Chapter 1 - The Locked Doors
Chloe threw herself into the black Audi and screamed: “Lock it!”
The tattooed man in the back seat looked down at the torn silver bracelet clenched in her bleeding hand.
Three letters had been scratched into its clasp.
V.M.C.
His expression changed.
Chloe had climbed into the wrong car.
Or perhaps, for the first time in years, she had climbed into exactly the right one.
The rear door slammed behind her.
For half a second, nothing happened.
Chloe could hear only her own breathing.
Then a fist struck the window.
BOOM.
She flinched so hard that her shoulder hit the opposite door.
“Chloe!”
Derek’s face appeared beyond the rain-streaked glass.
His hair was plastered against his forehead. His eyes were wild. Water ran from his jaw as he hammered the window again.
“Open the damn door!”
Chloe curled inward.
The man beside her did not move.
That frightened her almost as much as Derek.
He was large enough that the back seat suddenly felt smaller. His white dress shirt was open at the throat, exposing black ink across his chest and neck. More tattoos disappeared beneath his rolled sleeves and covered both forearms.
A black handgun rested low against his thigh.
He wasn’t pointing it at anyone.
He didn’t need to.
Everything about him suggested that panic was something other people did.
His dark eyes moved from Derek to Chloe.
“Your boyfriend?”
“Ex.”
Another fist hit the glass.
Chloe squeezed her eyes shut.
“He won’t accept that.”
The stranger studied the red mark across her cheek.
“Did he do that?”
Chloe hesitated.
Derek had spent two years teaching her that answering questions could be dangerous.
Sometimes the wrong answer brought shouting.
Sometimes silence brought worse.
Her eyes dropped to the stranger’s hand.
He wasn’t reaching for her.
That mattered.
She nodded.
The man leaned forward and pressed the central locking button.
Click.
Four doors locked at once.
It was the smallest sound Chloe had heard all night.
It felt enormous.
Derek pulled the handle.
Nothing.
He tried again.
Then he stared through the glass at the man beside Chloe.
The fury disappeared from his face.
Not gradually.
Instantly.
Derek stepped backward.
The stranger noticed.
“So,” he murmured.
Chloe looked between them.
“You know him?”
“No.”
“But he knows you.”
The stranger’s mouth barely moved.
“That appears to be the problem.”
A second man emerged from the alley.
Chloe’s stomach dropped.
Evan.
Derek’s friend.
The one who had blocked the rear exit of her apartment building while Derek came upstairs.
The one who had smiled when Chloe realized they had planned it.
Evan approached the Audi, saw the passenger in the rear seat, and stopped.
“Derek.”
Derek ignored him.
“Chloe,” he shouted through the glass, “get out.”
She shook her head.
“You’re making this worse.”
The tattooed man finally looked directly at Derek.
There was no anger in his expression.
That somehow made it colder.
He took out his phone.
“Marco.”
A voice answered immediately.
The stranger continued watching Derek.
“Bring the car around.”
A pause.
“And tell Salvatore we have company.”
Derek went pale.
Chloe noticed.
So did the stranger.
He ended the call.
“Who are you?” Chloe whispered.
The man looked at her.
“Vincent.”
Just Vincent.
As though that should have been enough.
Apparently, for Derek, it was.
Derek backed away from the window.
“We don’t want trouble.”
Vincent’s gaze sharpened.
“You were beating on my car thirty seconds ago.”
“I didn’t know it was yours.”
“That makes me feel much better.”
Derek swallowed.
“This is between me and Chloe.”
Vincent glanced at Chloe.
“Is it?”
“No,” she whispered.
Vincent looked back at Derek.
“Then it isn’t.”
Derek’s jaw tightened.
Chloe knew that look.
It meant humiliation was turning into rage.
“You don’t know what she did.”
Vincent remained still.
“What did she do?”
“She stole from me.”
Chloe stared at Derek.
“That’s a lie.”
“You took something that belongs to me.”
“I took my own things!”
Derek slapped the window with his palm.
“The drive, Chloe.”
Her blood turned cold.
Vincent noticed.
“What drive?”
“Nothing.”
Derek laughed.
