He Denied Our Daughter, Now He Begs for Us novel · Chapter 4 of 24

Chapter 4: Thirty Days

Santo Rinaldi stopped an arm's length from me, in the snow, and looked at the three bags on the sidewalk.

Then he looked at Daisy.

"How old is she?" he asked.

"Two days."

"And he put you out."

"His man handed me my coats in a garbage bag."

His face didn't change, but something in his jaw did.

"I'm going to tell you why I'm here," he said, "and you're going to decide if you can stand to hear it."

I held Daisy tighter. "Go ahead."

"Giacomo has held his seat for five years because the council trusts him to keep his own house in order. A boss who leaves his wife in the street with a newborn does not keep his own house in order."

"So you want to use me."

"Yes."

He said it so plainly that I almost laughed.

"I'll use your name in every room I walk into," he said. "I'll say that Giacomo Ferraro put his daughter out in the snow. I want his chair, and you are the best weapon I've ever been handed."

"You could have lied."

"You'd have known."

I looked at the bags.

I looked at the lit window on the third floor, where a chair had scraped as I stood in the hall.

"Why shouldn't I walk to the nearest church and ask a priest for a bed?" I asked.

"You can," he said. "There's one on the next block. I'll carry the bags there myself."

He meant it.

That was what decided it.

A man who wanted to trap me would have told me how safe I would be.

"What would I get," I said, "if I got in your car?"

"A room with a lock on your side of the door. A doctor for her, a kitchen for you. Giacomo's men can't come through my gate."

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