Chapter 4 - The Discovery in the Dark
The iron door to the cellar had been left cracked open three inches—Carlo had not bothered to lock it securely behind him, knowing the house was supposed to be empty of threats.
Lina pushed the heavy iron door with both hands. It swung open with a low, rusty groan that was swallowed by the subterranean draft.
The stairs leading down into the wine vault were steep, dark, and made of rough-hewn stone. Lina held the cold stone wall with one hand, taking one slow, careful step at a time, her tiny wool socks sliding on the damp stone. Biscotti padded down ahead of her, her yellow eyes glowing in the dark like twin lanterns.
At the bottom of the stairs, the air smelled different. It smelled of old oak barrels, damp earth, iron, and something else—something warm and sharp that made Lina’s tiny nose wrinkle.
Blood.
Lina peeked around the grand stone archway into the main vault.
The light bulb hung motionless from the ceiling, casting stark, jagged shadows across the room. On three wooden crates near the far wall, three heavy men sat with their backs turned to the entrance, playing cards on a flat piece of plywood, a bottle of cheap whiskey sitting between them.
And tied to the central pillar... sat Signor Damiano.
Lina’s eyes widened.
Signor Damiano looked entirely different. His dark hair was matted with thick, drying blood. His white shirt was torn and stained red at the shoulder. His arms were pinned behind the cold stone pillar by thick, rust-colored iron chains wrapped around his chest. And for the first time in her entire life, his hands were bare.
His gloves were gone.
Damiano sat with his chin resting against his chest, his breath coming in shallow, painful rasps. Three ribs were cracked from the heavy blows he had taken during the struggle. His vision was swimming in red and black haze.
Suddenly, he felt a tiny, warm touch against his bare left ankle.
Damiano’s eyes snapped open. He thought one of the guards had come to kick him. He braced his muscles for the impact.
He looked down.
Standing right beside his feet was a three-year-old girl in pink star pajamas, her dark hair messily tied in a pink clip, holding a calico cat under her arm.
Damiano’s heart nearly stopped in his chest. A cold, suffocating terror—a terror far greater than anything he had felt while facing Carlo’s gun—seized his throat.
"Lina..." Damiano breathed, the word barely a whisper, his voice cracking with absolute panic. "What... what are you doing here? Go back upstairs. Right now."
Lina didn't go back. She set Biscotti down on the dirt floor. She stepped closer, her tiny face filled with profound, innocent sorrow.
She reached out her small, warm, unblemished hand and gently touched the bare, cold skin of Damiano’s right thumb—the pale skin crossed by the thin white scar.
"Signor Damiano," she whispered, her dark eyes filling with fat, clear tears that didn't spill. "You're hurt. Where are your gloves?"
Damiano stared down at her, his mind reeling. The three guards were sitting twenty feet away, laughing loudly over a hand of cards, completely unaware that a child was standing in the shadows behind the central pillar.
"Lina, listen to me very carefully," Damiano whispered frantically, leaning his head down as far as the chains would allow. "You must be very quiet. Like a mouse. Do you understand?"
Lina nodded solemnly, pressing her tiny thumb against her lips. "Shh."
"Good girl," Damiano breathed, his eyes darting toward the card-playing guards. "Now... I need you to run upstairs to your mother. Tell her to take you out through the kitchen garden. Run to the police station in town. Do not stop for anything. Do you understand me, Lina?"
Lina looked at his chest, where the heavy steel padlock held the iron chains together behind the pillar.
She didn't run. She looked down at the dirt floor.
Lying in the dirt, just three inches from Damiano’s bare left foot, was the thin, shiny piece of metal Carlo had discarded after forcing the desk open—a long, heavy, steel hairpin that Lucia had dropped in the hallway two days ago, which Carlo had used to clean his nails before dropping it.
Lina reached down and picked up the shiny piece of steel.
"Is this for the toy?" she asked softly, pointing at the heavy padlock behind his back.
Damiano stared at the long, rigid steel hairpin in her tiny fingers. It was thick, tempered steel—the exact size and shape needed to bypass a simple tumbler lock.
A sudden, fierce spark of electricity shot through Damiano’s veins.
"Lina," Damiano whispered, his voice deadly earnest, his bare hands twitching behind his back. "Can you drop that piece of metal into my left hand behind the pillar?"
Lina didn't hesitate. She squeezed her small body into the narrow two-inch gap between Damiano’s back and the rough stone pillar. Her tiny, soft hands reached around his waist, and she carefully placed the long steel pin straight into Damiano’s cold, bare fingers.
For seven years, Damiano Falcone had never touched this child. He had never touched anyone without black leather between his skin and theirs.
Now, as her soft, warm, innocent fingers brushed against his bloodied, bare palm, something inside Damiano’s shattered soul snapped into place.
The touch was not dirty. It was not violent. It was pure, radiant warmth.
"I got it, Piccolina," Damiano whispered softly, his bare fingers wrapping around the steel pin with blinding speed and expert precision. "Now hide behind the big wine barrel over there. Do not make a sound."
Lina grabbed Biscotti, ducked behind the massive oak wine barrel five feet away, and squeezed her eyes shut.
Behind the stone pillar, in the dark, Damiano’s bare fingers moved with lethal, practiced speed.
Before he had ruled the Falcone syndicate, before he had worn tailored suits and leather gloves, Damiano had been a master thief on the streets of Palermo. He knew locks better than he knew his own name.
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Click.
The heavy steel padlock popped open in his bare hands.
