Missing for Twenty Years, I Found My Mafia Father in a Nightclub Chapter 01
While working as a club hostess at The Box in Manhattan, I met a guest who seemed strangely familiar.
His name was Vincent Moretti, the Don of the Moretti Family and a man no one in New York’s underworld dared to cross.
He tipped far more generously than the other guests, yet he never asked me to pour his drinks or keep him entertained.
He only told me to sit nearby, then slid an envelope stuffed with cash toward me.
“You look about the same age as my daughter, but you’re already earning your own living. She’s nothing like you. She still throws her arms around me and acts spoiled every day. My daughter went missing, so whenever I meet a young woman around her age, I can’t help wanting to do something for her. I just hope that wherever my little girl is, someone will help her when she needs it.”
As he spoke, several capos and the Family’s advisers fell silent.
Just then, the door to the private lounge was kicked open.
A young woman in an expensive evening gown strode inside and slapped me across the face.
“You’re nothing but a cheap nightclub hostess. How dare you try to seduce my father?”
Vincent frowned, but he did not reprimand her.
He only said, “Bianca, watch your mouth.”
Vincent had publicly acknowledged Bianca Moretti as his adopted daughter, and everyone in the Family treated her as Miss Moretti.
Vincent returned to discussing the port business with the Family’s underboss.
Bianca folded her arms and stood in front of me, sneering at my dress and cheap shoes.
“I’ve seen plenty of women like you. You use this job to get close to powerful men, then convince yourselves that sharing a few drinks with them will somehow make you part of a Family. But if you don’t have the blood, you’ll never belong.”
I stood before her, slowly curling my right hand into a fist.
Once I finished tonight’s shift, I would finally have enough money for the trip to meet the person who claimed to know where my father was.
***
The air in the private lounge was thick with cigar smoke and whiskey.
Several men in dark suits sat around the couches, with Family ledgers and port shipping documents spread across the table.
As I refilled one capo’s glass, Vincent raised a hand.
“Sit down.”
I sat beside him uneasily and heard him ask in a low voice, “Is this kind of work hard on you?”
“It’s not too bad.”
He looked up from the documents and studied me for a moment before pushing a thick envelope toward me.
“Take it. You don’t have to do anything. Just talk to me for a while.”
His voice was quiet, yet the entire room immediately fell silent.
“I’ve been searching for my missing daughter. Whenever I see a young woman around her age, I think of her. I hope that wherever she is, someone will help her when she needs it.”
My coworker Mia heard him and turned toward us.
“Mr. Moretti, that’s quite a coincidence. She’s been looking for her father too. Human traffickers took her when she was little and sold her from place to place. Even now, she still doesn’t know where her real home is.”
Vincent paused and looked at me.
My gaze landed on the old bullet-graze scar at his right temple, and for a moment, I forgot to breathe.
I was back in Bryant Park twenty years ago, sitting on my father’s shoulders as he carried me through the crowded winter market.
Whenever I looked down, I could see the scar at his right temple and the gentle smile he gave me when he tilted his face up toward mine.
Later, a black cloth was pulled over my face, and a stranger carried me away.
For the next twenty years, I never saw another man with the same scar.
“Young lady, are you looking for your family too?”
I opened my mouth, my fingers twisting tightly into the fabric of my skirt.
I wanted to tell him that I had never stopped searching for my father.
But when I looked around the dim private lounge, saw the holsters on the table, and glanced down at the short dress I had no choice but to wear for work, my courage vanished.
If he really was my father, what would he think if he saw that I had grown into a nobody, forced to serve drinks while Mafia men conducted business just to survive?
“Are you…”
Before I could finish, the door opened.
“Dad!”
Bianca strode in on high heels, her makeup flawless and two bodyguards following close behind.
She visibly hesitated when she saw me, then her expression twisted with disgust.
She marched over and slapped me across the face.
“You cheap little club hostess. How dare you try to seduce the Don of the Moretti Family?”
No one in the room said a word.
I pressed a hand to my burning cheek, the humiliation so crushing that I could barely breathe.
Vincent frowned, but once again, he did not reprimand her.
“Bianca, watch your mouth.”