Chapter 4: The Brother Who Came Home
Vincent Romano arrived at the brownstone at half past two in the morning.
He came alone, which told Gabriel everything he needed to know about how confident Vincent believed he was.
A guilty man with any instinct for self-preservation would have brought someone.
Vincent walked up the front steps with his hands in his coat pockets and a look of careful concern arranged on his face, the expression of a man arriving to support his family in a crisis.
Gabriel met him in the front room.
"Where's Leo?" Vincent said immediately.
"The text said he survived.
Is he—"
"He's safe."
Vincent's shoulders dropped with what looked like relief.
"Thank God.
Gabriel, I've been out of my mind.
I heard about the motorcade on the scanner and I tried calling you six times—"
"I know.
I saw."
Something flickered in Vincent's eyes.
Just for a moment.
Then the concern came back.
"Who did this?
Was it Sterling?"
"Sit down, Vincent."
"I don't want to sit down, I want to know who took my nephew—"
"Sit down."
Vincent sat.
He was thirty-four, eight years younger than Gabriel, with their father's jaw and their mother's habit of talking with his hands when he was nervous.
Right now his hands were very still.
That was new.
Gabriel remained standing.
"Tell me about the convoy route," Gabriel said.
"What about it?"
"Who knew it."
Vincent spread his hands.
"Half the organization knew the general direction.
It wasn't exactly classified—"
"The specific route.
The overpass on Wacker.
The sequence of vehicles.
Which SUV Leo was in." Gabriel watched him.
"Who knew that."
"I don't know.
Logistics, probably.
Marco's people."
"Marco's people didn't tell Sterling."
"Gabriel, I don't know what you're implying, but—"
"I'm not implying anything." Gabriel pulled a chair close and sat directly across from his brother, close enough that Vincent couldn't look away without making it obvious.
"I'm asking you a direct question.
Did you give Damian Sterling the convoy route?"
Vincent's face went through three expressions in two seconds.
Surprise.
Offense.
Then something that settled into a performance of both.
"That is an insane thing to ask me."
"Answer it."
"No.
Obviously no.
He's my nephew, Gabriel.
Daniel's son.
How could you even—"
"Because someone did." Gabriel's voice didn't rise.
It never rose.
That was the thing about Gabriel Romano that people who had only heard of him never understood.
The quieter he became, the worse it was.
"And the person who did knew details that only moved through family channels.
Not organizational channels.
Family."
Vincent leaned forward.
"Then look at your own people.
Look at whoever runs logistics.
Look at Marco, for all I care—"
"A witness heard your name."
The room went silent.
Vincent's mouth stayed open for half a second before he closed it.
"What witness."
"Someone who was in that warehouse."
"There's no witness." The words came out before he could stop them.
He heard it himself — Gabriel watched him hear it — and Vincent's expression shifted into something harder and faster.
"I mean, whatever someone claims they heard in some warehouse, that's not—"
"You just told me there's no witness," Gabriel said quietly.
"I didn't tell you where the witness was.
I didn't tell you it was a warehouse."
Vincent stood up.
"I'm not doing this.
You're grieving, you're exhausted, someone has fed you bad information and you're pointing it at me because I'm the easiest target in the room—"
"Sterling's men were going to keep Leo."
Vincent stopped.
"The original plan was leverage.
Force the shipping sale.
But someone upgraded the arrangement." Gabriel stood.
He was taller than Vincent by two inches, and right now those two inches felt like a wall.
"Someone paid extra to make sure Leo didn't come home.
The witness heard that too."
"Gabriel—"
"Was it the shipping routes?" Gabriel's voice was very quiet now.
"Did Sterling offer you something for the routes and then Leo became the price of the deal going wrong?
Or did you go to him first?"
"You need to stop talking."
"Did you know they were going to keep him?"
"I said stop—"
"Did you know, Vincent?"
Vincent's hand came up and pointed at Gabriel's chest.
His composure was gone now, replaced by something uglier and more honest.
"You have run this family like a fortress for fifteen years," he said.
"Every decision.
Every contract.
Every alliance.
You never asked me once.
Not once.
Daniel got the kindness and I got the leftovers, and then Daniel d*ed and you still didn't see me.
You looked right through me at a d*ad man." His voice cracked on the last word, and he seemed to hate himself for it.
"Sterling offered me a seat at a real table.
That's all."
"And Leo?"
The silence lasted four seconds.
"They weren't supposed to hurt him," Vincent said.
Quieter now.
Something collapsing behind his eyes.
"It was just supposed to be pressure.
One night.
Then you'd sell and Leo would come home and nobody would ever know."
"But they upgraded the arrangement."
Vincent said nothing.
"Did you authorize that?"
"No." The word came out fast and raw.
"No.
I didn't know about that until — I got a call two hours ago.
They told me the plan had changed.
I tried to reach Sterling to pull it back and he didn't answer." He sat back down.
His hands were shaking now.
"I swear to you I didn't know they were going to—"
"But you started it."
Vincent put his face in his hands.
Gabriel looked at his brother for a long moment.
The shaking shoulders.
The Gold Coast coat.
The careful concern that had walked through the front door an hour ago and was now sitting in pieces on the floor between them.
He thought about Daniel.
About Sunday dinners.
About a man who believed a backyard mattered more than territory.
Then he took out his phone and called Marco.
"Bring them in," he said.
The front door opened.
Two men Gabriel trusted with his life walked into the room.
Vincent looked up.
"Gabriel—"
"You'll be comfortable," Gabriel said.
"You won't be free.
And when the time comes, you'll answer for this properly." He picked up his coat from the back of the chair.
"But not tonight.
Tonight I'm going back to tell my sister-in-law that her son is alive."
He walked to the door.
"Gabriel." Vincent's voice broke on the second syllable.
"I'm still your brother."
Gabriel stopped with his hand on the frame.
May you like
"Daniel was my brother," he said.
He walked out.
