Sempre: Redemption (Forever Series #2)(141)

“Likewise.”

Rolling her eyes at their standoff, Haven scanned the apartment, making sure everything was boxed. The white walls were barren, the place suddenly feeling much smaller than before.

“So you are?” Kelsey asked. “You’re moving?”

Haven turned to her friend, guilt flaring inside of her. “I am.”

“Why?” Kelsey’s eyes darted from Haven to Carmine. “Let me guess . . . because of him.”

Carmine stood there, arms folded across his chest, mouth twitching like he was fighting the urge to interject.

“No, not because of him,” Haven said. “For him.”

“Is there a difference?”

“A smart man once told me there was.”

Kelsey sighed. “Look, Hayden, I—”

“Hayden?” Carmine interrupted, brow furrowed. “What the f*ck?”

Haven frowned as she explained. “That’s my name here.”

“Why?”

“Corrado’s idea,” she muttered. “He picked it.”

“Wait, what?” Kelsey shook her head in confusion. “Your name here? Jesus, is that not your real name? Who are you?”

Uh-oh. “I can explain.” Haven paused. “Well, actually, no I can’t.”

“You can’t?”

She slowly shook her head. Kelsey’s attention moved to Carmine, who shrugged just as his phone rang. “I can’t explain either,” he replied, glancing at the screen before holding his phone up. “But maybe he can.”

* * *

An hour later, after awkward bouts of strained conversation between the three of them, Corrado showed up at the apartment. He stood in the middle of the living room as Kelsey sat on the couch, watching him warily.

“Do you know who I am?” he prompted.

“An officer of some kind?” she asked. “Isn’t that what we decided?”

Corrado smirked. “I’m Corrado Moretti. My father, Vito, died in prison while doing a life sentence for a murder commissioned by Antonio DeMarco.” He pointed to Carmine. “Antonio was his grandfather. His name’s Carmine DeMarco, and his father, Vincent, died in a shootout at Salvatore Capozzi’s house.” He pointed to Haven. “Salvatore was her great-uncle. Her name’s Haven Antonelli, and her father, Michael . . . well . . . let’s just say it all comes full circle.”

Kelsey gaped at him, her mouth hanging open.

“We’re a family,” he continued. “Sometimes we fight, and sometimes we go our separate ways, but at the end of the day, we’re still a family. Do you understand what I’m telling you?”

After a few seconds of hesitation, Kelsey nodded. “I grew up in New York. I know all about the, uh . . .”

“The family,” Corrado said, finishing her sentence for her.

“The family,” she repeated. “My dad, he . . .”

“He’s a senator who was ushered into Congress based on his last name. His father—your grandfather—was the senior senator from New York who headed a special committee to investigate organized crime. It was because of his committee that my father was eventually convicted.”

“I, uh,” Kelsey stammered. Something flashed in her eyes. Fear? “I didn’t—”

“I don’t believe in punishing the son for the sins of the father,” Corrado continued, cutting her off. “Your father doesn’t believe in it, either. He and I have a mutual understanding of sorts about it.”

“You do?”

“Yes, you see, there’s no such thing as coincidence. There are no accidents in life. Everything that happens is the result of a calculated move that leads us to where we are. And where we are, Kelsey, is right here in this apartment, having this conversation that never happened. Capisce?”

She nodded slowly. “Yes.”

“Good.” Corrado started for the door. “Haven, Carmine, we’ll leave in the morning. I have one more loose end to tie up tonight.”

* * *

The construction site stood still at near midnight, the equipment switched off hours earlier. There was no drilling, no shouting, no sawing—not even the hum of the generator echoed through the lot. It appeared abandoned, but a sliver of light shining from a window of the small trailer indicated otherwise.

Corrado quietly slid through the lot under the cloak of darkness, avoiding going near the motion-sensor security lights that aligned the place so not to draw any unnecessary attention. He headed to the trailer, walking swiftly yet silently, and gripped the door with his glove-clad hand. It was unlocked and gave no resistance when he pulled on it, opening right away.

Gavin sat hunched over at a small desk along the side, facing away from the door. His spine straightened when Corrado stepped inside, his shoulders tense and body rigid, but he didn’t turn around to look. His focus remained on the notebooks scattered in front of him, illuminated by a dim lamp on the corner of the desk. Lines and columns of names and numbers filled the notebook pages, various statistics written down as probabilities were worked out in the margins like elaborate algebra problems. To a na?ve person it might have looked like he was a student studying diligently for an arithmetic exam, but Corrado wasn’t na?ve . . . nor was he ignorant.

“You should never sit with your back to a door,” Corrado said. “Didn’t your father teach you that?”