Chapter 3 - THE DAUGHTER OF A DEAD MANHis brother.
The murdered man at the Belladonna warehouse.
The man whose death had turned Dominic Moretti into someone the entire city feared.
My father.
I stared at the photograph until the faces blurred.
My mother looked younger, but I recognized her eyes. Elias Hale stood beside her with one hand on her shoulder. Dominic stood in the background, his expression serious even then.
And the baby wrapped in the white blanket wore a tiny silver bracelet.
I looked down at my wrist.
I had worn the same bracelet for as long as I could remember.
Dominic lowered himself into the chair beside me.
“My brother’s name was Luca.”
I could not speak.
“He was twenty-nine when he died,” Dominic continued. “He was reckless, stubborn, and incapable of walking away from anyone who needed him.”
“Did he know about me?”
Dominic looked at the photograph.
“I don’t know.”
Warren Pike shifted in his chair.
“He knew.”
Dominic moved so quickly that the chair crashed backward.
He grabbed Warren by the front of his shirt.
“How?”
“Luca hired Elias to protect Mara when she became pregnant.”
“Why didn’t he tell me?”
“Because he discovered the Black Council existed inside your organization.”
Dominic’s face darkened.
Warren continued.
“Luca didn’t know who he could trust. Not even you.”
Dominic struck him once.
Blood ran from Warren’s nose.
I jumped.
Dominic saw me and stopped.
He released Warren and turned away.
For several seconds, nobody spoke.
Then Sofia opened the envelope found inside the church box.
The letter was written in my mother’s handwriting.
Dominic,
If you are reading this, then they have found Leora.
I am sorry I lied to you. I am sorry I let you believe Luca died without leaving a child behind. I did it because the order to kill him came from someone close enough to stand beside you at his funeral.
Luca discovered that the Black Council was not a rival organization. It was an alliance operating inside the police department, the prosecutor’s office, the courts, and several criminal families. Their goal was to maintain permanent control of the city by making every side dependent on them.
Luca planned to expose them. Elias agreed to help us escape. They were both killed at Belladonna before we could leave.
I survived because Deputy Commissioner Rourke believed I died in the warehouse fire.
Dominic’s hand tightened around the paper.
Sofia continued reading aloud.
The ledger is not in any of the three boxes. Each box contains only part of the path. Leora carries the final key, although she does not know it.
I touched my bracelet.
Dominic noticed.
Sofia read the final lines.
Trust no one who asks to take Leora into official custody. Trust no one who claims Luca betrayed you. And Dominic—if you still have any love for your brother, protect his daughter better than I have been able to protect her alone.
The letter ended there.
Dominic folded it carefully.
“You protected her for seven years,” he said quietly, as though my mother could hear him. “You did more than any of us.”
A phone vibrated.
The computer operator answered.
Her face changed.
“Someone just accessed Mara Hale’s hospital employee file from inside the courthouse.”
“Location?” Dominic asked.
“Sublevel three.”
Sofia looked at the map.
“There is no sublevel three on the courthouse plans.”
“There is now,” Dominic said.
He ordered his men to prepare vehicles.
I stood.
“I’m coming.”
“No.”
“She is my mother.”
“You will stay here.”
“I know the signal for the boxes. I know things about her that you don’t.”
“This is not an argument.”
“You promised we would find her.”
“We will.”
“Then take me.”
Dominic looked at me with the same expression my mother used when she wanted to say no but knew I was right.
“Leora, the people holding your mother have already followed you, watched your school, and murdered anyone who threatened them.”
“They will hurt her if we don’t go.”
“They may hurt you if we do.”
I lifted my wrist.
“The letter says I carry the final key.”
Every person in the room became quiet.
“If they need the ledger,” I said, “they need me alive.”
Dominic crouched in front of me.
“That does not make you safe.”
“It makes me useful.”
Pain crossed his face.
“No child should ever have to think that way.”
“My mother taught me to notice what adults miss.”
“And what are we missing?”
I pointed at the courthouse image.
“She didn’t tell me three places because she wanted us to find all three boxes.”
“Why else?”
“She wanted me to remember the order.”
“Home. School. Church.”
I nodded.
“The boxes make a path.”
The home box arrived fifteen minutes later.
Inside was a map of the school auditorium.
The school box contained a brass token stamped with the shape of a church bell.
The church box held the key and photograph.
Sofia spread everything across the table.
“The auditorium map points to a storage locker,” she said.
The computer operator searched city records.
“There is a transit storage facility beneath the old Bell Tower Station.”
Dominic looked at me.
“Home. School. Church.”
I arranged the objects in that order.
The home box’s map contained a red circle around seat number 214 in the auditorium.
The school box’s brass token had the number 214 engraved on the edge.
The church box’s key carried a small label.
BTS-214.
“Bell Tower Station, locker 214,” Sofia said.
Dominic issued new orders.
One team would go to the station.
Another would prepare to enter the courthouse garage.
He told Sofia to keep me in the safe room.
This time, I did not argue.
Not because I agreed.
Because I had already decided to leave another way.
While everyone focused on the monitors, I slipped through the kitchen, climbed the staircase, and entered the restaurant’s main dining room.
Police officers still stood near the entrance.
The officer named Bell saw me.
“There she is!”
I ran toward the back hallway.
He followed.
