Chapter 5 - The Night Frankie Became the Target
Gabriel had told the world his sister was dead.
Frankie learned that at two in the morning while sitting in his grandmother’s kitchen with a red ledger full of corrupt names and enough coffee to make her hands shake.
“Elena died fourteen years ago,” Gabriel said.
“But she’s in that photograph.”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“I don’t know.”
“You’re sure it’s her?”
He looked at Frankie.
“A man can forget almost anything if he tries hard enough. Not his little sister’s face.”
Frankie studied the photograph again.
Elena looked about thirty.
She stood half-hidden beside a parked car.
Alive.
Watching the house.
“Did you see her body?”
“No.”
“What happened?”
“A car exploded.”
“Whose car?”
“Hers.”
“Body?”
“Too badly burned for visual identification.”
“DNA?”
Gabriel said nothing.
Frankie stared.
“You never confirmed.”
“My uncle handled the arrangements.”
“Luca.”
“Yes.”
The answer landed heavily.
Another death.
Another explanation provided by Luca Costa.
Gabriel’s father.
Gabriel’s sister.
Frankie’s father.
Three people connected to the same secret.
“What if Elena knew?”
Gabriel’s jaw tightened.
“Knew what?”
“That Luca was working with Rinaldi.”
“Then why disappear?”
“Maybe she didn’t have a choice.”
Gabriel stood.
“I’m finding her.”
Frankie grabbed his sleeve.
“Stop.”
He looked down at her hand.
Then at her.
“You run out that door angry, you become predictable.”
His expression changed.
She released him.
“That sounds like something you’d say.”
“I’m learning.”
Despite everything, something passed between them.
Warm.
Dangerous in a different way.
Gabriel looked away first.
By sunrise, they had a plan.
The ledgers would not be taken to the garage.
Copies had already been made and secured with an attorney Gabriel trusted outside the organization.
If anything happened to Frankie, Leo, or Gabriel, the records would be released.
“It’s insurance,” Gabriel explained.
Frankie raised an eyebrow.
“Look at you becoming legitimate.”
“Don’t spread it around.”
They spent the morning identifying names.
The corruption was larger than either expected.
Luca Costa and Rinaldi had been siphoning money for twenty-three years.
They sold routes.
Created false seizures.
Ordered rivals killed.
Paid police to redirect investigations.
But one page interested Frankie more than the others.
Payments to a private medical clinic.
The same clinic that had treated Vittorio Costa before his death.
“Your father was poisoned,” she said.
Gabriel stared at the page.
“I know.”
“No. You suspect.”
“I know.”
She understood.
Sometimes grief skipped the evidence.
The truth became emotional before it became legal.
“Then we prove it.”
Gabriel looked at her.
“Why?”
“What?”
“Why help me?”
Frankie leaned back.
“You mean aside from Luca probably murdering my father?”
“Yes.”
She looked at him.
Because I know what it feels like to discover the person you buried didn’t die the way you believed.
She did not say it.
Instead:
“Because your grandmother had good taste in insults.”
Gabriel laughed.
That afternoon, Matteo located Elena.
She had entered the United States three days earlier using another name.
They traced a rented vehicle to a motel near O’Hare.
Gabriel insisted on going alone.
Frankie insisted he was an idiot.
They compromised by going together.
Elena opened the motel door with a gun pointed directly at Gabriel’s chest.
He froze.
She froze.
Fourteen years disappeared from his face.
“Elena.”
Her hand began shaking.
“Gabriel.”
Frankie stepped backward.
Some reunions did not need witnesses.
But Elena looked at her.
“Who are you?”
“Frankie.”
Elena almost laughed.
“The mechanic.”
Frankie’s eyes narrowed.
“You know me?”
“Everyone knows you now.”
“That’s concerning.”
Elena lowered the gun.
Gabriel remained motionless.
“You’re alive.”
She nodded.
“You let me think you were dead.”
Her eyes filled.
“I had to.”
“For fourteen years?”
“I was trying to survive.”
“From Luca?”
Her expression answered.
Gabriel turned away as if physically struck.
Elena sat.
“I found out Uncle Luca was poisoning Dad.”
Gabriel went still.
“I confronted him.”
“When?”
“Two weeks before Dad died.”
“And?”
“He told me I misunderstood.”
“You believed him?”
“For one day.”
She laughed bitterly.
“Then Rinaldi followed me home.”
Frankie listened.
Elena continued.
“I copied some financial records. I planned to give them to Dad. Luca found out. He arranged the explosion.”
Gabriel whispered, “The car.”
“I wasn’t in it.”
“Who was?”
Elena looked sick.
“A woman from the office. She borrowed it.”
Gabriel closed his eyes.
Luca had allowed them to bury another innocent woman as Elena.
“Why didn’t you come home?”
“Because Luca called me.”
Elena’s voice trembled.
“He said if I returned, he’d kill you next.”
Gabriel looked at her.
“You should have told me.”
“You were twenty-two. Angry. You would’ve attacked him.”
He did not deny it.
“I disappeared. I collected evidence. But Luca kept moving everything. Shell companies. New names.”
“Why come back now?”
Elena looked at Frankie.
“Because of Salvatore Bellomo.”
Frankie stiffened.
“You knew my father?”
“He helped me escape.”
