Page 72 of Wicked Mafia Sinner

“What is it?”

She motions to the paper. "The truth about what your son is up to is on that paper.”

“And you’ve had this the whole time you’ve been here?”

She grows pensive for a moment before answering. “In all honesty, yes and no. Let me start at the beginning. The last customer who came into my shop was the man who was shot in the alley.”

“Right.”

“He was nervous, kept checking the windows like his wife was gonna burst through my door and beat him into a pulp any second. Anyway, he asked for a back door and I told him no problem. He threw some money on the counter before dashing out and I think that is when he dropped that.”

She looks at the paper in my hand again before coming to rest on mine. "I picked it up and followed him out, thinking he might need it.”

“That’s how you found yourself in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

She nods. “I shoved that paper in my boot and ran for my life. I didn’t have the guts to read it until yesterday. I felt it had bad juju and I was right."

Iopen it. My name at the top in bold ink, handwritten. Below it, dates. Locations. Cargo manifests. Shipping routes through Eastern European ports, routes I control, routes only a handful of people can access. Payment amounts large enough to be operational. Notes in the margins, cramped script.

At the bottom. One name.

Nikolai Volkov.

I turn the paper over. Block letters, a different hand: You have a mole. Your son has your routes. Found this on a dead man at a warehouse Nikolai uses. Be careful.

My thumb runs across the words. I turn the ring over and over as I read the words again.

My jaw locks shut. The weight of this settles just below my sternum. I finally have the proof I need. I know my brothers will back me up, but we need more men on our side. And this will get them to move. Namely the men of Genesis. If Nikolai will move in on our territory, what is stopping him from doing the same to them? This paper will show them it is in their best interest to help us take out the threat. I never wanted to think that about my own flesh and blood, but I see no other way that won’t cost lives.

"You should have told me sooner."

"I know."

"I would have listened."

"I know that too." She rises off the bed and steps closer. She falls to her knees in front of me and I lift her chin so our gazes meet. "The second I realized it was about your son, I dreaded telling you. No one wants to deliver that kind of news to a parent."

"I know who my son is, Cora." I brush her hair from her face and trace the tips of my fingers over the delicate line of her jaw.

She flinches at my tone and I reach for her hand.

"That is not anger at you. It’s at myself for not doing everything I needed to make sure he was not pulled into my lifestyle and poisoned."

Her fingers close around mine and I look at her for a long moment. Morning light filters through the compound in pale stripes. “Never at you,” I swear to her. I pull her against my chest and hold her to me.

Letting go requires acknowledging my failure in being a father. This moment is over twenty years in the making and it is my own fault. I can’t see a day where I will ever have the strength to tell her my sins. But I know one day I will have to pull the curtain back and show her the real me. The bastard son of a murderer. The father of a killer. A sinner at heart.

I have no right to ask her to love me when I despise the man I am to the core.

Fourteen

Cora

The man won't tell me where we're going.

Not that I’m complaining about being out of his underworld and enjoying some time in the daylight. But it would be nice to know.

I slide my hand across the seat and tease my fingers over his zipper, playing with the silver pull. We’re in a full-sized SUV so if I have to use my brand new seducing skills, I’ve got the room.