“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.”

and suit trousers. In my right hand, I carried Elena’s oil painting; in my left, the security photograph. They were two irreconcilable pieces of evidence from two very different timelines.

Nico took the wheel of the armored SUV. I sat in the sprawling darkness of the backseat, my spine rigid, my jaw locked. My reflection in the tinted window looked continue reading …