The Ultimate Sin (Sins of the Past 2)

Faith made a gurgling sound, similar to a laugh. Sonny looked down at her. “I wasn’t talking to you,” he cooed. “Different princess.”

Sonny called Faith his little princess all the time. So did Angelo. It was weird seeing macho men like them fall apart when Faith was in the room. But I loved it, and their love for Faith made me love them even more.

We rode the elevator up to my dad’s office with Sonny signing a song to Faith to make her laugh. He made my life easier. I couldn’t deny that fact. Having Sonny around was a huge help. I had no idea how to be a mother when mine was never around. Angelo and I learned on the fly and adapted as we went along.

Sonny had a fatherly side to him, which took me mostly by surprise. The man I knew was into freaky ass porn and liked to kill people for fun. He wasn’t the type to change diapers or make up songs for children. But he was becoming that man more each day. Even after all these years, I’d still never seen him with a serious girlfriend.

“You would be a good father, Sonny. When are you going to settle down?”

He laughed. “Never.”

I stuck the key into the door, turned the knob, and pushed it open. My father’s office had been closed up for a while. The cleaning crew vacuumed the floor once a week, but they were never allowed inside this room. Only on the outside. This office was closed off from the rest of the building for a reason.

All the shady deals my father had ever done with Angelo Sr. were locked away in one of his precious filing cabinets or on his computer, one that wasn’t connected to the rest of the network for a damn good reason.

“The right girl will come along some day and blow your world upside down.”

“Nah. Who could compete with Faith?” She giggled when he touched her nose with his thumb and made a fish face at her. “I already found my favorite girl.”

I laughed. “Don’t be stupid, Sonny. You could have a wife and child.”

“Not with everything we have going on right now. I’d be selfish to bring anyone into this mess. You were born into it. You’re different. An outsider would never understand all this. I couldn’t risk allowing someone to get too deep into our business.”

“There has to be a girl out there who understands how our world works.” I moved behind my father’s desk and checked his drawer for the key to the filing cabinet. “If you looked harder you might find her.”

Sonny sat in the chair across from me with Faith on his lap, bouncing her on his knee. “Maybe someday.” He offered me that much to get me off his ass.

I wanted to see Sonny happy, as much as I wanted the same for Angelo. But we lived in a cruel world, one where crime bosses and drug lords were lurking around every corner. The Morellis had a lot of enemies, some of which pretended to be their friends.

I was leery of inviting any of the men on the list to our wedding. Too bad Angelo and I had no choice in the matter. The wedding wasn’t about our marriage. It was a who’s who of the city, a way for the Don to show off how his wealth and power. I was marrying the family and not just the man. They were as much my burden to bear as Angelo’s.

After removing a stack of folders with a rubber band around them from the filing cabinet, I sat in my father’s chair and dropped them onto the desk. I looked across the desk at Faith and blew her a kiss. She was such a happy baby, always smiling and laughing.

My smile turned into an instant frown the second I flipped open the first manila folder. Years ago, my father had bought the plot for my mother. He promised to build her the house of her dreams, way out in the suburbs of Pennsylvania. It was supposed to be the home we would build as a family, far away from the Morellis. I choked back the tears that fought to escape.

How could my dad sell one of the few things left of my mother?

He moved most of her clothes and personal belongings into storage after her death. It was as if he was erasing her from our lives. And now this? He expected me to sign off on the documents. No way in hell. Not without an explanation. I opened the next two folders and was met with equal disappointment.

My great-grandfather on my mother’s side of the family owned Pitt Steal, an old steel mill right outside of Pittsburgh. Before I was born, the company had fallen on hard times, and my father bought the company to ensure it remained in my mother’s family. Except, no one in the family ran Pitt Steel.

My father handed it off to a business associate who acted on his behalf. The mill was worth a fortune, or at least at one time it was. According to the paperwork in my hands, we were selling some of the land around the mill. But we needed the land to expand our production. If we couldn’t expand, the company would fold. So, why was he doing this?

I pushed myself up from the desk to grab all the folders in the top drawer of the cabinet, spreading them out on the desk.

Sonny leaned forward. “What’s going on? You look upset. What did Daddy do now?”

I shot a worried glance in his direction. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Nothing.”

“You wouldn’t have said it if you didn’t mean anything by it.”

“Your dad has been up to something for a while now. I hear the boss fighting with Angelo sometimes. But they never tell me a damn thing.”

“Same here. No one tells me anything. All I do is sign over property to Angelo’s dad or one of his associates. Pretty soon, I won’t have a company to run.” I pushed the top folder across the desk to Sonny. “He’s even selling the land my father bought for my mom. How can he do this to her? To me? She was my mother. We were supposed to live there together. As a family. And now he’s throwing all of it away. For what?”

“For your freedom.”