Chapter 2 - The Man With the Scar
Dominic moved before anyone else understood what was happening.
He pulled Natalie behind him.
The man in the gray coat stopped.
His hand remained inside his jacket.
“Take it out slowly,” Dominic said.
The stranger smiled.
“Dominic.”
“Do I know you?”
“Not personally.”
“Then you have three seconds.”
The man's hand emerged.
He wasn't holding a weapon.
He held a hospital access badge.
Dominic didn't relax.
Natalie remained behind him, gripping the back of his jacket.
“Who are you?” Dominic asked.
“Elias Crane.”
Mercer interrupted.
“He works with hospital security.”
Crane glanced at Mercer.
Too quickly.
Dominic noticed.
“Hospital security wearing a visitor badge?”
Crane looked down.
The badge clipped to his coat was temporary.
Wrong color.
Wrong designation.
Natalie whispered, “That's the man from outside.”
Crane's smile disappeared.
“You've had an eventful night, kid.”
Dominic stepped forward.
“You spoke to her?”
“No.”
“You knew she was there?”
Crane didn't answer.
That was enough.
Dominic turned to the nurse.
“Call Chicago police.”
Mercer said, “There's no need.”
Dominic almost smiled.
“That's the second time tonight you've objected to involving someone who can investigate you.”
Mercer went silent.
The nurse hurried away.
Crane looked toward the sealed medicine cup.
“What's that?”
Nobody answered.
His eyes returned to Mercer.
Dominic saw the exchange.
Tiny.
Almost invisible.
But it confirmed everything Natalie had said.
Dominic's phone vibrated.
His chief of security, Marcus Vale, was downstairs.
Dominic called him.
“Sixth floor. Now.”
He ended the call.
Crane sighed.
“You're making this bigger than it needs to be.”
“My father died in this hospital.”
Mercer's face tightened.
Crane remained expressionless.
Dominic continued.
“Tonight a seven-year-old tells me she heard you discussing him.”
“I don't know your father.”
Natalie stepped out from behind Dominic.
“Yes, you do.”
Crane looked at her.
“You said his name.”
“What name?”
“Antonio.”
Dominic's jaw tightened.
Crane's eyes flicked toward Mercer.
Natalie pointed.
“He said, ‘Antonio never knew.’”
Silence.
Dominic turned to Mercer.
The doctor's confidence was disappearing.
Eight years of doubt suddenly had shape.
Dominic remembered his father's last afternoon.
Antonio joking about hospital coffee.
Antonio complaining that Dominic worked too much.
Antonio asking him to bring cannoli the next morning.
There had never been a next morning.
At 9:14 p.m., Mercer had called Dominic.
Your father has suffered a catastrophic cardiac event.
At 9:31, Antonio Moretti was pronounced dead.
Dominic had asked questions.
Mercer had answers for every one.
Too many answers, Dominic now realized.
Marcus Vale arrived with two security men.
Tall, broad-shouldered, gray-haired, Marcus took in the corridor instantly.
“Boss?”
Dominic pointed at Crane.
“He stays.”
Then Mercer.
“He stays too.”
Mercer became furious.
“You cannot detain a physician inside his own hospital.”
Dominic looked toward the nurse.
“Police coming?”
“Yes.”
“Then nobody is being detained. We're simply waiting.”
Marcus understood.
He positioned himself beside the elevators.
Dominic crouched near Natalie again.
“Can you tell me everything they said?”
Natalie looked at Crane.
Dominic shifted so she couldn't see him.
“Look at me.”
She did.
“Start from the beginning.”
So she told him.
She described the alley.
The dumpster.
The half sandwich.
The service door.
Mercer.
Crane.
The conversation.
Some words she didn't understand.
Dosage.
Toxicology.
Metabolize.
But she remembered them.
Children often remembered sounds before meanings.
Dominic had Marcus write everything down.
Then Natalie said something that changed the room.
“The gray-coat man gave the doctor a little blue box.”
Crane's expression changed.
“What box?” Dominic asked.
Natalie held her hands several inches apart.
“About this big.”
“What happened to it?”
“The doctor put it in his pocket.”
Everyone looked at Mercer.
Mercer stepped backward.
Dominic said, “Empty your pockets.”
“No.”
“Then police can do it.”
Mercer said nothing.
Dominic's phone rang.
Unknown number.
He answered.
“Moretti.”
A woman's voice said, “Do not let the hospital test those pills.”
Dominic straightened.
“Who is this?”
“If Mercer knows you're testing them, he'll destroy the comparison sample.”
Dominic looked directly at Mercer.
Mercer couldn't hear the caller.
But he knew something had changed.
“What comparison sample?” Dominic asked.
The woman hesitated.
Then whispered:
“The one from your father.”
Dominic stopped breathing.
“My father's medication was destroyed eight years ago.”
“No.”
“Who are you?”
“I worked in pathology.”
“Name.”
“I can't.”
“You called me.”
“Because that little girl just did what none of us had the courage to do.”
Dominic looked at Natalie.
She sat wrapped in his black coat now, barely visible inside it.
“What happened to my father?”
The caller began crying.
“I'm sorry.”
“For what?”
“I signed something.”
“What?”
“A transfer record.”
“Transfer for what?”
No answer.
Dominic's voice hardened.
“What did you transfer?”
“Your father's blood samples.”
“Where?”
“They were supposed to be destroyed.”
“Were they?”
“No.”
Dominic closed his eyes.
“Where are they?”
The woman whispered an address.
Marcus wrote it down.
Then the line disconnected.
Dominic immediately tried calling back.
The number was unavailable.
Police arrived minutes later.
Two officers entered the corridor.
Mercer transformed.
His shoulders relaxed.
His physician's composure returned.
He explained that Natalie was an unauthorized minor who had entered a restricted area.
He called Dominic agitated.
He called the entire situation a misunderstanding.
Then the sealed pills went to toxicology.
Crane denied knowing Mercer outside professional interactions.
Natalie repeated her statement.
Again.
And again.
Her story never changed.
At 1:08 a.m., a child services representative arrived.
Natalie panicked.
“No.”
The woman approached gently.
“Sweetheart—”
Natalie grabbed Dominic.
“No.”
Dominic looked down.
Her fingers clutched his sleeve.
“Where are they taking me?”
“Somewhere safe.”
“They always say that.”
Dominic looked at the social worker.
“What does that mean?”
Natalie answered.
“The last place had a man who locked the refrigerator.”
The social worker's expression changed.
Dominic's did too.
He crouched.
“Natalie.”
She looked at him.
“I need to find out what happened to my father.”
She nodded.
“You helped me tonight.”
Another nod.
“So I'm going to help you.”
“You'll come back?”
Dominic hesitated.
Promises were dangerous.
Especially to children.
Especially promises he wasn't sure he could keep.
“Yes.”
Natalie studied him.
“Promise?”
Dominic extended his little finger.
It felt ridiculous.
His father had done the same thing when Dominic was a boy.
Natalie wrapped her tiny finger around his.
“Promise.”
At 2:20 a.m., Dominic and Marcus drove to the address the anonymous caller had provided.
It was an old medical storage facility near the river.
Officially closed.
Marcus unlocked the outer gate.
Inside, rows of dusty refrigeration units lined the walls.
They found cabinet 17.
Inside was a single evidence container.
ANTONIO MORETTI.
Dominic stared at his father's name.
Marcus whispered, “Boss.”
There was something else inside.
A second container.
Fresh.
Dated that night.
The label read:
DOMINIC MORETTI.
And beneath his name someone had written two words by hand:
May you like
PHASE TWO.
Then a door slammed shut behind them.
