Chapter 7 - A Glimpse of Joy
“Uncle Nick?” Lucy whispered shyly. “Are you busy?”
Nicholas’s hardened expression melted instantly. He gestured for her to enter. “Never too busy for you, Lucy. Come in. Where is your mother?”
“Taking a nap,” Lucy said proudly, walking in on her tiptoes as if the plush Persian rug might break under her feet. “Doctor Evans gave her some tea and said she needed rest. So I drew a picture.”
She walked up to the massive desk and placed a crinkled piece of white paper directly on top of Nicholas’s confidential financial ledgers.
Nicholas looked down at the drawing. It was drawn in bright, uneven strokes of crayon. In the center was a very tall man in a black boxy suit with a square head. Holding his hand was a tiny girl in a yellow dress with wild brown scribbles for hair. Above them was a giant, smiling yellow sun and three lopsided brown circles that Nicholas assumed were cookies.
“That’s you,” Lucy explained, pointing a small finger at the tall black figure. “And that’s me. And those are the cookies we ate.”
Nicholas stared at the crude drawing for a long time. In his world, pieces of paper brought demands, death warrants, and multi-million-dollar contracts. He had never received something created purely out of gratitude and love.
“It’s magnificent,” Nicholas said softly, his voice thick with an emotion he didn't quite know how to handle. He picked up an ornate gold paperweight and placed it squarely over the drawing. “This stays right here on my desk.”
Lucy beamed, bouncing on the heels of her sneakers.
Just then, Maria appeared in the doorway, looking frantic. “Lucy! Oh, heavens, Mr. Moretti, I am so sorry! I fell asleep for twenty minutes and she slipped away—I didn't mean for her to disturb your work!”
“She’s not disturbing anything, Maria,” Nicholas said, standing up. He grabbed his coat from the rack. “Get your coat. We’re going out.”
Maria blinked, confused. “Going out, sir? Where?”
“Lucy needs fresh air, and you need a break from this house,” Nicholas stated simply. “And Dr. Evans mentioned she needs a pediatric wrist brace that fits better than that temporary bandage. Marco will drive us.”
Half an hour later, a convoy of two black armored SUVs pulled up outside an exclusive private park on the Upper East Side. Nicholas’s security detail discreetly secured the perimeter, ensuring the playground was entirely safe.
For the first time in years, Nicholas sat on a public bench in the sunlight, watching Lucy laugh as she chased pigeons across the grass, her little yellow dress fluttering in the breeze. Maria sat on the opposite end of the bench, watching her daughter with eyes full of disbelief and peace.
“She hasn’t laughed like that since her father died two years ago,” Maria murmured quietly.
Nicholas looked over at the young woman. “What happened to him?”
“An accident on a construction site,” Maria whispered. “The company had no insurance. They gave us five hundred dollars and told us to disappear. We lost our apartment three months later. I thought the world was full of monsters, Mr. Moretti.”
She looked directly into Nicholas’s eyes—the eyes that criminals and politicians dreaded to meet.
“You’re supposed to be a dangerous man,” Maria said softly. “Everyone in the city whispers about your name. But you saved my baby. You’re our guardian angel.”
Nicholas looked away, his jaw tightening slightly. “Don't mistake me for a good man, Maria. I’ve done things that would make you sick.”
“A man is defined by how he treats those who cannot fight back,” Maria said gently. “You protected her. That’s all that matters to me.”
May you like
Nicholas looked back at the playground just as Lucy tripped, caught her balance, and pointed toward an ice cream cart near the gate with a wide, infectious grin. For a split second, Nicholas felt something he hadn’t felt since his youth: peace.
But in Nicholas Moretti’s world, peace was always an illusion.
