Chapter 8 - Whispers in the DarkTwo months later, the small coastal town of Bar Harbor had largely accepted the quiet, broad-shouldered newcomer who worked twelve-hour shifts at the timber mill and drove an old, dented pickup truck.
No one in the town knew that Roman Vascari had once controlled half of Chicago’s underworld. To the locals, he was just a hardworking guy with a quiet demeanor, a complicated past, and a desperate desire to fix things with his estranged wife.
Every afternoon after his shift ended, Roman drove past Celeste’s house. Sometimes he didn't even stop—he just slowed down, watched the porch from a distance to make sure she was safe, and drove on.
Other times, he left a small box of fresh blueberries or a freshly baked loaf of sourdough on her front step, never knocking, never demanding acknowledgement.
Until the night the storm hit.
It was a late-autumn nor'easter. Wind howled off the Atlantic, driving sheets of freezing rain against the windows and knocking out power lines across the peninsula.
Roman was sitting in his small, sparsely furnished cabin when his cell phone buzzed. An unknown number.
He answered on the first ring.
"Roman," Celeste’s voice came through the line, tight, breathless, and laced with unmistakable pain.
Roman was out of his chair before she finished the word. "Celeste? What's wrong?"
"The storm... it triggered early labor. The roads are washed out. The ambulance can't get through the fallen trees on the ridge."
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Panic—cold, sharp, and primal—flared in Roman’s chest, but he forced it down instantly. There was no room for panic now.
"I'm coming," he said, grabbing his heavy canvas jacket and his truck keys. "Keep breathing. I'm right behind you."
