Chapter 2 - The White Pacifier
Hannah did not scream.
Fear sometimes arrived too fast for screaming.
Her hand tightened around the strap of her purse.
The man at table twelve remained still.
“Who are you?”
He leaned forward.
The register lamp caught his face.
He was one of Luca Moretti’s guards.
The youngest of the three Hannah had seen four nights earlier.
Maybe thirty-five.
Close-cropped brown hair.
A thin scar across one eyebrow.
Hannah remembered him because unlike the others, he had looked at the baby whenever the child cried.
“My name is Marco.”
“How did you get in?”
“I never left.”
“That’s impossible.”
“The kitchen door doesn’t latch.”
Hannah silently cursed the broken lock Millie had promised to repair.
Marco pushed the receipt across the table.
It was not hers.
She saw that now.
Same paper.
Same logo.
Different transaction.
“You looked like you recognized North Harbor.”
Hannah said nothing.
“Those two men noticed.”
Her mouth dried.
“Are they with you?”
“No.”
“Then who are they?”
Marco looked toward the dark windows.
“That depends how much you enjoy staying alive.”
Hannah almost laughed from pure nerves.
“You broke into my workplace to tell me not to ask questions?”
“I stayed behind to tell you to stop answering them.”
“I didn’t answer anything.”
“I know.”
Something softened in his voice.
“That may have saved you.”
Hannah took a step closer.
“What is North Harbor?”
Marco did not respond.
“Did it have something to do with Sofia Moretti?”
His jaw tightened.
That was enough.
Hannah removed her purse from her shoulder but kept it closed.
“The men tonight used the same account that paid here the night she died.”
Marco stood so quickly the chair legs scraped.
“What?”
“You didn’t know.”
It was not a question.
Marco crossed the room.
“Show me.”
“No.”
“Hannah.”
“How do you know my name?”
“Your tag.”
“Everybody keeps saying that tonight.”
Marco stopped.
“You printed an old transaction?”
She did not answer.
“Hannah, if you found something, you need to give it to me.”
“So it can disappear?”
His eyes narrowed.
“You don’t know what you’re holding.”
“That makes two of us.”
For several seconds they stared at each other.
Then the bell over the entrance rang.
Both turned.
The door was locked.
Yet it opened.
Luca Moretti walked inside holding the baby.
The infant was awake but quiet.
Luca looked from Hannah to Marco.
“What happened?”
Marco answered carefully.
“She found North Harbor.”
Luca became motionless.
Hannah had seen men become angry before.
Luca did not.
His expression emptied.
That frightened her more.
“What did you find?”
Hannah hesitated.
Then she removed the envelope.
She did not hand it over.
She pulled out the historical receipt.
“Someone from that account was here at 1:48 on the morning your wife died.”
Luca shifted the baby higher against his chest.
His eyes never left the paper.
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
“Who served them?”
“Millie.”
Luca looked toward the kitchen.
“She here?”
“Not until six.”
He extended his hand.
Hannah placed the receipt in it.
His thumb moved over M.VALE-04.
The baby made a small noise.
Luca looked down instantly.
The change in him was startling.
His shoulders relaxed.
“Easy, Gabriel.”
Gabriel.
The baby grabbed his shirt.
Luca kissed the top of the child’s head.
Then his face hardened again.
“Marco.”
“Yes.”
“Call Millie.”
Hannah stepped between them verbally before Marco could move.
“No.”
Both men looked at her.
“You’re not dragging my boss out of bed at four in the morning because of something I found.”
Luca’s eyebrows lifted slightly.
“Dragging?”
“You know what I mean.”
“I’m going to ask her a question.”
“You came in with armed security.”
Marco looked offended.
“We’re not—”
Hannah looked at the visible outline beneath his jacket.
Marco stopped talking.
Luca almost smiled.
Then his expression changed when Gabriel began fussing.
Hannah pointed toward a booth.
“Sit.”
Marco stared at her.
No one told Luca Moretti to sit.
Luca sat.
Hannah disappeared into the kitchen.
She warmed a small amount of milk from a sealed bottle Luca had brought in his diaper bag.
When she returned, Gabriel was crying harder.
Luca looked helpless.
Hannah took the bottle.
