Chapter 15
Six months later, the private tennis club looked almost exactly the same.
Matches upstairs.
Members drinking coffee behind glass walls.
Valets moving cars beneath the building.
But the underground level had changed.
The old storage room was now an open equipment area visible from the security desk.
Michael Reed had been promoted to director of club operations.
He nearly refused the position.
Rocco told him:
“I don’t need someone who agrees with me.”
Michael answered:
“That’s fortunate.”
Rocco almost smiled.
Grant was still repaying what he could.
Most of his former authority had disappeared with the Bellandi name he once borrowed.
Bianca moved out of Manhattan.
She had attempted twice to contact Rocco.
He answered neither call.
When she sent a birthday gift for Mia, Rocco did not decide what happened to it.
He asked Mia.
She did not want it.
So he returned it unopened.
The biggest change was quieter.
Every Saturday morning, Rocco took Mia to breakfast before her swimming lesson.
No private club.
No bodyguards at the table.
Just a small diner where the waitress already knew Mia wanted blueberry pancakes.
One morning Mia slid out of the booth and stood beside Rocco.
“Daddy?”
“Yes?”
“Can I stand here?”
Rocco looked at the empty space beside him.
“You can stand wherever you want.”
Mia smiled and climbed onto his lap instead.
Rocco wrapped one arm around her.
For years he had believed protection meant controlling every danger before it reached the people he loved.
Now he understood that sometimes protection meant building a life where the people around him were allowed to speak before danger became normal.
His phone vibrated.
Michael.
Rocco almost ignored it.
Then he saw the message.
One of the men who had secretly paid Bianca and Grant had returned to the club.
He was not asking for money.
He was asking for the promise Bianca had made him.
Rocco looked down at Mia eating pancakes from his plate.
Six months earlier, he would have left immediately.
Instead he typed:
“Schedule him for Monday.”
Then he turned the phone face down.
Mia held up a blueberry.
“For you.”
Rocco opened his mouth.
She dropped it in.
May you like
And for the rest of breakfast, the unfinished business beneath Manhattan remained exactly where it belonged.
Outside the room.