I pushed through a service door and entered the alley.
Rain had begun falling.
A black vehicle waited beside the loading dock.
Its driver stepped out to answer his phone.
I opened the rear door, climbed inside, and hid beneath a folded coat.
Two minutes later, Dominic entered the vehicle.
Sofia sat beside him.
Neither noticed me.
The car moved.
Dominic spoke into his phone.
“Bell Tower team, report.”
A man answered through the speaker.
“Locker 214 is empty.”
Dominic cursed softly.
“There are fresh scratches around the lock,” the man continued. “Someone opened it recently.”
“When?”
“Within the last twenty-four hours.”
Sofia looked at Dominic.
“Rourke has the ledger.”
“No,” I said from beneath the coat.
The vehicle swerved.
Sofia screamed.
Dominic pulled the coat away and stared at me.
His expression was terrifying.
“What are you doing here?”
“The locker was supposed to be empty.”
His anger paused.
“What?”
“The boxes were never leading to the ledger.”
“How do you know?”
“Because my mother always said the safest hiding place was one everyone could find.”
Sofia frowned.
“That makes no sense.”
“It does if the boxes are a test.”
Dominic looked at the key.
“A test for whom?”
“For you.”
The car continued through the rain.
I pointed to the photograph.
“My mother wanted to know whether the person opening the boxes would protect me or chase the ledger.”
Sofia leaned back slowly.
“If Dominic had gone straight for the evidence and ignored Mara…”
“He would have failed,” I said.
Dominic studied me.
“What happens if I pass?”
I looked at the silver bracelet around my wrist.
“My mother always told me never to remove this.”
He reached toward it, then stopped.
“May I?”
I held out my arm.
The bracelet had three small charms: a house, a book, and an angel.
Home.
School.
Church.
Dominic pressed the three charms in that order.
A tiny compartment opened beneath the angel.
Inside was a memory card smaller than my fingernail.
Sofia whispered, “The ledger.”
Dominic removed it carefully.
At that exact moment, the driver shouted.
A truck emerged from the intersection.
It struck the side of our vehicle.
Glass exploded.
Metal screamed.
The black car spun across the wet road.
Dominic threw himself over me.
The vehicle slammed into a concrete barrier.
For several seconds, I heard nothing except ringing.
Then Dominic lifted his head.
Blood ran from a cut near his temple.
“Leora?”
“I’m okay.”
Sofia groaned beside us.
The driver was unconscious.
Outside, men in masks climbed from the truck.
Dominic reached beneath his coat.
His gun was gone.
It had fallen near the front seat.
The rear door was pulled open.
A masked man grabbed my ankle.
Dominic struck him with his elbow, but another man fired through the window.
The bullet hit Dominic’s shoulder.
He collapsed against me.
“Dominic!”
A third attacker dragged me from the vehicle.
I screamed and kicked.
Rain struck my face.
Sofia tried to climb out, but a masked man hit her with the stock of his weapon.
I saw police lights in the distance.
For one second, I felt relief.
Then the police vehicles stopped beside the attackers.
Deputy Commissioner Rourke stepped out.
He was tall, silver-haired, and dressed in a dark uniform decorated with medals.
The masked men lowered their weapons respectfully.
Rourke looked down at me.
“So,” he said. “Luca Moretti’s daughter is finally real.”
Dominic tried to rise.
Rourke aimed a gun at him.
“Stay down.”
Dominic’s voice was rough.
“You murdered my brother.”
Rourke smiled.
“No, Dominic.”
He glanced toward the courthouse rising at the end of the street.
“Your brother was killed by the person you trusted enough to put beside him.”
Dominic froze.
Rourke crouched in front of me.
“Give me the bracelet.”
I closed my fist around it.
He sighed.
“Leora, your mother is waiting.”
“Where?”
“In a room beneath the courthouse.”
“Is she alive?”
“For now.”
Dominic’s hand moved slightly toward the fallen gun.
Rourke noticed.
He fired.
The bullet struck the pavement beside Dominic’s fingers.
“Next one goes through your heart.”
He looked at me again.
“The bracelet.”
I thought of my mother showing three fingers to the camera.
Home.
School.
Church.
But there had always been a fourth place in our emergency game.
She had never said it aloud.
She would touch my chest and tell me:
If all three places are gone, keep the truth here.
I pulled off the bracelet.
Rourke smiled.
But before giving it to him, I threw it through the broken window of the black car.
Dominic caught it.
Rourke’s smile vanished.
“Take the girl,” he ordered.
Two men lifted me.
I screamed Dominic’s name.
He tried to stand despite the blood spreading across his coat.
Rourke pressed the gun against his forehead.
“Watch carefully,” Rourke told him. “This is what happens when Moretti men think love makes them stronger.”
He pulled the trigger.
The gun clicked.
Empty.
Rourke stared at it.
Dominic smiled through the pain.
Sofia lay near the vehicle, holding the gun’s magazine in her bleeding hand.
Dominic struck Rourke across the face.
Gunfire erupted.
Black vehicles raced from both ends of the street.
Moretti men poured out.
The attackers dragged me toward a police van.
I saw Dominic fighting to reach me.
Then someone covered my mouth with a cloth.
The world blurred.
May you like
The last thing I heard was Dominic shouting:
“LEORA!”
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