Dante's Franco
Chapter 1
Dante walked into the Port Charles Police Station that morning, as he had every morning for a week. After all, it had only been eight or nine days since he'd been checked out of General Hospital. Why had he been in the hospital? His father, Sonny Corinthos, had shot him in the chest for being an undercover cop. Had Sonny known Dante was his son? No. Actually, hardly anyone had known that Dante was Sonny's son. But Dante was lucky to be alive, and lucky to have a job with the PCPD, especially after lying in his official statement about how he'd been shot.
"Hey, Detective!" It was Mac. He walked by Dante, coffee in hand, and settled down in his desk. Immediately, he began to thumb through some files.
"Morning, Mac," said Dante as he made his way over to his desk. This was the first real desk Dante had ever had, because working undercover wasn't exactly a desk-type job. Then, something caught his eye. It was a letter with no return address, laying on a stack of paper. He picked it up and looked closely at it.
"Mac, did you see anyone put this," he held the letter aloft, "on my desk?"
Mac looked up from his work to examine the envelope. "Nope," he said with a shrug before returning his attention to the file he'd been studying.
Dante turned back to his desk, placing the envelope off to the side. From his pocket, he pulled out a little headshot of his girlfriend, Lulu Spencer. Smiling at it, he sat it up against a jar of pens. Lulu was the only thing Dante looked forward to now a days.
"Just open it, Dante," said Mac without looking up. "It's probably just something from one of the other detectives. Maybe he forgot the return address."
Although Dante doubted it, he replied, "Yeah, probably. Let's see." With his index finger, Dante carefully tore the envelope open. Inside was a flyer.
"What the-" Dante stopped short when he saw what the flyer depicted. 'Wanted – Murderer and Escaped Convict Ralph Maszen' was printed across the top in bold, and below was a picture of a young, grimacing man.
Mac heard Dante's pause, and walked over to see what was going on. He took one look at the flyer and nodded knowingly. "Oh yeah. I forgot to tell you about him. He's some murderer who escaped from prison a couple of days ago. Apparently, he's in the Port Charles area. I guess one of the detectives wanted you to know."
At that moment, Ronnie entered the station. He looked over at Dante and Mac and smiled. As he walked over, he said, "Oh, good. You got my letter."
Dante put the flyer down on his desk. He glanced up at Ronnie briefly. "You remembered."
"Remembered what?" asked Mac.
Before Ronnie could reply, Dante cut in. "Ralph was my first case. I was the man who sent him to prison."
"Right before they dragged him to the slammer, he yelled that the man who brought him down would die at his hands, if it were the last thing he'd ever do." Ronnie didn't seem very concerned. "Wouldn't it be funny if you brought him down again?"
"Yeah, sure." Dante sounded detached.
"We'll consider him a more of a threat, then. If he wants you dead, this could get ugly." Mac patted Dante on the back and walked back to his desk. Ronnie did the same before leaving the station.
Dante just sat there, looking at the picture of Lulu. Things weren't going very well lately, with Sonny about to stand trial and all. But everything was about to get much worse.