It was an ugly sound.
“Ask her.”
Vincent turned toward Chloe.
For the first time, she saw genuine curiosity in his face.
“What is he talking about?”
“I don’t know.”
Derek shouted through the glass.
“She knows exactly what I’m talking about!”
Vincent’s gaze dropped.
To Chloe’s fist.
She had been clutching something since she entered the car.
The silver bracelet.
She had almost forgotten it.
Vincent reached toward it, then stopped before touching her.
“May I?”
The question startled Chloe.
Derek had never asked permission for anything.
Slowly, she opened her palm.
The bracelet lay against her skin.
Old silver.
Thin chain.
Small rectangular clasp.
Vincent took it carefully.
His eyes found the scratched letters.
V.M.C.
His face emptied.
“Where did you get this?”
“It was my mother’s.”
Vincent looked up.
“What was her name?”
“Why?”
“What was her name, Chloe?”
She stared at him.
She had never told him her name.
Derek had.
Of course.
Still, something about Vincent’s voice unsettled her.
“Maria Bennett.”
Vincent stopped breathing.
Only for a moment.
But Chloe saw it.
Outside, Derek suddenly started walking away.
Vincent noticed through the glass.
He pressed a button on his phone.
“Marco. Don’t let either of them leave.”
Derek broke into a run.
Two black SUVs turned into the street.
Men in dark coats stepped out.
Derek and Evan froze.
Chloe stared at Vincent.
“What is happening?”
He continued examining the bracelet.
“My father had one like this made.”
“For my mother?”
Vincent didn’t answer.
“Who are you?”
This time, his eyes met hers.
“Vincent Moretti.”
The name meant nothing for perhaps two seconds.
Then Chloe remembered.
News stories.
Restaurants.
Construction companies.
A charity foundation.
Rumors whispered by people who lowered their voices before saying the Moretti name.
She looked at the gun beside his leg.
Then at the men surrounding Derek outside.
“Oh God.”
Vincent returned the bracelet.
“You’re safe in this car.”
“You’re a Moretti.”
“Yes.”
“I climbed into a mafia boss’s car.”
A faint shadow crossed his expression.
“I prefer businessman.”
Despite everything, Chloe almost laughed.
Instead, a sob escaped.
She covered her mouth.
“I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“For getting in your car.”
Vincent looked through the rain-covered window.
Derek was being held near the curb.
“No,” Vincent said. “I suspect getting into my car is the first sensible decision you’ve made tonight.”
Chloe stared at him.
She should have been terrified.
Maybe she was.
But when she looked outside at Derek, she remembered the apartment.
The broken phone.
The locked bedroom.
The moment she had climbed through the bathroom window onto the fire escape.
She remembered running barefoot across wet pavement.
She remembered believing no one would stop Derek.
Then she looked at the locked door beside her.
For once, the lock was keeping danger out.
Not keeping her in.
Vincent’s phone rang.
He answered.
His expression changed almost immediately.
“Say that again.”
Chloe watched him.
The voice on the other end spoke rapidly.
Vincent looked down at the bracelet.
Then at Chloe.
“What?”
He said nothing.
“Vincent, what is it?”
He ended the call.
Outside, one of his men opened Derek’s jacket.
Something fell onto the pavement.
A small black flash drive.
Chloe stared.
“That isn’t mine.”
Vincent’s eyes remained on Derek.
“I know.”
“How?”
“Because Marco just searched your ex’s car.”
Vincent paused.
“They found photographs.”
Chloe felt cold.
“Photographs of what?”
Vincent turned the phone toward her.
A photograph filled the screen.
It showed Chloe leaving her office.
Another showed her buying groceries.
Another showed her asleep beside her apartment window.
Her stomach twisted.
Then Vincent swiped to the final image.
Chloe stopped breathing.
It was an old photograph of her mother.
Maria Bennett stood beside a much younger man.
The man was Vincent’s father.
And on the back, someone had written a date.
The day before Maria Bennett disappeared.
Chloe looked up.
Vincent’s phone rang again.
This time, the caller ID made him go completely still.
May you like
The number belonged to a man who had been dead for twelve years.
And Vincent answered.
