Chapter 8 - Sifting the Ledger
The private suite at the Oak Park hospice facility smelled of clean linen, fresh lilies, and the distinct, sweet scent of anise and vanilla—a scent that Iris’s father, Thomas Halloway, had carried in his skin after forty years of working the ovens on Taylor Street.
Thomas sat up in the wide hospital bed, his silver hair thin, his breathing steady under the quiet hum of the high-grade oxygen machine Callum had provided. Iris sat on the edge of the mattress, her hand clutched in his, while Wren sat on the floor near the window, busy coloring a picture of a large red tractor with a box of brand-new crayons.
The door opened with a soft, quiet click.
Callum walked into the room, his long overcoat unbuttoned, his gray eyes instantly softening as they found Iris. He didn't look like the ruthless syndicate boss who had spent the weekend destroying an entire mafia family; he looked like a man who had finally stepped across a border into a country where he wanted to stay.
Thomas Halloway looked up, his old, faded brown eyes searching Callum’s face with the fierce, protective intelligence of a father from the old neighborhood.
"Callum," the old man said, his voice rough but clear. "Your mother told my girl that you were a business. She said you didn't have room in your ledger for anything that didn't have a price tag attached to it."
Callum walked over to the foot of the bed, his hands coming out of his pockets in an open, vulnerable gesture that Marcus had never seen him use in a boardroom. "My mother was a liar, Thomas. She spent her life building a fortress out of other people’s skin. I dismantled that fortress this morning."
He looked at Iris, his voice dropping into a deep, painful whisper that carried the full weight of the last three years. "The Kanes are gone, Iris. The territory is clean. Your father’s bakery is registered under a permanent trust that will belong to Wren by her eighteenth birthday. Nobody can touch your family again. Nobody can touch our daughter."
Iris stood up from the bed, her brown eyes bright with tears that she no longer tried to guard against. She walked over to him, her fingers hesitant before she placed her palm against the side of his jaw. His skin was warm, the stubble rough against her fingers, the steady beat of his pulse under her thumb confirming that the ghost of Michigan Avenue was finally real.
"You're a fool, Callum Voss," she whispered, her voice cracking as a single tear escaped her eye. "You broke a treaty that took five years to write for a girl from Taylor Street."
"I broke a lie, Iris," Callum said, his arm wrapping around her waist, pulling her tight against his chest in the quiet warmth of the hospital room. "I’m just sorry it took me three years to find the crosswalk."
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Wren looked up from her coloring book, her storm-gray eyes catching the amber light of the afternoon sun coming through the window. "Mommy, is Daddy staying for dinner?"
Iris looked up at Callum, a genuine, beautiful smile breaking through the last remnants of her grief. "Yes, baby. Your daddy is staying for everything."
