Page 60 of Daddies of the Underworld

I ducked around behind the building and crossed to the other end, where a bus stop with a cracked plastic panel gave me a view of Nina without calling me out as a creeper.

Children spilled out of the building in a rush of voices. A boy ran to a man in a work jacket. Two girls fought over a mitten. A teacher stood in the doorway with a clipboard, shouting a warning as a little girl burst through the door, blowing past the teacher with a happy shout. “Mama!”

Nina crouched in time to catch the flying bundle of energy as the girl hit her full force. Nina rocked back, laughing as she wrapped one arm around the girl and kissed her forehead. She asked something, making the girl nod before Nina checked the coat zipper, then adjusted the girl’s purple knit cap and brushed curls away from the rounded face.

Nina stood, and the girl grabbed her hand, talking with enough animation that my heart stopped. Luca. She moved like Luca when he was excited. I gripped the edge of the bench hard enough for the cold metal to freeze my fingers.

They turned, walking toward me. The girl continued to chatter, her steps light and quick. She jumped over banks of slushy gray snow, then curled her nose and stopped. Her chin lifted, and she stared right at me.

Fuck. A car drove down the street, cutting off my line of sight, but it didn’t matter. I’d seen enough. It was there in the intensity of her stare, the shape of her eyes if not the color. Matteo’s eyes.

My hand went to my phone, but I didn’t lift it yet. Nina scanned the street while the girl kept talking. Her gaze moved over parked cars, shops, the bus shelter. Me.

For one terrible second, I thought she saw me, but then she blinked and kept going. I waited until my ass went numb, letting her reach the far end of the block before I followed.

They walked to a small apartment building tucked away from the main streets. Nothing fancy but secure enough. The front door stuck, and Nina had to shove it with her shoulder while keeping the grocery bags stable. The girl danced in place, then darted ahead of her.

I’d found Nina. I hadn’t let myself fully accept that until the door closed. She had a daughter.

I took a breath to steady myself and called Matteo. “I found her.” I barely waited for his greeting before I spit the words out.

Silence, then, so quiet I almost missed it, “Alive?”

“Yes.”

Luca’s cursing came as a blessed relief. “Is she hurt?” He must have taken the phone from Matteo, or Matteo had put me on speaker.

I backed away from the apartment in case she looked out the window. I didn’t know which room was hers, but I’d find out without following her inside. I found a protected nook out of the wind and concentrated on the conversation. “She looks healthy.”

“Thank god.” Luca exhaled.

“There’s one thing.” I should ease into it, but it wouldn’t make it any better. “She has a little girl. Old enough to be in school.”

It didn’t take a rocket scientist to add up the years. The line went dead quiet.

Matteo recovered first. “What did you say?”

“Little girl. Probably about five.” My throat felt like I’d swallowed glass. “She called Nina Mama.”

Luca cursed softly in Italian, not with heat, but like something had been torn out of him.

Matteo’s voice dropped even lower. “Are you sure?”

“I don’t make mistakes. Not about things like this.”

“Dante,” Luca practically shouted in my ear. “What does she look like?”

I stared up at the windows. “I’m trying very hard not to answer that until I have more information.” A curtain flicked in one of the upper windows. The glass lifted, and a tiny head poked out over the fire escape.

Nina’s head popped out next, and the two of them climbed onto the fire escape.

I lifted my phone quickly and snapped a picture, zooming in as much as I could before either of them turned away.

Nina was explaining how to climb down the fire escape. I didn’t have to hear the words to understand the hand motions. It was a good thing for the girl to know, but what had prompted Nina to teach her?

The lesson lasted thirty seconds, and I took one more picture, hoping for a better angle, before they climbed back through the window and closed it behind them. I backed up and counted. Third floor. Fifth window from the left. I knew where she lived. Our luck had finally turned.

“Sending you a picture.” I barely got the words out and the picture sent with my trembling fingers. I waited, my heart beating out of my chest.