Chapter 6 - The Broken King
Despite my clear boundaries, Vincent managed to find me. It was a rainy Tuesday afternoon, exactly one month after Lily’s passing. I had spent the morning volunteering at a pediatric hospice center downtown—donating art supplies and reading to sick children in Lily’s memory. It was the only place where my heart felt slightly lighter, where the suffocating grief gave way to purposeful love.
As I walked out toward the parking garage, a lone figure stood waiting under the concrete awning.
Vincent looked like a shadow of his former self. He had lost at least twenty pounds; his expensive bespoke suit hung loosely from his broad shoulders. His right arm was tucked inside his sling, concealing the gunshot wound Salvatore had mentioned, and deep purple hollows ringed his eyes.
He didn't advance on me. He stayed ten feet away, hands visible, looking at me like a condemned man looking at an angel he had betrayed.
""I won't come close,"" Vincent rasped, his voice raw and broken. ""I know you have a restraining order. Marco told me he’d put a bullet in my knee himself if I harassed you.""
""Then why are you here, Vincent?""
""I brought this,"" he said, using his uninjured hand to pull a thick, registered deed from his inner coat pocket. He laid it gently on the concrete hood of an empty car between us. ""The property on Lake Michigan. The big estate in Door County that Lily loved. I bulldozed the guest houses. I had the land deeded to the Chicago Children’s Memorial Hospital. It’s a retreat for families with terminally ill kids now. In Lily’s name.""
I paused, looking at the legal seal on the document. The Lily Moretti Pediatric Sanctuary.
""It doesn't change anything,"" I said quietly, looking up into his tortured eyes.
""I know,"" he choked out, fresh tears spilling down his pale face. ""I know it doesn't bring her back. I know it doesn't earn me a single second of your forgiveness. I don't want you to take me back, Claire. I know I lost that right the night I let Sophia pull me away from our dying baby.""
He took a ragged, trembling breath, struggling to keep his composure. ""I just wanted you to know... I gave away the casino licenses. I signed the transfer papers for the logistics fleet to the feds. I’m stepping down from the family. Salvatore is taking over the business, and I’m turning myself in to Vance tomorrow morning for the historical smuggling charges.""
I stood motionless under the dim fluorescent lights of the garage. The most terrifying man in the Midwest was willingly handing himself over to a federal penitentiary because living with his own guilt was a far worse sentence than a concrete cell.
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""Why?"" I asked.
""Because as long as I’m free, I keep seeing her pink dress,"" Vincent whispered, his chest heaving with silent sobs. ""I keep hearing the phone ring twenty-seven times in my dreams. Every time I close my eyes, she asks me if I’m going to dance with her. I don't deserve the sky, Claire. I don't deserve to breathe clean air while she’s in that urn.""
