Chapter 3 - Marco’s ConfessionMarco Ricci had always been handsome in a sharp, expensive way. He wore his suits like armor and his smile like a key. People liked him before they feared him.
That had made him useful.
Now he sat tied to a metal chair in the basement of the funeral home, his tie gone, his face slick with sweat, his eyes moving every time pipes groaned overhead.
Tony stood behind him.
I placed the stuffed bunny on the table.
Marco stared at it.
“What is that?” he asked.
“You tell me.”
“I don’t know.”
I pressed the recorder’s play button.
At first, there was static.
Then a man’s voice.
Marco’s voice.
“Stop crying. You’re not dead, kid. Not if you stay quiet.”
Rosa’s sob came from the stairwell.
I turned.
She and Tomas stood there despite the fact that I had told them to stay at the clinic. Behind them were two of my men, looking uncomfortable.
Tomas stepped forward.
“I need to hear it.”
“No,” Marco said quickly. “You don’t.”
I looked at Tomas.
“This will hurt.”
“My daughter was in a coffin,” he said. “There is no version that does not hurt.”
I let the recording continue.
Another voice entered.
Deeper. Older. Calm.
Victor Harlan.
“The boat leaves at midnight. Keep the family busy with grief. After the service, we move the box.”
Then Marco: “Dom came. He brought the dog.”
Harlan laughed.
“That animal always did have better instincts than you.”
The recorder crackled.
Then Elena’s small voice, weak and slurred.
“I want my mama.”
Rosa almost fell.
Tomas caught her, but his own face looked ruined.
Marco closed his eyes.
“I didn’t record that,” he said.
“No,” I replied. “Harlan did.”
The recorder had been hidden inside the bunny not by Elena.
By Harlan.
A tracking device and a listening device.
He had wanted to hear the grief. Maybe he had wanted to make sure the coffin stayed where it belonged. Maybe monsters liked souvenirs.
Tony leaned toward Marco.
“Blue door,” he said. “Where?”
Marco’s mouth tightened.
“I tell you, I’m dead.”
I sat across from him.
“You keep quiet, you’re worse.”
He laughed once, ugly and broken.
“You think this is just Harlan? You think one man moves children through New York without help? Police, doctors, judges, port inspectors. Harlan doesn’t own a crew. He owns doors.”
“Then give me one.”
Marco looked at me.
For the first time in twelve years, he looked smaller than his suit.
“You’ll burn with him.”
“Maybe.”
“Everything you built.”
“Maybe.”
“Your men won’t all follow you into that.”
I glanced at Tony.
Tony’s jaw hardened.
Marco saw it and smiled weakly.
“You think loyalty is love, Dom? Loyalty is math. Men follow the man who can pay them tomorrow. Harlan offers tomorrow. You offer rules.”
I leaned back.
“And yet you are tied to a chair.”
His smile died.
Tomas suddenly moved.
He crossed the basement and grabbed Marco by the shirt.
“My daughter knew you,” he said, voice shaking. “She called you Uncle Marco when you came to my restaurant.”
Marco looked away.
“She was supposed to forget.”
“She is seven.”
“I told you, I didn’t mean—”
Tomas slapped him.
Not hard enough to injure. Hard enough to make the room hear a father’s heart break.
“You put her in a coffin.”
Marco lowered his head.
The silence stretched.
Then he whispered, “Pulaski Bridge.”
Tony looked at me.
Marco swallowed.
“There’s an old maintenance entrance under Pulaski. Blue steel door. Leads into the old utility tunnels near the water. Harlan uses it as a holding point before moving people to the docks.”
“How many children?” I asked.
“I don’t know.”
“How many?”
Marco shook.
“Last I saw? Nine.”
Rosa cried out.
I stood.
Tony was already moving.
“Call Nora Price,” I said.
Tony stopped.
The room stiffened.
Detective Nora Price was not family. She was not bought. She was not afraid. For eight years, she had been trying to put me away and had failed only because I was careful and she was honest.
Tony stared at me.
“You want to call a cop?”
“I want those children alive.”
“Dom—”
“Call her.”
Marco gave a small laugh.
“You really are going to burn it down.”
I bent close to him.
“No, Marco. You burned it down the moment you made a child cargo.”
His eyes flicked toward the recorder.
“Harlan has names,” he said. “Your names. Payments. Bodies. Routes. Carlo.”
I froze.
Tony slowly turned.
“What did you say?”
Marco looked up.
There it was.
The old ghost.
Carlo, my cousin, sold out and shot in a butcher shop freezer six years earlier. We blamed a small-time rat named Nicky Vale. We buried Nicky for it.
But Bruno had never liked Marco after Carlo died.
I had ignored that too.
“What about Carlo?” I asked.
Marco’s voice became quiet.
“Harlan paid me to give him Carlo’s route that night.”
Tony muttered a curse.
I did not move.
I did not blink.
I heard Carlo’s mother crying at the graveside. I heard Marco’s oath beside me. We’ll find who did this, Dom. I swear on blood.
Blood.
Always the cheapest currency for liars.
“Why?” I asked.
Marco’s eyes filled with something almost like regret.
“Because Carlo found the first shipment. Kids hidden in produce crates. He was going to tell you.”
The basement lights buzzed.
Somewhere upstairs, funeral flowers still perfumed the air.
I stared at the man I had called brother.
“You let me kill Nicky Vale.”
Marco whispered, “I had to give you someone.”
I nodded slowly.
Then I turned to Tony.
“Take him with us.”
Tony blinked. “To Pulaski?”
“Harlan trusts fear. We’ll bring him fear wrapped in Marco’s skin.”
Marco pulled against the ropes.
“No. Dom, please.”
I walked toward the stairs.
Behind me, Marco began begging.
I did not look back.
May you like
Somewhere under a bridge, children were waiting.
And for once in my life, the police and the devil were about to arrive together.
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