“Please mister, buy this painting so we can buy bread,” three dirty triplets begged. The billionaire mafia boss stared at the canvas, his heart stopping. The woman painted on it was the wife he mourned for years. With shaking hands, he pulled out a black card and whispered, “Take me to her.”

rushing static in my ears. I slowly lowered the phone, staring blankly out at the sprawling city as a chasm opened up directly beneath my feet.

Elena was alive. My daughters were out there. And somewhere in the freezing rain of Boston, the woman I had mourned for seven years was slowly dying because she was too terrified of the monster I had become continue reading …