Chapter 3 - The Price of LoyaltyBy the end of the week, the atmosphere inside the Costello estate had shifted from tense to explosive.
Rumors were circulating among the guards and domestic staff like wildfire. The assassination attempt on Arthur’s life—though hushed up by the inner circle—had sent shockwaves through the syndicate. Someone inside the organization had leaked Arthur’s transit route. Someone was trying to overthrow him from within.
And Dante Vance was acting like a man who believed he was about to inherit the throne.
I kept my head down, scrubbing floors, changing linens, and retreating to my tiny boiler-room refuge the second my shift ended. But escape was no longer possible.
Late Friday night, a sharp knock rattled my iron door.
I froze, knife-in-hand—a paring knife I had stolen from the main kitchen for self-defense. I crept to the door and pulled it open a crack.
It wasn't Arthur.
It was Maria, one of the older cooks who had worked in the estate for twenty years. Her face was pale as chalk, her eyes wide with terror, clutching a silver tray of leftover pastries.
“Norah, thank God,” Maria whispered, grabbing my sleeve and pulling me out into the dim hallway. “You need to get out of here. Pack your things and leave.”
“What are you talking about, Maria?” I asked, my heart skipping a beat.
“Dante,” she hissed, glancing nervously down the dark corridor. “He’s been questioning everyone in the kitchens. He found a blood-stained handkerchief in the incinerator ash behind the laundry room. He knows someone helped Arthur patch up a wound last Saturday night.”
My stomach plummeted.
“He thinks it was one of the maids,” Maria continued, her voice trembling. “He’s already interrogated Clara. She swore she didn't know anything, but Dante... Dante isn’t going to stop until he finds out the truth. And if he thinks you covered for the boss... he’ll kill you, Norah. He won't even hesitate.”
Before I could process the warning, heavy, rhythmic footsteps echoed down the stone hallway behind us.
Clack. Clack. Clack.
Dante Vance appeared around the corner, flanked by two armed guards in black suits. His signature snake-like smile was plastered across his face, but his eyes were dead.
“Well, well, well,” Dante purred, stopping a few feet away. He looked at Maria, then zeroed in on me. “The little ghost of the boiler room. You’re up late, Norah. Tidy girl, aren't you? Always cleaning up messes.”
Maria tried to step in front of me, her voice shaking. “Mr. Vance, she was just helping me with the— Shut up, old woman,” Dante snapped without breaking eye contact with me. He gestured to the guards, and within a second, Maria was roughly shoved aside, her tray clattering loudly against the stone floor.
Dante closed the distance between us, stepping right into my personal space.
“A handkerchief was burned in the laundry incinerator,” Dante said smoothly, his voice dropping into a soft, venomous purr. “A very expensive Italian silk handkerchief monogrammed with the initials A.C. Only problem is, the boss doesn't do his own laundry. And none of the senior capos were bleeding last weekend.”
He reached out, his long fingers curling roughly around my wrist, squeezing until the paring knife slipped from my fingers and clattered onto the floor.
“So I started asking myself,” Dante continued, leaning down until his face was inches from mine. “Who has access to the private residential wing? Who lives right down here in the staff bowels? Who has a sick father in Evanston who suddenly received a fifty-thousand-dollar wire transfer from an anonymous offshore account this morning?”
My breath hitched. The money. Arthur had wired money to my father’s hospital account.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I managed to choke out, trying to wrench my wrist free from his iron grip.
“Liar,” Dante hissed, his smile vanishing instantly. His free hand shot up, his palm cracking hard across my cheek.
The impact sent a blinding flash of white light through my vision. I stumbled backward, crashing hard against the stone wall, the taste of copper flooding my mouth from a split lip.
“You’re going to tell me every single thing Arthur said to you that night,” Dante snarled, stepping forward, drawing a heavy silver pistol from his shoulder holster and pressing the cold barrel directly against my forehead. “Or I promise you, Norah, your father’s hospital bed is going to look like a vacation compared to what I do to you right here, right now.”
I stared down the barrel of the gun, my entire body trembling. This was it. The end of the line.
Then, a voice cut through the hallway like a blast of Arctic wind.
“Take the gun off her head, Dante.”
Every guard in the hallway instantly stiffened. Dante’s hand froze.
Slowly, agonizingly, Dante lowered the pistol and turned around.
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Arthur Costello was standing at the end of the corridor. He had no gun in his hand, no guards flanking him. He was dressed in a simple black shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows, revealing the fresh, clean bandages on his forearm.
But the look in his eyes was pure, unadulterated murder.
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