. “Not the exact date, if that’s what you’re asking. But it was early October, I think.”

Paolo sighs dramatically. “Luckily, the dude working in your reception makes every visitor sign in.” My son’s quiet as he pulls up the exact date from an email exchange with the receptionist. “Here we go.”

He shows us the date and then goes back to the spreadsheet, which shows Harry received almost twenty thousand from NovaGen the very next day.

“What in the fuck were they doing to that poor woman that was worth that much money?” Gio asks with a disgusted grunt.

“I honestly don’t want to know,” Paolo’s quick to say.

Something cold and precise settles behind my sternum. Not rage. Rage is hot, messy, useless. This is colder. Sharper. This is the clarity that comes right before you pull the trigger.

“Show me the communications.”

While switching tabs, Paolo tells me about the communication between Harry and NovaGen he’s managed to get his hands on. It’s mostly emails and some texts. But as Paolo scrolls down, I also see meeting notes from a NovaGen executive’s calendar that Paolo somehow got his hands on. I don’t ask how since it doesn’t fucking matter.

“Harry wasn’t just signing papers.” Paolo scrolls through a chain of emails dated last spring. “He was negotiating. Asking for higher compensation when the trial protocols got more aggressive. There’s a meeting where he specifically requested…” Paolo stops, his eyes scanning the text. “… he requested that the seizure medication be adjusted to keep her ‘compliant’ with the trial parameters.”

The table splinters under my fist as the wood cracks. The sound echoes through the warehouse, sharp and final. Paolo flinches. Gio doesn’t move, but his posture shifts—weight forward, ready.

Straightening, I realize my knuckles are bleeding. “Do we have any motherfucking names?” I snarl. “I want the goddamn name of everyone who touched this, everyone who authorized payments. Fuck, everyone who as much as muttered Paige’s name.”

“Already sent men to Harry’s place,” Gio says.

Paolo’s mouth curves into a cold, lethal smile as he slides a printed list across the broken table. “Thought you’d never ask.”

Even though I’m pissed, I return the smile. My son might be an arrogant shit most of the time, but he’s thorough when it counts.

“NovaGen’s CEO. Their head of legal. Two trial coordinators.” Paolo ticks them off with his finger. “Two doctors who signed off on the protocols and the nurse you already know about, all three are already dead, by the way. You’re welcome. And two financial officers who handled the payments.”

I fold the paper and tuck it into my inner jacket pocket. “Thank you,” I grunt.

Gio reaches into a duffel bag at his feet and pulls out three pistols. Compact. Clean. Untraceable. He lays them on the table one by one, like a dealer setting out cards. It’s a bit redundant since I’m sure we’re all packing already. But I suppose I shouldn’t say no to extra firepower.

“Carly told me not to come home until we’ve killed the people responsible for Kira’s loss. So, let’s go.”

I pick up the first one and check the magazine, rack the slide, and tuck it into the holster at the small of my back. The routine is muscle memory. Paolo does the same with his, slower but competent. Gio handles his like it’s an extension of his hand.

We’re arming up when Gio’s phone buzzes. He checks it, and the curse that leaves his mouth is low and vicious.

“Harry’s gone.” Gio pockets the phone. “His place is empty and his phone’s off. No sign of where he went or when he left. The team’s canvassing the neighbors, but nothing yet.”

Annoying as that is, I can’t say I’m surprised. Harry’s a fucking cockroach and those bastards always run when the light finds them. I’m sure he made himself scarce the moment he realized Paige was dead.

I look at the list in my pocket. Then, at the warehouse door.

“We’ll hit NovaGen first,” I say. “Harry can wait. The money’s more important to him than breathing. Cut that off, and he’ll surface like the pest he is.”

Gio nods. Paolo is already gathering his things, his laptop snapping shut with a click.

The car starts on the first turn of the key. I pull onto the industrial road, Gio beside me, Paolo in the back, and drive toward the highway with my hands steady on the wheel and something ugly and patient sitting behind my ribs.

Harry Adams sold his wife for thirty pieces of silver. By morning, he won’t have a fucking penny to show for it.

NovaGen’s headquarters rises like a glass monument to everything I hate. Twenty stories of reflective windows and corporate landscaping.

A guy dressed in a cheap blazer mans the security desk. He stands up and stupidly rounds his desk when we walk through the automatic doors.

“Hi, can I—”

Gio’s hand finds his throat before he finishes speaking, and the man chokes out a sound like a deflating tire.

“We’re just going to borrow this.” Paolo takes the access card dangling from the guy’s belt.

“W-wait,” he stutters.

Gio tightens his grip. “You know, I don’t think we will.” He squeezes until the guy goes limp, and then he drops him like a sack of potatoes.

