Page 212 of Merciless Daddy

Sal’s hand tightened slightly against the chair.

“I remain with her.”

I reached behind me and found his hand.

The blue bowl waited downstairs in the kitchen.

My notebook waited beside the files.

And for one night, in a guarded house in a city full of enemies, I let myself believe those things belonged together.

*

Pietro arrived before dawn with blood on his cuff.

Not much. A dark line near the wrist.

I was in the study with coffee going untouched beside my files. Sal stood at the window, phone in hand. He turned when Pietro entered.

“The driver talked,” Pietro said.

Sal’s face did not change. “What happened?”

Pietro looked at me first.

I hated that. I hated the small pause people made when deciding whether I was strong enough to hear the truth of the world.

“Tell me,” I said.

“They took his daughter,” Pietro said. “Gianni’s men. They held her overnight. Beat the driver. Told him they would send pieces of her home if he did not cooperate.”

My stomach clenched.

“He put a tracker in Kiryl’s overnight bag,” Pietro continued. “Sewed it into the lining.”

“Where is she?” I asked.

“Recovered. Alive. Scared. No serious injuries.”

The word alive left my lungs in a slow breath.

“And the tracker?”

“Exactly where he said it was.”

Sal held out his hand. Pietro placed a small black square in his palm. It looked harmless. Cheap plastic. A child’s broken toy.

It had been meant to lead men to my brother.

“That is why he missed the check-in,” I said.

Pietro nodded.

“He had to place it. He panicked afterward. They hurt him enough that the story held.”

Angela came in behind him, hair still damp from a shower, laptop open against her chest.

“The tracker was transmitting intermittently,” she said. “Low power. It would have remained quiet until the next transfer.”