Chapter 3 - Forty-Eight Hours Until the Wedding
Thirty-two minutes later, Desmond stood beneath the central clock at Union Station.
The wedding countdown no longer mattered.
Every minute now belonged to whoever had designed the trap.
Claire remained at a secure medical property controlled by Elias.
Vanessa had insisted on coming.
Desmond refused.
She came anyway.
Roman walked beside him through the crowd.
“Three exits. Transit police near platform six. Cameras everywhere.”
“Vale likes cameras.”
“Or whoever’s pretending to be Vale does.”
Desmond glanced at him.
“You’re learning.”
“I’ve always been delightful company.”
Desmond kept walking.
Locker 317 was located in an older corridor near the long-distance platforms.
No Patrick.
No blood.
No sign of a shooting.
Only the locker.
Roman scanned the area.
“Too clean.”
“Yes.”
Vanessa approached from behind.
Desmond turned.
“I told you to wait in the car.”
“And I ignored you.”
“That habit gets people killed.”
“So does marrying strangers.”
Roman looked between them.
“I’ll give you two some privacy after we survive.”
Desmond inserted the key.
The locker opened.
Inside was a small metal case.
No wires.
No obvious trigger.
Roman checked it before Desmond lifted it out.
They moved to an unused service room.
Desmond opened the case.
Inside were three things.
A ledger.
A digital recorder.
And a wedding invitation dated nine years earlier.
Desmond picked up the invitation.
The names were unfamiliar.
But the location was not.
The same cathedral where he was supposed to marry Vanessa.
Roman frowned.
“What’s that?”
“A wedding.”
Vanessa looked over his shoulder.
“Those families were killed.”
Desmond turned.
“You know them?”
“Everybody in my world knows them.”
She took the invitation.
“The Marino and Costello families tried to merge nine years ago.”
“What happened?”
“Twenty-three people died at the reception.”
Roman said, “Gas explosion.”
Vanessa shook her head.
“That’s what newspapers reported.”
Desmond looked at the date.
His father had died six days after that wedding.
Coincidence was becoming expensive.
He opened the ledger.
Names.
Payments.
Security assignments.
Bribes.
At the top of one page was Arthur Hayes.
Desmond stopped breathing for half a second.
Roman noticed.
“What?”
Desmond turned the book.
Arthur’s signature appeared beneath a payment authorization.
The amount: $750,000.
Recipient: A. Vale.
Date: two days before the Marino-Costello wedding.
Vanessa whispered, “Your father paid him.”
“For what?”
The recorder answered.
Desmond pressed play.
Static.
Then Arthur Hayes’s voice filled the small room.
“If you’re hearing this, the agreement failed.”
Desmond froze.
He had not heard his father’s voice in nine years.
Arthur continued.
“Anthony, I need you to understand something. The merger cannot happen. Not because of territory. Because of the network behind it.”
Vanessa moved closer.
“The network?”
Arthur’s recording continued.
“They are using marriages to consolidate criminal families under a single hidden command. Marino and Costello don’t know who arranged their union. Neither side asked first. Someone approached both and convinced each that the other initiated negotiations.”
Desmond and Vanessa looked at each other.
Exactly like them.
Arthur’s voice lowered.
“If they succeed, they will do it again.”
Roman muttered, “They did.”
The recording crackled.
“I have identified one member inside my own organization. I don’t know how deep it goes. I cannot tell Desmond. He’s too young, and telling him makes him a target.”
Desmond’s fingers tightened.
The voice continued.
“If I die, Anthony, protect my son from the network.”
Then the recording stopped.
Desmond pressed play again.
Nothing.
Vanessa whispered, “Vale wasn’t your father’s enemy.”
“No.”
“He was protecting you.”
“Maybe.”
Roman opened the ledger.
“Then why disappear?”
Desmond looked at the payment.
“Because somebody wanted me to think he was responsible for my father’s death.”
A noise came from the corridor.
All three turned.
Roman opened the door.
Patrick Shaw stood outside.
Blood covered his left shoulder.
“Patrick.”
Roman caught him as he stumbled.
Desmond helped lower him into a chair.
“You were shot.”