“The executive suite is on floor eighteen,” Paolo says, checking the directory mounted beside the elevators. “Are we going straight there, or…?”

“Gio is,” I confirm. “We’re going to take the scenic route and work on that list you gave me.”

As Gio gets on the elevator, both Paolo and I pull our guns out. Then we start the trek up the stairs.

Reaching the seventh floor, I wonder why in the fuck they’re stupid enough to announce names and departments on the doors. That’s just making this little hunt all too easy. But here we are, at the finance department.

“Go ahead,” I tell Paolo. “I’ll continue up. Come meet us on eighteen when you’ve taken out the fuckers.”

My son salutes me before throwing the door wide open. As it swings shut, I hear people screaming. A part of me wants to go in there and be the one who ends the two financial officers myself. But my ego isn’t what matters right now.

Getting all our targets is the only thing that matters.

As I finally reach the eleventh floor, the home of the trial experts, I’m cursing myself for not doing more cardio.

When I open the door, I’m immediately met by a security guard. “What’s your business here?” he asks. His eyes widen comically when he notices the gun in my hand.

The idiot reaches for his walkie. He fumbles so hard he almost drops it, which gives me enough time to rush him. I slam my fist into his face, smiling when he staggers.

“Listen up,” I snarl. “I don’t have an issue with you. I just need you to point me in the direction of Halk and Brighton.”

The guard looks at me for half a second, then he must decide he doesn’t get paid enough for this shit because he points at the closest door. “They… they share that o-office,” he stammers.

Nodding, I gesture with my gun for him to get in front of me. “Let’s take a walk.”

“B-but I—”

“Don’t make me repeat myself,” I growl, cutting him off. “Get in front of me and walk over there. If you don’t, I’ll shoot you right now.”

Predictably, he does as I say. Like most people with a gun digging into their back, he follows my orders. Even when we reach the door and I tell him to open it. As soon as he’s done what I said, I slam the butt of the gun into his head hard enough for him to pass out.

Then I turn my focus on the man and woman in front of me. Halk, the woman, lets out an ear-splitting scream.

“Who are you? Let us go. We can pay,” Brighton rambles.

Instead of answering, I aim my gun at Brighton and pull the trigger. That silences Halk really quickly. Her scream cuts off around the same time Brighton falls to the floor, blood gushing from the hole between his eyebrows.

“No, no, no, no,” Halk chants, covering her ears with her hands.

“Oh, yes,” I say.

Then I pull the trigger again, ending Halk without ceremony.

When I turn around, I see people running around, some are even hiding behind curtains and chairs. Since I’m not here for them, I ignore them and walk back out to the staircase and take the rest of the stairs to the eighteenth floor two at a time.

I’m almost there when Paolo catches up to me. He’s covered in blood, way more than is expected from shooting your target and then getting out of there.

“Are they dead?” I ask.

He nods. “Oh, yes.”

When we reach the eighteenth, the door to the stairs is already open and Gio’s waiting for us, looking entirely too fucking pleased with himself.

“Took you long enough,” he observes.

I flip him off. “Did you get them?”

He explains that the CEO and head of their legal team are waiting in meeting room K. Looking around, I notice the entire floor is empty.

“When I told them I was with the DeLuca family, people were eager to cooperate. So most cleared out, and some of the senior employees promised they’d take care of the other departments and security footage if we don’t come after them.”

Shrugging, I say, “I’m not making any promises yet.”

Inside meeting room K, I find the CEO, Roger Martins, a man in his fifties with thinning hair, and when he opens his mouth, I notice a few teeth are missing. Beside him is, who I assume to be, Kim Joung, the head of legal. The latter is younger and looks like he’s in shock as blood runs from his nose.

I sit across from them. The desk between us is walnut, polished to a shine that reflects the overhead lights and the blood on Roger’s upper lip.

“What’s the meaning of this?” he sputters, outraged.

“Let’s talk about your human trials,” I say calmly. “Specifically, Paige Adams.”

“Who?”

Roger glares at Kim at the stupid question.

“Really?” I drawl. “You want to waste time pretending you don’t know who I’m talking about? Okay, I’ll oblige.”

Even though I’m itching to kill them both where they sit, I explain who Paige is—was—and what they’ve done to her. While I talk, Roger wipes blood from his lip with a trembling hand.

“Those trials were FDA-approved. The consent forms were—”

“Signed by a man you were paying to keep his wife in your program,” I interrupt on a snarl.

Kim opens his mouth, but shuts it again as I hold up a hand.

“Paige Adams was the mom of the woman I love.” I lean forward, elbows on the desk. “My wife is at home, grieving, because you killed her mom. And when my wife is unhappy…” I let the sentence hang. “I become extremely fucking unreasonable.”

