Chapter 5 - Eighty Thousand Dollars
Chloe replayed the sentence.
Not your brother.
Again.
Not your brother.
Leo shut the laptop.
“Enough.”
“No.”
“You're shaking.”
“Then let me shake.”
She opened the video again.
Nothing followed.
The file ended.
Marco checked its metadata.
“Edited.”
“By whom?”
“Unknown.”
Chloe paced.
“My father was Daniel Bennett.”
“Yes,” Leo said.
“So she means him.”
“He died sixteen years ago.”
“Did he?”
Nobody answered.
Chloe laughed once.
A broken sound.
“My dead mother isn't dead. Maybe my dead father isn't dead either.”
Leo approached.
“Chloe.”
She raised a hand.
“Please.”
He stopped.
“I need five minutes where nobody protects me from information.”
Leo nodded.
Five minutes later, Chloe asked to see Richard Hayes.
They brought him to Leo's office.
His left temple was bandaged.
Chloe placed the photograph of Antonio and Amelia before him.
“Daniel Bennett.”
Richard looked at it.
“What about him?”
“Is my father alive?”
“No.”
“Did you see his body?”
Richard hesitated.
Leo noticed.
“So that's a no.”
Richard sighed.
“Daniel disappeared in 2010. Antonio told everyone he was dead.”
“Why?”
“Because Daniel had made a deal with Salerno.”
Chloe's chest tightened.
“What deal?”
“Evidence for protection.”
“My father betrayed my mother?”
“Yes.”
The answer was brutal because Richard did not soften it.
“He sold Salerno the location of the records Amelia had hidden.”
“And Amelia?”
“He was supposed to give Salerno her location too.”
“Did he?”
“I don't know.”
Chloe looked down.
Leo's hand appeared beside hers on the table.
Not touching.
Available.
She moved her fingers into his.
Richard watched.
Something like recognition passed over his face.
“You love her.”
Leo did not answer.
Chloe pulled her hand away, suddenly aware of everyone.
Richard gave a tired smile.
“Antonio knew this might happen.”
“What?”
“Not specifically you two. But he believed Chloe should eventually be told the truth by someone who cared whether she survived hearing it.”
Leo's face hardened.
“Where is Daniel?”
“Last confirmed sighting was Montreal. 2018.”
Marco's phone buzzed.
He read.
“We traced the eighty thousand.”
“To Salerno?” Chloe asked.
“No.”
He looked at her.
“Danny paid it to a private investigator.”
“Who?”
“Evelyn Ross.”
Leo knew the name.
“She finds missing people.”
“Apparently she found one.”
Marco turned the screen.
A payment receipt.
Below it, a report.
SUBJECT LOCATED: AMELIA BENNETT.
Chloe's eyes filled.
Danny had found her.
“Where?”
“Upstate.”
They drove that night.
Leo refused to wait.
Chloe refused to stay behind.
Three hours later, the convoy stopped outside a small house near Lake George.
One lamp burned upstairs.
Leo's men searched the property.
Empty.
Inside, Chloe found photographs.
Hundreds.
Photographs of her.
School graduation.
College.
Her first job.
Danny.
Even a photograph of Chloe entering Leo's building four months earlier.
Her mother had been watching from a distance for years.
On the kitchen table sat a letter.
CHLOE.
Her hands trembled opening it.
My darling girl,
If you've found this house, Danny succeeded.
Chloe stopped.
She continued.
I stayed away because every person who came close to me became leverage. Antonio protected you. Richard protected the money. Danny protected the truth.
But there is something none of them knew.
Your father came back.
Chloe's breathing stopped.
Leo read over her shoulder.
The next line had been violently crossed out.
Then:
He wants what is inside Antonio's trust, but money is not the reason.
The letter ended there.
A sound came upstairs.
Leo turned.
Marco raised his weapon.
Chloe whispered, “Mom?”
Footsteps.
Slow.
Someone descended.
A man appeared.
Late fifties.
Gray at the temples.
Chloe recognized him from childhood photographs.
Daniel Bennett.
Her father.
Alive.
He stared at her pregnant belly.
Then at Leo.
“You shouldn't have brought a Moretti here.”
Chloe could barely speak.
“You're alive.”
Daniel's face collapsed.
“I can explain.”
“Sixteen years?”
“I was protecting you.”
“Everyone keeps saying that.”
Leo stepped forward.
“Where is Amelia?”
Daniel's eyes shifted.
Too late.
Leo saw the lie.
“What did you do?”
“Nothing.”
Chloe approached her father.
“Where is Mom?”
Daniel looked at her.
Then at the floor.
“Victor has her.”
“Because of you?”
“No.”
“Because of you?”
“Yes.”
Chloe slapped him.
The sound cracked through the room.
Daniel accepted it.
“I deserve that.”
“You deserve more.”
“I know.”
“Where is she?”
Daniel reached into his pocket.
Marco aimed.
Daniel slowly produced a key.
“There's a storage facility outside Albany.”
“What is there?” Leo asked.
“The evidence Amelia stole twenty-eight years ago.”
“And Salerno?”
“He thinks I have it.”
“Do you?”
Daniel looked at Chloe.
“No.”
“Who does?”
A car engine roared outside.
Marco ran to the window.
The front door burst open.
Danny stumbled inside.
Blood covered his shirt.
Chloe screamed his name.
He collapsed into Leo's arms.
“Danny!”
Chloe dropped beside him.
Danny's eyes found hers.
“I'm sorry.”
“Don't talk.”
“They found Mom.”
“Where?”
Danny struggled for breath.
Then his eyes moved toward Daniel.
His face transformed.
Not relief.
Terror.
“Chloe,” he whispered. “Get away from him.”
Daniel stepped backward.
Danny reached beneath his bloodstained jacket and pulled out a photograph.
He pushed it into Chloe's hand.
It showed Daniel standing beside Victor Salerno.
May you like
The timestamp was yesterday.
And between them stood Amelia.