“May I?”
He hesitated.
Then nodded.
She sat beside him.
“Keep him more upright.”
Luca adjusted Gabriel.
The baby latched onto the bottle.
Silence descended.
Marco looked away as if witnessing something private.
Hannah said quietly, “How long since his mother died?”
“Seven weeks.”
“I’m sorry.”
Luca stared at Gabriel.
“The police said her car lost control.”
Hannah did not mention the news report.
“But you don’t believe that.”
“No.”
His answer was immediate.
“Why?”
“She hated that car.”
“What?”
“It belonged to North Harbor. One of our companies used it. She refused to drive company vehicles.”
“Then why was she in it?”
“That’s the question.”
Gabriel drank slowly.
Luca continued.
“Sofia called me that night. She was scared.”
“What did she say?”
“That she had found something.”
His voice dropped.
“She told me to meet her at home.”
“Did you?”
“I never got there.”
Hannah looked at him.
“Why?”
“Someone called about Gabriel. Said he had been taken from the nanny.”
Hannah froze.
“Taken?”
“It was a lie. But I spent forty minutes driving across the city before I learned that.”
“And while you were gone…”
“Sofia died.”
Hannah understood.
Someone had moved Luca away deliberately.
She looked at the receipt.
“1:48 A.M.”
Luca nodded slowly.
“The crash happened at 2:16.”
Twenty-eight minutes.
Someone had been sitting at Millie’s less than half an hour before Sofia died.
Someone connected to the car.
Marco asked, “What exactly did the two men want?”
“When Luca came back.”
Luca looked up sharply.
“Those words?”
“Yes.”
“Not when I was here?”
“No.”
Marco and Luca exchanged a glance.
“What?” Hannah asked.
Luca’s eyes returned to her.
“The night Sofia died, I had been out of town.”
“Where?”
“Baltimore.”
“When did you return?”
“2:31 A.M.”
Hannah looked at the table.
“You came here?”
“No.”
“But someone may believe you did.”
Luca nodded.
“Millie’s sits on the route between the private terminal and my house.”
Marco added, “If they’re reconstructing his movements, they’re not investigating the past.”
“They’re planning something,” Hannah said.
Nobody contradicted her.
Gabriel finished the bottle.
His eyelids drooped.
Hannah gently removed it.
Luca watched her.
“You have children?”
“No.”
“You’re good with him.”
“My sister has three.”
Gabriel’s tiny fingers closed around Hannah’s thumb.
For a strange second, everything else disappeared.
Then someone knocked on the glass door.
Three slow taps.
Marco reached inside his jacket.
Luca stood, holding Gabriel close.
Hannah turned.
Millie stood outside.
Sixty-two years old.
Gray hair.
Winter coat thrown over pajamas.
Her face was white.
Marco unlocked the door.
Millie rushed inside.
“I got your message.”
“I didn’t message you,” Hannah said.
Millie stopped.
Luca looked at Marco.
Marco shook his head.
Millie pulled out her phone.
A text showed Hannah’s number.
COME TO THE DINER NOW. URGENT.
Hannah stared.
“That wasn’t me.”
Millie’s eyes moved toward table twelve.
Then toward the receipt in Luca’s hand.
Her expression changed.
Luca noticed.
“You remember this.”
Millie whispered, “Where did you get that?”
“Your register.”
Millie sat down heavily.
Hannah went beside her.
“Who was here?”
Millie looked at Luca.
“You need to leave.”
“Who?”
“I promised I wouldn’t say.”
“Who did you promise?”
Millie’s hands began trembling.
“A woman came in that night.”
Luca stopped breathing for a second.
“What woman?”
Millie looked directly at him.
“Your wife.”
The room went silent.
“That’s impossible,” Luca said.
“She sat right there.”
Millie pointed to table twelve.
“She wasn’t alone.”
Luca placed Gabriel carefully against his shoulder.
“Who was with her?”
Millie swallowed.
Before she could answer, every light in the diner went out.
Marco drew his weapon.
A car engine started outside.
Then Gabriel’s baby monitor, lying inside Luca’s open diaper bag, crackled to life.
May you like
A man’s voice whispered through the speaker.
“Midnight tomorrow.”
