Chapter 7
I asked Julian what the succession issue was.
He smiled.
Too quickly.
“Nothing.”
I held up the notebook.
“Then why write it?”
He shrugged.
“Old family discussion.”
“Whose family?”
Silence.
I turned pages.
Several names belonged to men inside the Vance organization.
Others did not.
One appeared repeatedly.
Leonard Shaw.
I knew him.
Former Vance adviser.
My father’s generation.
Retired badly.
Too ambitious to disappear gracefully.
“What does Shaw have to do with Evelyn?”
Julian looked away.
That was enough.
Evelyn stared at him.
“You know Leonard?”
Julian said nothing.
She looked at me.
I hated how little she knew about the world operating around her marriage.
Not because women should know Mafia business.
Because her husband had clearly made her part of it without telling her.
I sat across from Julian.
“What did Shaw want?”
He exhaled.
“Your retirement.”
I almost laughed.
“I’m fifty-eight.”
“Exactly.”
“And?”
“He said the organization needs transition.”
“To who?”
No answer.
I looked at the notebook.
Then understood.
“Evelyn.”
Her face changed.
Julian looked at her too.
“She’s your only child.”
I stared.
“And Ethan is my grandson.”
“Yes.”
My jaw tightened.
Leonard Shaw had no right to succession.
Julian did not either.
But marriage to Evelyn put Julian close enough to pretend he had a voice.
“If something happened to me?”
Julian looked down.
There it was.
Evelyn whispered, “What?”
He said nothing.
I answered for him.
“He thought being your husband would put him near my chair.”
Her face drained.
Julian snapped, “That’s not what I wanted.”
I looked at him.
“Then what did you want?”
He shouted.
“To stop being treated like your son-in-law!”
Silence.
Finally.
Truth.
Not love.
Not pressure.
Humiliation.
May you like
He had spent years beside Vance power while being reminded it did not belong to him.
And somewhere along the way, he decided controlling Evelyn was easier than earning anything himself.
