The Mafia Boss Needed a Date for His Brother’s Wedding—The Woman He Chose Shocked Everyone
PART 2
“Sylvio Gardoni,” the man said, stepping closer beneath his black umbrella.
I backed into the brick wall, the rolled canvas hidden inside my jacket, rain streaming down my face. Behind me, in the museum, men with fuel cans were trying to burn the truth I had just cut from its frame. And in front of me stood a man whose family seal, a wolf holding scales, glowed in ultraviolet ink beneath that very truth. The Gardonis. The family my father had been accused of stealing from. The family he had sworn, until his last appeal, had framed him.
“Stay back,” I said, though my voice shook.
“You’re holding something that belongs to a great deal of trouble, Miss Mitchell,” Sylvio said. He did not move toward me. He simply stood, calm in the rain, watching me with an expression I could not read. “The men inside that building were sent to destroy that painting. Do you understand what that means? It means the painting matters. It means what’s hidden beneath that varnish is worth killing for. And you’ve just walked out of there with it inside your jacket.” He paused. “Get in the car. Before they come out and find you here.”
“Get in the car with you?” I laughed, half-hysterical. “You’re a Gardoni. Your family destroyed my father. Why would I trust you?”
Something flickered across his face. “Because,” he said, “I am not the Gardoni who destroyed your father. And because the painting you’re holding might be the only thing in the world that can prove it.” He extended a hand toward the open car door. “I know what’s under that varnish, Miss Mitchell. I’ve been looking for it for three years. A hidden ledger. The real one. The one that shows where the money actually went. The one that would prove your father, Arthur Mitchell, never stole anything at all.”
I stared at him, the rain soaking through my clothes, the sirens beginning somewhere in the distance.
“How do you know my father’s name?” I whispered.
“Because I’ve spent three years trying to undo what was done to him,” Sylvio said. “Get in the car, and I’ll tell you everything. Or stay here, and let the men with the fuel cans take the painting and finish what they started. Those are your choices. You have about thirty seconds to make one.”
I got in the car.
