Chapter 3 - THE BROTHER WHO CAME BACK FROM THE DEAD
Dante’s brother was named Julian Rosselli.
At least that was the name on every old newspaper article Marco pulled up.
Twelve years earlier, Julian had supposedly died when his car exploded beneath an overpass outside Providence.
No body was publicly shown.
Dental records confirmed him.
Family buried him.
End of story.
Except now I was staring at his face on video.
“Why would your dead brother be following my mother?”
Dante’s jaw tightened.
“That is the correct question.”
Leo crawled toward me.
I looked down.
He lifted both arms.
Without thinking, I picked him up.
The reaction in the room was strange.
Marco looked surprised.
Dante looked… wounded.
Not because I touched his baby.
Because Leo relaxed against me instantly.
His cheek rested beneath my collarbone.
Like he had done it before.
My stomach turned.
“Has he met me?”
“No.”
“You’re sure?”
“Yes.”
“Then why does he act like this?”
Dante’s eyes moved to my necklace.
It was cheap.
Silver chain.
Tiny oval locket.
My mother gave it to me at sixteen.
Leo grabbed it.
Not randomly.
He pressed it between his fingers and made a happy sound.
Dante stood.
“Open it.”
“What?”
“The locket.”
“It doesn’t open.”
“Yes, it does.”
I stared at him.
“How would you know?”
“Because Elena wore one exactly like it.”
My skin went cold.
I pulled the necklace free.
The tiny hinge had always looked decorative.
Dante used a pocketknife to pry it gently.
It opened.
Inside was a photograph.
Tiny.
Old.
Two women.
Young.
One was unmistakably my mother.
The other had dark curls and gray eyes.
Leo’s mother.
Elena.
They were standing together.
Behind them was a brick building.
Dante stopped breathing.
“What?”
“That building belonged to my father.”
I looked closer.
A symbol had been painted on the wall.
A dragon.
My mother’s warning echoed again.
If you ever see men with dragons on their skin, Lena, you walk the other way.
Dante touched the tattoo at his neck.
“My father used the dragon as a family mark.”
“So my mother knew your family.”
“Yes.”
“Before me.”
“Long before.”
Marco entered carrying a file.
“Boss.”
“What?”
“We ran Sofia Valdez.”
I almost laughed.
“She worked hospital billing for nineteen years. Good luck finding anything interesting.”
Marco did not smile.
“Not Sofia Valdez.”
He handed Dante a birth record.
I looked over his arm.
Name:
SOFIA BELLINI.
My mother’s maiden name was not Valdez.
It was Bellini.
Dante’s expression changed immediately.
“You know that name.”
“Yes.”
“Who are they?”
“The Bellinis were a crime family.”
“Were?”
“Twenty-five years ago, they disappeared.”
“How does a whole family disappear?”
“They don’t.”
He looked at the birth record.
“They’re erased.”
Marco turned another page.
There was an old photograph.
My mother.
Elena.
And a third girl.
Maybe seventeen.
Standing between them.
Dante whispered:
“That’s Lucia Rosselli.”
“Who?”
“My sister.”
Another dead relative?
I was beginning to hate his family.
“When did she die?”
Dante looked at me.
“Twenty-three years ago.”
I stared at the photograph.
Three young women.
Sofia.
Elena.
Lucia.
All connected.
Two supposedly dead.
One missing.
Then Marco pointed to the handwritten note on the back.
THE THREE GIRLS KNOW WHAT FRANCESCO DID.
Dante’s face became unreadable.
“Francesco was my father.”
May you like
And suddenly my mother’s warning about dragons sounded less like superstition.
It sounded like testimony.
