And when I wake up, wrapped in his arms, I realize that the dream doesn't have to stay a dream.
I can make it real.
One step at a time. One day at a time. One choice at a time.
I choose hope.
I choose life.
I choose me.
CHAPTER 14
Leviathan
The file is three inches thick.
I spread it across the table in the chapel, letting the brothers see exactly what we've compiled over the past six weeks.
Photographs. Documents. Sworn statements. Financial records that tell a story of corruption so deep it makes my own sins look like jaywalking.
"This is everything?" Zenon asks, flipping through the pages.
"Everything we could verify. There's probably more, but this should be enough."
Behemoth lets out a low whistle. "Enough to bury him."
"That's the idea."
The file tells the story of Douglas Varro's career—not the sanitized version he presents to the public, but the real one.
The complaints he buried. The investigations he derailed. The witnesses who mysteriously recanted their statements after visits from officers loyal to the Chief.
And at the center of it all, a pattern of protecting his son.
Klutch's contacts came through.
The complaint Ripley mentioned—the one Cain bragged about his father making disappear—was real.
A woman named Sarai filed it four years ago, before Ripley, before any of us knew what Cain was capable of.
She had photos, hospital records, everything she needed to put him away.
The case never made it to trial.
Varro intervened personally, pressuring Sarai to drop the charges.
When she refused, her apartment was broken into. Evidence went missing. She left Pittsburgh a month later and never came back.
We found her in Cleveland, working as a waitress, still looking over her shoulder.
When we explained what we needed, she agreed to give a statement. She wasn't the only one.
"How many victims?" Sipher asks quietly.
"That we know of? Four. Before Ripley." I let that sink in. "Four women Cain hurt, and four times his father made the problem go away."
The room is silent.
