Chapter One

It was snowing in Port Francis. Rain, then sleet, and now the snow belted down as if trying to win that particular competition. So they would have an unexpected white Christmas tomorrow. Too bad they had no roof to go with it.

Jack Barsanti kicked a chunk of ice that had formed on the unfinished balcony of his future bedroom and it sailed through where a railing should be, out into open air to vanish in the white onslaught.

Damn the holiday and damn the climate crisis and damn the best laid plans, but, most of all, damn the builders who were two months late getting their damn roof on.

Beside him, Sal Rausa stepped up into the frame of the double doorway. The whole house was only a frame and concrete foundation, despite their contractor’s promises to the contrary.

Both wore winter coats and gloves, Sal all in black, Jack’s coat navy, while Sal also carried his toy bag in one hand, bumping the nylon absently against his leg, his gaze inscrutable.

Jack still wasn’t sure how Sal felt about Christmas, or snow for that matter. Usually the more emotionally open of the two, Sal had been reticent all season.

It was their first shared winter, which made rushing to build a house together feel rather hasty. Jack had no regrets. In their line of work, either could be dead tomorrow if a rival family took a notion to start a new war.

Jack had spent his whole life, well into his mid-forties, hiding, pretending, skating by in other men’s worlds, pleasing everyone else.

Not anymore. If turning around from being bagged and tortured by a Mafia boss to sleeping with the same, becoming his consigliere, and now picking out light fixtures together meant that Jack was having a midlife crisis, bring it on. Best year of his life. Except for the fucking roof.

They watched hypnotic snow in silence for a minute, side by side in the doorway, before Jack said, “You realize they’d been late on every single thing with the whole build?

I ran the numbers. At the demonstrated rate of progression rather than the supposed projected pace from the contractor, the house will actually be finished in twenty-six months.

Two months late on the roof already and now it’s the holidays. No one will be back until a week into January—and that’s only if there’s no snow. Just look at this mess. Probably water in the basement too.”

Sal let out a slow breath through his nose that steamed before his face. “I’m sure you know what this means.”

“Time to invest in quality tarps?”

“I’ll have to kill our contractor.”

Jack looked at him.

Sal’s eyes were solemn, mouth drawn in a hard line.

Jack turned away, kicking another ice chunk over the side. “I hate it when you do that.”