Chapter 2 - The Song My Dead Wife Took to Her Grave
The door opened.
Marcus stood there.
Noah immediately stopped speaking.
I watched my son bury his face against Elena's shoulder.
Marcus looked from him to me.
"Problem?"
"No."
I had survived long enough because I knew when not to reveal what I knew.
Marcus had been my friend before he became my security chief.
He had pulled me out of a burning warehouse.
Taken a bullet meant for me.
Held Noah at his baptism.
If my son feared him, I needed to know why.
But accusations were cheap.
Proof mattered.
"I thought you wanted privacy," Marcus said.
"I did."
"Then why is she still here?"
Elena stiffened.
"She's staying."
His eyes narrowed.
"The maid?"
"The woman who made my son speak."
That shut him up.
I walked closer.
"Have the west guest suite prepared."
"For her?"
"Yes."
Marcus studied me.
"You're serious about that marriage offer?"
Elena made a small sound behind me.
I ignored it.
"This isn't about marriage."
"Then what's it about?"
I smiled.
"Since when do you need explanations?"
Marcus smiled back.
But his eyes did not.
"I'll arrange the room."
He left.
I waited until his footsteps disappeared.
Elena whispered, "He scares Noah."
"I noticed."
"You trust him?"
"With my life."
She looked at Noah.
"Maybe that's the problem."
I should have been angry.
Instead, I remembered the note.
Someone had betrayed Preston.
"Tonight you stay here."
"I have an apartment."
"Not anymore."
Her eyes flashed.
"You don't own me."
"No. But if your mother's death wasn't accidental, whoever killed her may know what she gave you."
"And bringing me deeper into a mafia boss's mansion is your definition of safety?"
"Tonight it is."
She almost smiled.
Almost.
Noah fell asleep against her twenty minutes later.
I carried him upstairs.
He felt heavier than he had the last time I remembered holding him.
That realization hurt.
I had spent three years trying to protect him.
Maybe somewhere along the way, I had stopped being his father and become his guard.
After putting him to bed, I went to my study.
Elena followed.
I opened the safe behind the painting of Lake Michigan.
Inside were Hannah's personal effects.
Wedding ring.
Phone.
Hospital bracelet.
A sealed envelope I had never opened because it contained the last photographs recovered from the crash.
I put everything on the desk.
Elena stared at the bracelet.
"May I?"
I nodded.
She turned it over.
Her expression changed.
"What?"
"This isn't right."
"What isn't?"
"My mother mentioned Hannah's bracelet."
"So?"
"She said it was red."
The bracelet in Elena's hand was white.
I took it.
St. Catherine's.
HANNAH HALE.
Admission: 11:48 P.M.
"What does red mean?"
"At that hospital? Allergy alert."
Hannah had a severe penicillin allergy.
She always wore a red allergy band during medical procedures.
I knew because I had once spent an entire night beside her after an emergency appendectomy.
"Could they have replaced it?"
"Maybe."
Elena didn't believe that.
Neither did I.
I called someone I had not spoken to in eighteen months.
Dr. Adrian Cole.
He had been the attending physician the night Hannah died.
He answered on the fourth ring.
"Preston?"
"Adrian."
A pause.
"It's been a long time."
"Not long enough."
"What do you need?"
"Tell me about Hannah."
Silence.
"Preston, we've gone over this."
"She regained consciousness."
The silence changed.
That was enough.
"Who told you that?"
"So she did."
"I didn't say that."
"You didn't need to."
Elena watched me.
Adrian lowered his voice.
"Where are you?"
"Home."
"Are you alone?"
Interesting.
"No."
"Listen to me carefully. Don't discuss this over the phone."
"Why?"
"I made a mistake."
My fingers tightened around the phone.
"What mistake?"
"I believed I was protecting you."
"From what?"
"I can't say."
"You have thirty seconds."
"Preston—"
"Twenty-nine."
"Meet me tomorrow."
"Where?"
"Not the hospital."
He gave me an address.
An abandoned church in Bridgeport.
Midnight.
Then he said something strange.
"Don't bring Marcus."
The line disconnected.
Elena had heard enough from my expression.
"He knows."
"Yes."
"What now?"
"Now we find out what he's afraid of."
At eleven the next night, I left the mansion through the service garage.
Elena insisted on coming.
I refused.
She followed anyway.
"You are either brave or stupid."
"Those aren't mutually exclusive."
I looked at her.
For the first time since Hannah died, I felt the corner of my mouth lift.
We reached the church at 11:57.
The doors were unlocked.
Adrian wasn't inside.
A single candle burned near the altar.
"Stay behind me."
I drew my gun.
Elena obeyed.
We moved through the aisle.
"Adrian?"
Nothing.
Then Elena saw the phone.
It rested on the front pew.
The screen was cracked.
A voice recording was open.
I pressed play.
Adrian's voice filled the church.
"If Preston hears this, then I didn't make it."
Elena grabbed my arm.
The recording continued.
"Hannah Hale survived the crash. She was conscious for seventeen minutes."
My blood turned cold.
"She told me the crash wasn't an accident. She said the person responsible was someone Preston trusted. Before I could document her statement, two men entered the trauma room."
A noise sounded behind the altar.
I raised my gun.
Nothing moved.
Adrian's recording continued.
"I recognized one of them."
The audio crackled.
Then stopped.
I hit play again.
Nothing.
"Recognized who?" Elena whispered.
A door slammed somewhere beneath us.
We found stairs descending into darkness.
At the bottom was a storage room.
And Adrian Cole was lying on the floor.
Alive.
Barely.
I knelt.
"Adrian."
His eyes opened.
"Preston."
"Who did this?"
He struggled for air.
"The man..."
"Who?"
His hand closed around my wrist.
"Your wife wasn't the target."
I stared at him.
"What?"
He looked past me toward Elena.
Then back at me.
"The target was Noah."
May you like
A floorboard creaked above us.
Someone else was inside the church.
