Chapter 5 - The Man Behind the Monster
The staff apartment was small but beautiful.
It had two bedrooms, clean carpets, a warm kitchen, and windows that faced the frozen lake. There was a crib already assembled in Jamie’s room, a stack of diapers in the closet, and enough formula to make Penny cry before she could stop herself.
She hated crying over gifts.
Gifts had strings.
But as Jamie slept safely in a room of his own for the first time in months, Penny sat on the edge of the couch and let the tears come anyway.
The next morning, Rosa Martinez arrived with coffee and paperwork.
Rosa was Lake Haven House’s human resources director, though everyone knew she had been at Sandro’s side long before the fancy title. She was in her late fifties, warm-eyed, blunt, and completely unimpressed by wealth.
“You’re not being fired,” Rosa said.
“I heard.”
“You’re also not being punished.”
“I broke a rule.”
“Yes,” Rosa said. “A stupid rule.”
Penny looked up.
Rosa sat across from her. “You know what Sandro did after that meeting?”
“No.”
“He called every department head into a room and asked how many employees had children. Then he asked how many could afford childcare.”
Penny blinked.
“And?”
“And he learned Lake Haven House has been pretending to be family-friendly while expecting mothers to choose between their children and their jobs.”
Penny did not know what to say.
Rosa smiled faintly. “You made a powerful man uncomfortable. That’s not easy.”
Later that afternoon, Sandro came to the apartment.
He stood outside the door for several seconds before Penny opened it.
He had no bodyguards with him. No expensive coat. Just a dark sweater, tired eyes, and a paper bag from a local bakery.
“I brought dinner,” he said.
Penny folded her arms. “Do mafia bosses usually bring lasagna?”
His mouth almost curved into a smile.
“Only when they’re trying to avoid being yelled at.”
“I’m still deciding whether to yell at you.”
“That seems fair.”
She let him in.
For a while, they ate in uneasy silence while Jamie sat in his high chair and smeared tomato sauce across his cheeks.
Sandro watched him with an expression Penny could not read.
“You’re good with him,” she said.
“I had a younger sister.”
“Had?”
“She died when I was nineteen.”
Penny stopped eating.
“I’m sorry.”
“So am I.”
He looked toward the window.
“My father had enemies. He believed fear kept us safe. It didn’t.” Sandro’s voice was quiet. “It only made everyone around him pay the price.”
For the first time, Penny saw something beneath the coldness.
Grief.
Not the loud kind.
The kind that had hardened into stone.
“My father wanted me to inherit his world,” Sandro continued. “I spent years trying to turn it into something else. Legitimate businesses. Better people. Fewer ghosts.”
“And did it work?”
“Not enough.”
Their eyes met.
Penny should have been afraid of him.
Instead, she felt something more dangerous.
Understanding.
Then Sandro’s phone rang.
He looked at the screen, and every trace of softness vanished.
“Dominic,” he said.
A voice spoke through the speaker.
Sandro’s expression darkened.
“What happened?”
Penny could only hear fragments.
“Construction records…”
“Missing documents…”
“Bellandi.”
Sandro’s hand tightened around the phone.
“I’ll handle it,” he said.
When he ended the call, Penny stood.
“What is Bellandi?”
“A man who should have disappeared from my life years ago.”
“Does he have something to do with Owen?”
Sandro’s silence answered her.
Penny’s chest tightened.
“If you find out who did this,” she said, “don’t protect me from the truth.”
Sandro looked at her for a long time.
“I’m trying to protect you from what the truth will bring.”
May you like
But Penny had already lost too much to be protected by silence.
---
