Chapter 7 - The Number He Never Needed Again
Three months later, I was standing behind the counter at Sal’s Diner when the bell over the front door rang.
“Willa!”
Leo came charging inside.
His leg had healed.
No crutches.
No brace.
Just sneakers and too much energy.
“Slow down!”
He ignored me and hugged my waist.
Dante entered behind him.
Black suit.
Black coat.
Two men waited outside.
Some things apparently never changed.
“You’re late,” I told him.
Dante checked his watch.
“By forty seconds.”
“Unacceptable.”
Leo climbed onto a stool.
“Chocolate pancakes.”
“We don’t have chocolate pancakes.”
“You made them last time.”
“That was bribery.”
Dante sat beside him.
“I’ll have coffee.”
“You can make coffee at your mansion.”
“I prefer yours.”
Sal watched us from the kitchen doorway with a grin.
I pointed at him.
“Don’t.”
He disappeared immediately.
After Thomas Vale’s arrest, everything had changed.
The evidence connected him to Elena’s death and Leo’s kidnapping.
Paul Mercer accepted a deal and testified.
Sebastian Bell recovered and finally made peace with Dante after years of suspicion.
And Leo returned to school.
But something else had changed too.
Dante kept appearing at Sal’s.
First because Leo wanted pancakes.
Then because Leo wanted to see me.
Then sometimes without Leo.
I poured his coffee.
“You working tonight?”
“Yes.”
“You don’t need to.”
“We've discussed this.”
“You could work for me.”
“Doing what?”
Dante considered it.
“Anything.”
“That’s not a job description.”
Leo interrupted.
“Daddy likes you.”
Dante nearly choked on his coffee.
I stared at Leo.
“Does he?”
“Yes.”
“Leo.”
The boy grinned.
“He talks about you.”
Dante gave his son a look that had probably terrified grown men.
Leo continued eating pancakes.
Completely unaffected.
I leaned against the counter.
“What does he say?”
“Leo.”
“He says you’re stubborn.”
I smiled.
“Accurate.”
“And loud.”
“Excuse me?”
“And brave.”
My smile disappeared.
Dante looked at his coffee.
Leo added:
“And pretty.”
Dante closed his eyes.
“I'm changing schools.”
Leo laughed.
I laughed too.
Eventually, Dante did.
A quiet, genuine laugh I had never heard before.
Later, Leo ran into the kitchen to show Sal a drawing.
Dante and I were alone.
He reached into his coat.
My eyebrows rose.
“If that's another security phone, I'm throwing it in the fryer.”
“It isn’t.”
He placed something on the counter.
A folded piece of paper.
I opened it.
Ten digits.
The same phone number that had been written on Leo’s arm.
I looked up.
“What is this?”
“The number that changed my life.”
“I thought it was your emergency number.”
“It was.”
“Was?”
Dante nodded toward the kitchen.
“Leo doesn’t carry it anymore.”
“Why?”
“He memorized it.”
I smiled.
“Good.”
Dante hesitated.
“There’s something else.”
“What?”
“That night, I threatened you.”
“You definitely did.”
“I thought whoever answered that phone might have taken him.”
“I figured.”
“But you stayed.”
“He needed someone.”
“You had no idea who he was.”
“That shouldn’t matter.”
Dante studied me for several seconds.
“No,” he said quietly. “It shouldn’t.”
Leo came running back.
“Willa!”
“What?”
He held up a drawing.
Three stick figures.
One small.
One woman in pink.
One extremely tall man wearing black.
Above them, in uneven letters, he had written:
MY FAMILY.
My throat tightened.
Dante saw it.
Neither of us spoke.
Leo looked worried.
“Do you like it?”
I crouched beside him.
“I love it.”
“Daddy?”
Dante knelt.
“I love it too.”
Leo smiled.
Then he wrapped one arm around his father and the other around me.
Six months later, I stopped working doubles.
Not because Dante ordered me to.
He had finally learned better than that.
Sal made me assistant manager and eventually offered me a partnership in the diner.
Dante invested only after I made him sign paperwork stating he had absolutely no authority over how I ran the place.
Marco laughed for ten straight minutes when he heard.
Leo became the unofficial pancake inspector.
And Dante?
Chicago still lowered its voice around Dante Valenti.
Men still moved when he entered a room.
His enemies still feared him.
But every Saturday morning at nine, he sat in booth seven while his son covered expensive suits in syrup.
And one rainy evening, almost exactly a year after I found Leo behind the dumpster, Dante stood beneath the diner awning beside me.
“You hate rain,” he said.
“I hate freezing rain.”
“There’s a difference?”
“Yes.”
He smiled.
Then his expression became serious.
“Come home with us.”
I looked at him.
“Tonight?”
“No.”
I understood.
“Dante—”
“I’m not ordering you.”
“Good.”
“I’m asking.”
Through the diner window, Leo pressed his face against the glass.
Then he held up a handwritten sign.
SAY YES, WILLA.
I laughed.
Dante turned.
“Traitor.”
Leo grinned.
I looked back at Dante.
“Your negotiation methods are improving.”
“Is that a yes?”
I reached for his hand.
“Yes.”
The rain kept falling.
But this time, nobody was lying broken in the alley.
Nobody was running.
Nobody was afraid.
Inside Sal’s Diner, Leo was jumping up and down like he'd just won the lottery.
Dante opened the door for me.
I stopped before entering.
“One condition.”
His eyebrow rose.
“What?”
“You never threaten me over the phone again.”
A faint smile crossed his face.
“Agreed.”
“And Leo gets chocolate pancakes tomorrow.”
“That's two conditions.”
“Deal with it.”
Dante laughed.
And somewhere between the night I found a frightened little boy with ten digits written across his arm and the morning those digits were no longer necessary, three strangers had become something none of us expected.
May you like
A family.
THE END
