Chapter 4 - Shadows Inside the House
The solarium was warm, smelling of damp potting soil, lemon trees, and orchids.
Evie sat on a teak bench near the glass wall, a fresh, clean towel around her shoulders. She had washed the plaster from her face and bandaged a small laceration on her jaw where a shard of glass had clipped her. She wore a pair of clean sweatpants and a heavy knit sweater that Roman’s housekeeper had provided.
The glass doors slid open, and Roman entered carrying two tumblers and a heavy leather-bound folder. He set the glasses on a low iron table between them and poured two fingers of amber liquid into each.
“Single malt,” he said. “Better than the well bourbon you served me tonight.”
“I preferred the bourbon,” Evie replied, her voice steady. “Felt more honest.”
Roman took a sip, his eyes studying her in the soft amber light of the greenhouse lamps. The hostility between them had shifted into something else—a tense, volatile current of mutual survival.
“Derek is at a private clinic in Bensalem,” Roman said casually. “Three cracked ribs and a severe contusion to his solar plexus. He won't be eating solid food for three weeks.”
“He was lucky. If I had turned my hips another three degrees, his sternum would have fractured into his heart.”
“I know,” Roman said. “I had his medical scans sent to my phone. My chief of security took one look at them and asked if we were being targeted by a Spetsnaz operative.”
He leaned back, setting the folder on the table.
“Talk to me, Evelyn. No lies. No half-truths. Why did you stay dead?”
Evie looked at the glass of scotch, then took a long, burning swallow. The heat spread through her chest, soothing the chronic ache in her damaged lung.
“Six years ago, Elena called me at six in the morning,” Evie said, her voice dropping into a low, haunting cadence. “She was terrified. She told me she had found a set of offshore accounts and shipping manifests in your study. Accounts that proved someone in your inner circle was moving untracked fentanyl through your freight hubs in South Jersey on behalf of Marco Moretti.”
Roman’s hand tightened around his glass until his knuckles turned ivory. “I have never touched fentanyl. Ever. It was the one rule my father set, and the one rule I maintained.”
“I know,” Evie said. “Elena knew that too. That’s why she realized it was treason. Whoever was doing it knew that if you found out, they were dead. Elena was coming into the city to bring the physical ledger to a safe-deposit box at the Girard Bank. She hired me because she couldn't trust your house drivers.”
“Why didn't she come to me?” Roman asked, a sudden, agonizing crack appearing in his deep voice. “I would have torn this city apart to protect her!”
“Because she didn't know how deep it went!” Evie’s eyes blazed. “She thought you were either involved, or that the traitor was someone so close to you that you would be blinded by loyalty. And she was right to be afraid. We were two blocks from the bank when the garbage truck rammed our Mercedes.”
Evie leaned forward, tapping the scarred surface of the table.
“The gunmen knew our exact coordinates. They didn't shoot to capture. They fired ninety rounds into the passenger compartment within twenty seconds. I pushed Elena into the floorboard. I took three rounds trying to drag her through the rear door. As she was dying... she pressed a silver key into my hand.”
Roman froze. “A safe-deposit key?”
“No,” Evie whispered. “A key to a locker at the 30th Street train station. Locker 412.”
“Did you get the ledger?”
“I was in an induced coma at an underground clinic in West Philly for three months, Roman. By the time I woke up, the news said Elena Vale had died in a tragic mob hit, and that Evelyn Cross, her rogue personal bodyguard, was being hunted by the Vale syndicate for orchestrating the murder.”
Evie looked directly into his eyes, her gaze unflinching.
“You put a half-million-dollar bounty on my head. Every hitman from Boston to Baltimore was tearing through my old gyms, kicking down the doors of my family and friends. If I walked out into the light with that ledger, your own men would have put a bullet in the back of my head before I ever reached your office.”
Silence descended on the solarium, heavy and suffocating.
Roman looked at his hands. For six years, he had built a monument of rage around his wife’s death. He had executed three dozen Moretti foot soldiers, destroyed rival businesses, and lived like a ghost inside his own home, driven by the sole purpose of punishing the world for Elena’s absence.
And all the while, the woman who had taken three bullets for his wife had been hiding in the shadows, washing dishes and carrying trays to survive his own blind vengeance.
“Who was it?” Roman asked, the words hollow, terrifying in their quiet intensity. “Who was Elena investigating?”
“The ledger was gone when I finally recovered enough to check the locker,” Evie said. “Someone had cleaned it out. But Elena told me one name before she died in that car.”
“Give it to me,” Roman said.
“Derek Shaw,” Evie replied.
Roman didn't blink. But inside, the foundations of his empire shook. Derek was the son of his father’s oldest lieutenant. Derek had been at Elena’s funeral, weeping beside the casket. Derek had sat at Roman’s right hand for a decade.
“Derek doesn't have the brains to coordinate an offshore distribution network,” Roman said coldly.
“No,” Evie agreed. “He doesn't. Which means Derek wasn't working alone. He was the enforcer inside your house. The brain is someone else. Someone who sits at your table every single week.”
Before Roman could answer, his phone buzzed against the table.
He picked it up, glanced at the encrypted message, and his eyes darkened into pitch.
“Moretti just called an emergency summit of the Five Families at the Union League for tomorrow night,” Roman said softly. “He claims he has evidence that I’ve become unstable, that my recent actions are threatening the stability of the ports.”
Evie let out a dry, humorless chuckle. “They’re moving against you, Roman. Derek’s failure at the restaurant threw their timeline off. They know I’m alive, they know I dropped Derek, and they know you’re digging. They have to strike before you put the pieces together.”
Roman stood up. He walked to the glass wall of the solarium, staring out into the dark, rain-swept gardens of his estate.
He turned back to look at her.
She was exhausted, bruised, wearing borrowed clothes, yet she sat with the spine of a warrior queen.
“Tomorrow night, I attend that summit,” Roman said.
“They’ll kill you,” Evie said flatly. “It’s an ambush. They’ll isolate your security at the door and eliminate you in the private dining rooms.”
“Not if I have the Valkyrie beside me,” Roman said.
Evie stared at him. “I’m a retired fighter, Roman. Not a bodyguard anymore.”
Roman walked over, stopped beside her chair, and leaned down until his face was inches from hers. The heat between them was sudden, suffocating, and undeniable.
“Elena trusted you with her life,” Roman whispered, his dark eyes burning into hers. “Tonight, my daughter trusted you with her heart. I don't give a damn about my empire, Evelyn. But I want the people who took Elena from that little girl. And I want them in the dirt.”
He extended his right hand.
“Stand with me tomorrow. Help me finish this. And I will give you your life back. Your real name. Your freedom. And anything else you want in this city.”
Evie looked at his hand—broad, powerful, unyielding.
She took it.
May you like
“Get me a custom Glock,” Evie said. “And a dress that hides two extra magazines.”
***
