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“I’m fine,” Carmine said, unsure if that was true. He climbed out and grasped the side of the car to stabilize himself, his legs wobbly. He felt sick right away and hunched over, vomiting.
“You have a serious concussion,” Vincent said. “Probably some fractured ribs. Looks like a broken nose and—”
“Quit fucking diagnosing me,” he said. “Where’s Haven?”
“I hoped you could tell me. I was on my way back to the house and saw the car here.”
Carmine’s panic flared. “I, uh . . . She was with me. We were at the house and someone started shooting. Nicholas got hit.”
“Nicholas? Where is he?”
“Still at the house. I had to leave him and get the fuck out of there.” He fought back his guilt, unsure of which hurt worse—the emotional anguish or the physical pain. “We were trying to get away, but a car ran up on us, and here we are. Or, fuck, here I am. Where is she?”
“We’ll find her,” Vincent said. Carmine wondered how he could be calm, and froze when something a few yards behind him caught his attention. His heart pounded forcefully when he realized it was a person.
His father glanced in that direction. “Johnny.”
“Johnny? Who the fuck is Johnny?”
“Nobody important. I’m not even certain that’s his name. He’s part of Giovanni’s street crew.”
“One of your own?”
“He has a gunshot wound to the abdomen, but it’s not necessarily fatal,” Vincent said. “Missed his major organs, but I’m venturing a guess it hit his spinal cord.”
“A gut shot? I thought you shot to kill?”
“I didn’t shoot him,” he said, shaking his head. “I hoped you could tell me who did.”
“You found him there?” Carmine stared at his father, bewildered, before turning to the car. The passenger side door was open and the seatbelt was unlatched, so he didn’t think Haven could have been too hurt in the accident. There wasn’t any blood on her side.
“Maybe she went for help,” he said, tossing things around. “Where’s my gun?”
The moment he said it, he spotted the single .45-caliber cartridge on the passenger side floorboard. He picked it up and got back out of the car, eyeing it as his father sighed. “I had a feeling something like this would happen—even before I knew she was related to Sal. After everything I lost, I knew saving her wouldn’t be easy. They all knew how important it was to me. I was afraid someone would take her for leverage. I should’ve known it would be him.”
Carmine’s legs wobbled. “Nunzio?”
Vincent nodded. “No one has heard from him in days. He was called in for a sit-down and didn’t show. It was the reason I was going to Chicago this weekend.”
Carmine felt the bile rising up. The thought of her being somewhere with Nunzio sickened him. He couldn’t begin to imagine what she was going through.
“I’ll kill him,” Carmine said. “He’ll pay for this.”
“He will,” Vincent said. “But right now, we need to be more concerned with finding her.”
* * *
It turned out to be a brisk night, a storm rolling in from the west making the waters of Aurora Lake more turbulent than usual. Vincent stood at the end of a long pier a few miles from the Barlow residence, huddled up in his coat as he tried to shield himself from the harsh winds.
Vincent could easily recall the first time he met Nicholas, a warm fall day at the local elementary school. Carmine had just turned ten, and it was the first time Vincent had made it to one of his football games. Between juggling his job at the hospital and managing his work with la famiglia, he had little time left over for his children.
But that day, he had snuck out of work early to watch. Toward the middle of the game, a scrawny boy with tanned skin took a nasty spill, and someone’s cleat gashed his cheek. It was a superficial wound, so Vincent grabbed a first-aid kit from the car, sparing the boy a trip to the emergency room. “Thanks, Doc,” he’d said. “Oh, what did the doctor say when the invisible man asked for an appointment?”
“I’m not sure.”
“Sorry, but I can’t see you today.” He laughed hysterically at his joke. “Get it? Can’t see you? You know, because he’s invisible!”
Vincent smiled. “I get it.”
