Chapter 2 - The Drawing in the Apron
The silence inside Callahan’s Pub was absolute, save for the rhythmic patter of rain against the grimy windowpanes and the low hum of the beer cooler.
The man in the black overcoat—Dante Rossi, a name whispered in hushed tones across Boston from the North End to the dockyards—did not blink. His gaze remained fixed on Josie Morrow, who stood like a human shield between him and six-year-old Mila. The four armed men forming his perimeter kept their hands close to their jacket openings, their eyes darting across the room to ensure no patron made a sudden movement.
Behind the bar, Phil Callahan looked like he was about to faint, clutching a dry rag so hard his knuckles had turned bone-white.
Dante took one slow step forward. The tailored wool of his coat brushed against a sticky table.
“You’ve been feeding her,” Dante repeated, his voice smooth, low, and carrying the chilling weight of absolute authority. “Every night for two months. While men in my employ were paid to watch her meals.”
Josie swallowed hard, forcing her vocal cords to cooperate. Her heart hammered against her ribs, but beneath the fear, a surge of protective anger flared up. She looked down at the angry red bruises circling Mila’s upper arm—bruises left by Tate’s rough, impatient grip.
“Your men were too busy staring at their phones to notice she wasn't eating,” Josie said, her voice shaking only slightly. “And your man over there”—she flicked her chin toward Tate, who was now sweating profusely near the jukebox—“thought squeezing a six-year-old’s arm was the best way to make her walk faster.”
Tate opened his mouth, his face flushing dark red. “Boss, she’s lying—the brat was acting up—!”
Dante did not look at Tate. He raised a single finger, and the bodyguard on the left immediately stepped sideways, pressing the muzzle of a silenced pistol against Tate’s ribs. Tate swallowed his words, his eyes bulging as he shrank back against the pinball machine.
Dante returned his attention to Josie. His dark eyes scanned her face, searching for deception, for fear-driven lies, for anything other than the stubborn, exhausted defiance he found there.
Then, Mila moved.
The little girl, who had not uttered a sound to anyone in the pub for months, tugged gently on the hem of Josie’s apron. With trembling fingers, Mila reached into the deep canvas pocket where Josie kept her order pads and pens. She pulled out a folded square of paper—a napkin covered in frantic, detailed crayon strokes.
Mila clutched the napkin in both hands and stepped past Josie. She walked right up to the terrifying crime lord of Boston, the man everyone else fled from, and pressed the paper against his chest.
Dante looked down. His expression, carved from ice, fractured.
He knelt slowly, ignoring the sticky sawdust on the pub floor, and unfolded the napkin.
Drawn in black and blue crayon was a car engulfed in jagged orange flames. Beside it stood two figures: a woman with long hair falling backward into the dark, and a man holding something up to his wrist. On that wrist, drawn with painstaking, obsessive detail, was a distinctive watch—a luxury timepiece with a glowing blue face and a jagged silver bezel.
Josie watched Dante’s face. The color drained from his olive skin until he looked like a marble statue. The cold, unreadable mask vanished, replaced by a sudden, devastating storm of shock, grief, and pure, unadulterated fury.
“Where...” Dante’s voice cracked, the word tearing from his throat. He looked up at Mila, his hands shaking as he held the napkin. “Mila... where did you see this?”
Mila did not speak aloud, but her lips formed three silent words that Josie could read in the dim neon light: Uncle Arthur's watch.
May you like
Dante stood up so fast his knee knocked against a chair. He turned his head toward the shadows near the back entrance, his eyes locking onto the pub’s swinging kitchen door.
“Arthur,” Dante whispered, the name dropping like a lead weight.
