A Hungry Little Girl Asked Me for Two Dollars to Feed Her Sick Mother—Then I Followed Her Home and Found a Woman From My Past.

Dominic stood up from his desk, holding the photograph in his trembling gloved hand, his breath coming in deep, controlled gasps.

His father, Carmine Vescari, was alive in Europe?

And who was the ten-year-old boy standing beside him in Paris?

Before Dominic could process the mind-shattering discovery, his private satellite phone on the desk chimed with an incoming call from an unlisted European number.

Dominic picked up the receiver, his voice dropping to an ice-cold, lethal register. "Speak."

A deep, cultured European voice spoke softly through the speaker—a voice Dominic recognized instantly, despite fifteen years of silence:

"Hello, Dominic. You handled Vincent and Julian quite well in Chicago."

Dominic’s grip tightened on the phone until his knuckles turned white. "Father?"

"I see you found the photograph in Vault 4," Don Carmine Vescari chuckled softly over the clear satellite line. "You always had your mother's sharp eyes, my son."

"You faked your death fifteen years ago," Dominic stated, his voice flat as granite. "You left me to fight Vincent and the Morettis in the streets."

"I left you to forge you into a Don, Dominic!" Carmine replied, his tone growing serious and commanding. "Chicago was merely a testing ground. The real Vescari empire has been operating out of Europe for thirty years."

"I don't care about your European empire," Dominic growled. "My family is in Chicago. Claire and Lily are safe."

"Are they safe, Dominic?" Carmine asked softly. "Check the brass key you found in the box. Key number 104."

Dominic picked up the brass key from his desk, holding it under the light. "What does this key open?"

"It opens Vault 104 at the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago," Carmine revealed. "Inside that vault is the second half of the Chicago Agreement. The half that proves Claire Bellini is not the last surviving Bellini heir."