Chapter 6
My father met Elena once.
I never knew.
Two weeks before he died.
She had come to the hospital to see me.
I was away meeting capos.
My father recognized her name.
Apparently he had known about us through his own people.
Typical.
He asked her to sit.
Then asked one question.
“Do you love my son, or do you love the room around him?”
Elena told him:
“Sometimes I hate the room.”
He laughed.
I could hear it.
Then he told her something he never told me.
The Sloan alliance was not his idea.
Silvio’s.
My father tolerated it.
Never approved fully.
Why?
Because he distrusted Preston.
And because Victoria’s father had once tried to control Caradonna decisions through marriage.
History repeating before I noticed.
Elena then said:
“Your father told me if there was ever a child, I should come to him first.”
My throat tightened.
He died before she knew.
But he left something.
A sealed note with the hospital attendant.
Addressed to Elena.
She received it two days after his funeral.
Inside:
If Dante ever becomes foolish enough to let another family choose his future for him, remind him that Caradonna survives because we choose our loyalties. We do not lease them.
That sounded exactly like him.
Elena kept the letter.
Victoria learned about it at the clinic.
How?
The clinic receptionist photographed Elena’s personal documents while processing the pregnancy file.
Sloan people again.
They saw my father’s signature.
Silvio panicked.
Because a letter from the former boss supporting Elena would destroy the narrative that she was an opportunist.
More importantly, it would show that the previous Caradonna head had never endorsed the Sloan marriage.
I looked at Silvio.
“You weren’t protecting my father’s plan.”
He said nothing.
“You were protecting yours.”
There.
The alliance had become his legacy project.
He needed it completed because too many old captains measured his usefulness by it.
May you like
My child threatened not only a marriage.
The child threatened the story Silvio had spent years telling about his own importance.