Silence.
Frankie stared.
“Elena…”
“The night of the explosion, I called one person outside the family.”
“My dad.”
“Yes.”
“Why him?”
“Because Dad trusted him.”
Gabriel looked confused.
“Vittorio trusted Salvatore that much?”
Elena nodded.
“They had been working together for years.”
Frankie sat.
Her father had lived an entire secret life beside the one she knew.
“He gave me cash. Papers. A car. He told me to disappear.”
Tears filled Frankie’s eyes.
“That’s why Luca killed him?”
“Not immediately. Salvatore convinced Luca he didn’t know where I went.”
“But five years ago?”
Elena looked toward the window.
“I contacted Salvatore.”
Gabriel understood first.
“That’s why he called me.”
“Yes.”
“I found final evidence against Luca. Salvatore agreed to deliver it to you.”
Frankie whispered, “Then Luca discovered the plan.”
Elena nodded.
“He killed Salvatore before he could do it.”
Frankie stood abruptly.
The motel room became too small.
She went outside.
Gabriel followed after a minute.
She stood beside the railing.
“My father died because he helped your family.”
Gabriel said nothing.
“He could’ve stayed out of it.”
“Yes.”
“He could’ve told me.”
“Yes.”
“He could’ve chosen us.”
Gabriel’s voice was quiet.
“Maybe he believed he was.”
She turned.
“How?”
“Luca had already tried to kill Elena. He had killed my father. If Salvatore knew the truth and did nothing, eventually Luca would have become stronger.”
Frankie wiped at her eyes angrily.
“I don’t want the noble version.”
“Then don’t take it.”
“What?”
“Be angry at him.”
Gabriel stepped closer.
“Love does not require you to approve of every choice someone made.”
Frankie stared.
“Where’d you learn that?”
“My sister just returned from the dead.”
A laugh escaped her through tears.
Gabriel smiled.
Then Frankie realized how close they were.
His hand hovered near her face.
He stopped before touching her.
Waiting.
Frankie could have moved away.
She didn’t.
His fingers brushed a tear from her cheek.
The tenderness frightened her more than his gunmen ever had.
“Gabriel.”
“Yes?”
“This is a terrible idea.”
“Probably.”
“You tried to take my garage yesterday.”
“I remember.”
“My brother owes your organization money.”
“Technically under review.”
“You’re impossible.”
“So I’ve been told.”
She kissed him.
Once.
Briefly.
Then stepped back.
Gabriel looked genuinely stunned.
Frankie pointed at him.
“That never happened.”
“Of course.”
“If you smile, I’ll break your nose.”
He smiled.
She almost hit him.
Elena opened the motel door.
“You two finished?”
Frankie wanted the ground to open.
Gabriel remained calm.
“No.”
Frankie glared.
He corrected himself.
“Yes.”
Elena rolled her eyes.
“I remember why I left.”
By evening, they had enough evidence to expose Luca.
But Luca moved first.
Leo disappeared.
His phone was found outside the garage.
A single text arrived on Frankie’s number.
NO POLICE. MIDNIGHT. ORIGINAL LEDGERS.
Then a video.
Leo sat tied to a chair inside Bellomo Auto.
Luca Costa stood behind him.
Older than Gabriel.
Elegant.
Calm.
He looked directly into the camera.
“Francesca, your father made the mistake of believing truth matters more than family.”
He smiled.
“Tonight, you can make a better choice.”
The screen went black.
Gabriel immediately said, “You’re not going.”
Frankie grabbed her jacket.
“That’s my brother.”
“It’s a trap.”
“I know.”
“They want the original ledgers.”
“I know.”
“Frankie.”
She turned.
“You don’t get to decide which member of my family is worth risking my life for.”
Gabriel stopped.
She softened.
“But you can help me bring him home.”
At eleven forty-five, Frankie entered Bellomo Auto carrying both ledgers in a canvas tool bag.
Alone.
At least that was what Luca believed.
Leo sat tied near Bay Three.
Rinaldi stood beside him.
Luca waited behind her father’s desk.
Frankie placed the bag down.
“Let him go.”
Luca smiled.
“You have Salvatore’s temper.”
“And you have his murderer’s face.”
Rinaldi moved toward her.
Luca stopped him.
“No.”
He looked at Frankie almost fondly.
“Your father and I used to argue right there.”
Frankie’s stomach turned.
“You don’t get to talk about him.”
“He was stubborn.”
“You cut his brakes.”
“Rinaldi did.”
Frankie glanced at Rinaldi.
He smiled.
“On Luca’s order?”
Luca remained silent.
Frankie knew enough.
“Give me the ledgers,” he said.
“Release Leo.”
“First the books.”
“No.”
Luca smiled.
“There it is. That Bellomo pride.”
Frankie reached into the bag.
Then stopped.
Because from somewhere outside came the sound of sirens.
Luca’s expression changed.
Frankie smiled.
“You really should’ve learned something from my father.”
“What?”
“When the obvious part fails…”
She looked toward the rear entrance.
“…look upstream.”
The lights went out.
Gabriel’s men entered.
But before anyone could reach Leo, Rinaldi pulled a gun.
He aimed directly at Frankie.
Gabriel came through the side door.
“Frankie!”
May you like
The gun fired.
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