My Mafia Boss Husband Chose His Mistress While I Was in Labor, but When He Came Home Our Son and I Had Vanished

The winter chill descended upon Manhattan four months later, turning the streets into slick, ice-covered corridors of dark granite and steel.

Inside the private dining room of an exclusive steakhouse in East Midtown, three men sat around a heavy round table.

Damian Moreland sat at the head. Across from him sat Paulie "The Wall" Cavallo, the head of the Philadelphia syndicate, and Anthony Marcone, a senior lieutenant from the Brooklyn outfit.

The atmosphere in the room was suffocatingly tense.

"You're slacking, Damian," Paulie said, chewing on a thick cigar, his heavy gold rings clicking against his wine glass. "The docks in Newark have been sitting stagnant for three weeks because your shipping trucks aren't moving. The federal grand jury is breathing down our necks because your accounting firm in Miami leaked six years of offshore invoices."

Damian didn't touch his steak. He stared at Paulie with eyes that were sunken, dark, and hollowed out by months of sleeplessness and relentless searching.

"The Newark docks will move by Monday," Damian said, his voice raspy.

"That's what you said last month," Anthony Marcone interjected, leaning forward. "Word on the street is you've pulled thirty of your best enforcers off security detail to run around the country looking for your wife. You're spending family money on private eyes and tech nerds, Damian. The bosses in Chicago are getting nervous."

Damian set his fork down with a sharp CLANG against the porcelain plate.

"My family business," Damian said, his voice dropping into a register that made the waiter near the door step back in fear, "is my business."

"Not when your wife is sitting on federal evidence, it isn't!" Paulie barked, slamming his palm on the table. "We all know what happened! She walked out on you with a flash drive full of Florida property deeds! If the Feds get their hands on those documents, my boys in Philly go down along with yours!"

Paulie leaned across the table, his eyes narrowing into vicious slits. "Find the bitch and put her down, Damian. Or we’ll find her for you."

Before Paulie could draw another breath, Damian reached across the table, grabbed Paulie by his expensive silk tie, and slammed his face flat onto the wooden table.

BANG.

Glassware shattered; wine spilled across the white tablecloth like fresh blood.

Damian pulled a short silver knife from his jacket pocket and pinned Paulie's right hand to the table, forcing the blade through the meat between his knuckles into the wood below.

Paulie screamed in agony, his face pressed against the spilled wine.

"If anyone under your command," Damian whispered directly into Paulie's ear, his breath hot and ragged, "so much as utters my wife’s name again, I will personally skin every soldier you have from Atlantic City to Scranton. Do you understand me?"

Anthony Marcone stood up rapidly, pulling his jacket open to reach for his firearm, but Viktor—who had stepped in from the hallway—instantly pressed the cold barrel of a suppressed pistol against the back of Marcone’s neck.

"Freeze, Anthony," Viktor warned quietly.

Damian let go of the knife handle, leaving Paulie pinned to the table, sobbing in pain. Damian wiped his hands on a linen napkin, pulled his heavy wool coat off the back of his chair, and walked out of the private room without looking back.

Outside on the snow-covered street, Viktor followed close behind.

"Boss," Viktor said quietly, pulling his collar up against the freezing wind. "That was Cavallo. The Philly family will declare war on us by morning."

"Let them," Damian said, his chest heaving as he stared up at the dark sky. "They don't matter. None of this matters."

"Damian..." Viktor hesitated, his voice softening with rare concern. "Eli found something."

Damian froze in the middle of the sidewalk. He turned slowly, his eyes wild. "What?"

"A small regional bank in Portland, Maine," Viktor whispered. "An account was opened four months ago under a corporate trust name—Vance Holdings. Yesterday, a wire transfer was made from that account to a pediatric clinic in Harbor Cove."

Damian felt his heart leap into his throat with a force that almost knocked him off his feet.

"Harbor Cove," Damian whispered.