Chapter 4 - The Revealed Pendant
Nico’s playful squirming continued, entirely oblivious to the lethal tension vibrating between the adults. His tiny fists grabbed at the white lace trimming of Mara’s neckline, his fingers exploring the soft textures with curious delight. In his innocent grasping, his little knuckles caught on a thin, delicate metallic chain hidden beneath the folds of her collar.
With one cheerful, uncoordinated yank, the eight-month-old pulled the chain forward.
The motion was sudden, snapping the small hidden stitch on the interior of her apron. The necklace slipped free from its concealment, swinging out into the open air beneath the dazzling light of the crystal chandeliers.
It was an antique silver pendant, roughly the size of a half-dollar coin, suspended from a heavy, hand-linked platinum chain. The silver was tarnished around the beveled edges, worn smooth by decades of being pressed against warm skin, but the craftsmanship was unmistakable.
Engraved across the face of the medallion was an ancient, intricate symbol: a weeping angel with folded wings, framed by two crossed gladius swords and a crown of thorns—an emblem that had not been struck by any jeweler in North America for nearly fifty years. Beneath the weeping angel, carved in microscopic, razor-sharp Latin script, was a motto that was known to only four living people in the entire Western hemisphere: Sanguis Meus, Anima Mea.
The pendant swung gently in the golden light, casting tiny silver reflections across Mara’s pale throat.
Dominic’s eyes tracked the glittering metal.
The moment his gaze landed on the weeping angel and the crossed blades, the breath violently evacuated his lungs. It was as if an invisible bullet had punched straight through the center of his sternum.
Every muscle in his colossal frame locked into petrified immobility. The dark ink across his throat seemed to pull taut as the color drained from his face with terrifying, unnatural speed. The ruthless, untouchable mafia kingpin who had watched men beg for their lives without a flicker of emotion turned deathly, ghostly pale. His pupils dilated until his dark brown irises were almost entirely consumed by blackness.
Beside the doorway, Marco saw the shift in his employer's posture. "Boss? What is it?"
Dominic did not answer. He couldn't. His ears were ringing with a high-pitched, deafening roar, drowning out the soft murmurs of the restaurant, the hum of the chandeliers, and the contented gurgles of his infant son.
That pendant.
That specific, one-of-a-kind, hand-carved medallion was not an heirloom that could be bought in an antique shop or forged by a pawn broker. It had been commissioned in Palermo in 1974 by his grandfather, Don Bernardo Moretti. Only two had ever been cast in solid platinum and silver. One had been lowered into a bronze casket in a cemetery on Staten Island twelve years ago, resting around his mother's neck.
The other had disappeared twenty-three years ago, on a rainy November night when the Moretti estate had burned, vanishing along with the one person Dominic had spent half his life mourning—and hunting.
Dominic’s hands began to shake. The dragon tattoo across his knuckles, usually a sign of imminent violence, trembled with an uncontrollable, visceral shock that made his signet ring click faintly against his wristwatch.
Mara noticed the transformation. The sudden, horrifying change in the dangerous man before her made her blood run cold. She saw his eyes fixated on her chest, saw the sheer, unadulterated shock contorting his masculine features, and an old, deeply buried instinct flared to life.
Hide it, her mother’s dying voice echoed in the back of her memory. Never let them see it, Mara. If a man with dark ink or heavy rings ever sees that angel, run. Run and never look back.
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With a sharp gasp, Mara released her hold on Nico with her right hand, clamping her trembling palm over the silver pendant, desperately trying to shove it back beneath the collar of her pale-yellow dress while supporting the baby with her left arm.
The movement snapped Dominic out of his trance.