Gio shifts his weight behind me. The sound of his jacket settling is enough to make both men flinch.

“We’ve put people in concrete for less,” Paolo says casually, examining his nails. “Whole families, sometimes. Depends on the mood.”

The CEO’s throat works. A drop of sweat traces his temple.

“Harry Adams had legal authority as her husband,” Kim argues. His voice is steadier than it should be. Practiced. The voice of a man who’s argued his way out of depositions and regulatory hearings. “The Medical Power of Attorney forms were—”

Fed up with this bullshit, I shoot Roger in the shoulder.

Even with the silencer, the gunshot echoes. Roger screams—a high, shattered sound that cuts off when he clamps his hand over the wound. Blood seeps through his fingers, dark and fast, staining the custom wool of his suit jacket.

Kim gags but darts to his feet, apparently stupid enough to make a run for it. Gio laughs darkly as he circles left while Paolo goes right. The two of them pin him down in seconds and roughly return him to his seat.

“Sit the fuck down,” Gio barks, clamping one hand on Kim’s shoulder while Paolo casually positions himself behind Roger, just in case he tries to run as well.

Nobody moves. The legal counsel has gone perfectly still, his eyes fixed on the gun in my hand as if it’s the only thing in the universe.

“Medical Power of Attorney,” I say, turning to Kim and acting as if his little escape attempt didn’t happen. “That’s your defense?” I level the gun at his right hand, where it rests white-knuckled on the arm of the chair. “Would you like to change your tune?”

He doesn’t answer fast enough, so I shoot him through the hand.

The scream is worse than Roger’s. Raw. Unfiltered. The man clutches his ruined hand to his chest, blood spraying across his shirtfront, his breath coming in ragged sobs.

Paolo laughs. The sound is cold and genuine. “I bet he’s still thinking about how to get out of this. It’s adorable.”

“Paperwork won’t save you,” Gio grunts.

I set the gun on the desk between us.

“Here’s your choice.” My voice is quiet. Measured. “Give me everything I want, or by tomorrow, NovaGen won’t exist in any way that matters.”

Roger is crying now. Silent tears cutting tracks through the blood on his face. Kim is hyperventilating, his good hand pressed against his chest as if he’s trying to hold his heart in place.

“W-we’ll cooperate,” Roger stammers. “Whatever you want. Just… please…”

Nodding, I pick the gun back up and aim it at Kim. “Since you don’t want to help, there’s no point in keeping you around.”

“N-no, you m-misunderstand—”

He stops talking when I pull the trigger for the third time, sending a bullet right into his head. Roger shouts as Kim slumps forward, his head hitting the table.

“I’m glad you want to help,” I say to Roger. “I need you to cut Harry Adams off completely. Notify your banks to stop all pending payments. Dispute any transactions you can.”

Gio is already moving. He pulls the CEO’s laptop from his bag, unlocks it with the man’s fingerprint while he’s too shocked to resist.

I step into the hallway and dial a number from memory. The judge answers on the third ring.

“DeLuca.” His voice is guarded. It always is.

“I need Harry Adams’ assets frozen. Every account, every holding, every property. Within the hour.”

A pause. “That’s irregular without—”

“Do it, or the next call I make will be to Mandy, you know, your secretary who still thinks you’ll get divorced and run away with her. Oh, and the one who’s seen me in your office enough times to know we work together.”

The line goes quiet.

Then he finally agrees. “One hour.”

I hang up and walk back into the executive suite. Gio has a USB drive in his hand, loaded with everything from Roger’s laptop. Paolo is making calls, his voice low and threatening, ensuring the payment stoppages are happening in real time.

It’s done. Or this part of it is.

Eyeing the sniveling and crying man, I say, “Paolo, take Roger to the safe house and get him patched up.”

“Got it.”

Then I turn to Gio. “Keep looking for Harry.”

I want to say more, but before I can form any words, my phone rings. I’m equally surprised and worried when the caller ID says, “My wife.”

“Hey baby,” I say. “Everything okay?”

“When are you coming home?” she asks, her voice thick with sleep. “I… the penthouse feels wrong without you here, Domenico.”

Eight words, and suddenly nothing else matters. “I’m coming home soon.”

“How soon?”

“I…” Pausing, I look at Gio and Paolo, both of them nodding and mouthing ‘We got this.’ “I’m on my way,” I tell Kira, already heading to the elevator.

As soon as I end the call, my son catches up to me. “We’ll take Roger’s car so it isn’t left here. Call you later?”

Clasping his shoulder, I look him right in the eye. “Thank you.”

“Anytime.”

Trusting them to handle the next part, I get into the elevator and press the button for the ground floor.