“Grazed.”
“I heard it.”
Patrick gave a humorless smile.
“Then my acting career is improving.”
Desmond’s expression hardened.
“What happened?”
“Someone called me using your voice.”
Roman swore.
Patrick continued.
“They told me to come to locker 317 and destroy the contents.”
“Why would I do that?”
“They said Vanessa had planted evidence implicating your father.”
Desmond glanced at her.
Patrick followed his eyes.
“You brought her?”
“She had the key.”
Patrick’s face changed.
“Where did she get it?”
“Vale.”
Patrick went silent.
“You knew he was alive,” Desmond said.
Patrick closed his eyes.
“Yes.”
Roman stepped forward.
“You let us think he was dead?”
“I promised Arthur.”
Desmond leaned closer.
“Start talking.”
Patrick looked suddenly older than his sixty-two years.
“Your father discovered the network eighteen months before his death. Vale helped him investigate it. When the Marino-Costello wedding happened, Arthur tried to stop the alliance.”
“By killing them?”
“No.”
Patrick shook his head.
“The explosion wasn’t Arthur.”
“Who was it?”
“The network.”
“Why?”
“Because Marino discovered the truth the morning of the wedding.”
Desmond stared at the old invitation.
“And my father?”
“He intended to expose them.”
“Six days later he died.”
Patrick nodded.
Desmond had been told his father suffered a heart attack.
He had accepted it because Arthur had spent thirty years eating badly, sleeping three hours a night, and collecting enemies.
Now he felt stupid for believing death could ever be simple in his family.
“Was he murdered?”
Patrick did not answer.
That was answer enough.
Desmond turned away.
Vanessa watched him carefully.
“Desmond.”
“Not now.”
Patrick grabbed his sleeve.
“There’s more.”
Desmond looked down.
“The member your father identified inside the organization.”
“Yes.”
“Who?”
Patrick looked toward Roman.
Roman’s hand moved toward his gun.
Patrick said, “Not him.”
Roman relaxed slightly.
“Comforting.”
Patrick looked at Desmond.
“I never knew the name.”
“You said Arthur identified someone.”
“He refused to tell me. He said knowing would get me killed.”
“Did Vale know?”
“Yes.”
“Then we find Vale.”
Patrick shook his head.
“You don’t find Anthony Vale. He finds you.”
Desmond almost smiled.
“People keep saying things like that.”
“Because they’re true.”
Vanessa opened the ledger again.
“There are recent entries.”
Desmond turned.
She pointed.
Payments from six months earlier.
Venue deposits.
Transportation contracts.
Catering companies.
Security firms.
Every vendor associated with their wedding had received money routed through shell companies connected to the ledger.
Roman said, “The whole wedding is compromised.”
“Yes.”
Patrick stared at the entries.
“They’ve built another Marino-Costello.”
Desmond looked toward Vanessa.
“The wedding gets canceled.”
She nodded.
“No argument.”
Patrick suddenly said, “You can’t.”
Desmond turned.
Patrick struggled upright.
“If you cancel publicly, whoever is behind this disappears.”
“I prefer disappearance to mass murder.”
“You have a chance to expose them.”
“With two families as bait?”
Patrick lowered his voice.
“With an empty wedding.”
Desmond understood.
Pretend the wedding remained active.
Remove innocent guests.
Feed the network false information.
See who arrived to complete the operation.
Roman nodded slowly.
“We turn the trap around.”
Vanessa looked at Desmond.
“Can you fake a wedding in forty-eight hours?”
Desmond buttoned his jacket.
“I’ve faked more expensive things in less time.”
For the first time since the kitchen, Vanessa smiled.
Then Patrick’s phone buzzed.
He looked at the screen.
His smile vanished.
Desmond took the device.
A text message displayed a live photograph.
Claire.
Sitting in the medical safe house.
Elias stood beside her.
The timestamp was current.
Another message appeared.
YOU STILL HAVE A TRAITOR.
Then a second photograph loaded.
It showed the same room from a different angle.
May you like
Taken from inside the house.
And standing behind Claire, reflected faintly in a mirror, was a man Desmond had trusted since childhood.
