Chapter 2 - The Room Behind the Wall
The hidden panel opened six inches.
Vincent shoved Emma behind the desk.
“Stay down.”
A man stepped through.
Emma expected a gun.
Instead, the stranger raised both hands.
“Vincent, don’t shoot.”
Vincent didn’t have a weapon visible, but his posture suggested that could change quickly.
The man was in his fifties, broad-shouldered, wearing the gray uniform of building security.
Vincent recognized him.
“Frank?”
“The elevators are locked. Security cameras are looping old footage. Someone took control of the floor.”
Emma rose slightly.
“Did you send me the picture?”
Frank looked confused.
“What picture?”
Vincent showed him Emma’s phone.
Frank’s expression hardened.
“That camera angle is from the service corridor.”
Emma looked toward the hidden passage.
“The same corridor I used to bring the champagne.”
Vincent turned sharply.
“Who assigned you that route?”
“My supervisor.”
“What’s his name?”
“Leonard Pike.”
Frank and Vincent exchanged a glance.
Emma saw it.
“What?”
Vincent asked, “How long have you worked for him?”
“Eight months.”
“Describe him.”
“Forties. Thin. Brown hair. Glasses.”
Vincent’s face changed.
“There is no Leonard Pike employed by the catering company.”
Emma stared.
“He hired me.”
“No,” Vincent said. “Someone hired you to believe he did.”
Her pulse accelerated.
Eight months.
Leonard had interviewed her.
Approved her shifts.
Called when lucrative private events appeared.
He knew where she lived.
He knew when she worked.
He knew she needed money badly enough to accept dangerous assignments.
Emma suddenly remembered something.
Three weeks earlier, Leonard had specifically asked whether she had family in New York.
She had said no.
Her mother was dead.
Her father had died when she was eight.
Leonard had paused.
Then asked exactly how her father had died.
Emma had thought it was strange.
She hadn’t thought about it again.
Until now.
Vincent told Frank to take them through the passage.
They moved quickly.
The hidden corridor ran behind the office walls, narrow and dimly lit, originally designed for staff access.
Emma clutched the cuff link.
“Where are we going?”
“Private elevator,” Frank said.
“Isn’t it locked?”
“Not from the mechanical level.”
They descended a narrow staircase.
Emma followed Vincent.
Questions crashed through her mind.
Who was Leonard?
Why had he spent eight months placing her here?
Why had someone photographed her apartment?
And why did Vincent Moretti possess something her father supposedly left for her?
At the bottom of the stairs, Frank stopped.
A service door stood open.
It should have been closed.
Vincent raised one hand.
They listened.
Nothing.
Then a phone rang.
Not Emma’s.
Not Vincent’s.
Frank reached into his pocket.
His expression changed.
“That isn’t mine.”
The ringing came from beneath a utility cart.
Emma crouched before Vincent could stop her.
A cheap prepaid phone had been taped underneath.
The screen displayed one incoming call.
DANIEL.
Emma stopped breathing.
Vincent whispered, “Don’t answer.”
Emma answered.
“Hello?”
Silence.
Then breathing.
A man’s voice came through.
Older.
Rough.
“Emma?”
Her knees nearly gave way.
Something inside that voice belonged to a memory she had buried twenty years earlier.
Saturday mornings.
Burned pancakes.
A baseball game on television.
A man laughing when she put syrup on his nose.
Emma gripped the phone.
“Who is this?”
The voice said nothing for several seconds.
Then:
“Peanut.”
Emma’s heart stopped.
Nobody had called her that since she was eight.
Her father had invented the nickname after Emma became obsessed with peanut-butter sandwiches.
She had hated it.
Then loved it.
Then cried for months after he died because nobody ever said it again.
“Who are you?”
“Listen carefully.”
Emma’s eyes filled with tears.
“Dad?”
Vincent turned away as though the word physically hurt.
The voice continued.
“You are not safe with Moretti.”
Emma looked at Vincent.
“What?”
“Leave the building. Don’t let Vincent take you anywhere.”
“Where are you?”
A pause.
“Your mother did everything she could to keep you away from this.”
“Are you Daniel Reeves?”
Another pause.
Then the line went dead.
Emma stared at the phone.
Vincent reached for it.
She pulled away.
“No.”
“Emma.”
“You knew.”
“I suspected.”
“You knew he might be alive.”
“I hoped.”
She slapped him.
The sound echoed through the corridor.
Frank looked away.
Vincent did not react.
“You let me believe he was dead.”
“I hadn’t seen Daniel in twenty years.”
“You had his cuff link.”
“Because he gave it to me the night he vanished.”
Emma shook her head.
“Why?”
“He told me that if his daughter ever came looking, I should give it to her.”
“Why didn’t you find me?”
“Your mother begged me not to.”
“Convenient.”
“She believed staying invisible would keep you alive.”
Emma laughed bitterly.
“Apparently that worked wonderfully.”
A distant alarm began sounding.
Frank checked the service panel.
“Fire suppression system.”
Vincent looked up.
“No smoke.”
Frank understood immediately.
“Evacuation.”
“Or cover,” Vincent said.
The doors upstairs would open.
Hundreds of guests would move into hallways.
Security would lose control.
Someone could take Emma without anyone realizing.
Vincent removed his jacket and handed it to her.
“Put this on.”
“Why?”
“Your uniform makes you easy to identify.”
Emma hesitated.
Then obeyed.
They entered the mechanical elevator.
Frank used a key.
The car descended.
Vincent watched the floor numbers.
Then the elevator stopped.
Between floors.
The lights went out.
Emma heard metal scraping above them.
Frank looked upward.
“Someone’s opening the roof hatch.”
Vincent pushed Emma into the corner.
The hatch lifted.
A flashlight beam swept the elevator.
Then a voice said:
“Emma Reeves?”
She froze.
Vincent answered.
“She isn’t here.”
A man laughed.
“You were always a terrible liar, Vincent.”
Vincent’s face tightened.
Emma recognized the voice.
Leonard Pike.
Her supervisor.
The man who had spent eight months placing her exactly where someone wanted her.
“Emma,” Leonard called softly. “Vincent hasn’t told you why your father disappeared.”
Emma said nothing.
“He hasn’t told you what Daniel stole.”
Vincent looked upward.
“Pike.”
“He hasn’t told you who ordered the hit either.”
Emma stared at Vincent.
“What hit?”
Leonard laughed again.
“Ask him about November seventeenth, twenty years ago.”
Vincent’s eyes closed briefly.
Emma saw it.
Guilt.
Real guilt.
“What happened November seventeenth?”
Vincent said nothing.
“Tell her,” Leonard called.
The elevator suddenly jerked downward.
Emma screamed.
Frank grabbed the rail.
The car dropped half a floor and stopped.
Leonard’s voice disappeared.
Vincent hit the emergency control.
Nothing.
Emma backed away from him.
“What happened that night?”
Vincent finally looked at her.
“Your father was supposed to die.”
“Supposed to?”
“Yes.”
“Who ordered it?”
The elevator shuddered again.
Vincent answered anyway.
“My brother.”
Emma swallowed.
“And you?”
Vincent’s expression became unreadable.
“I was there.”
Before Emma could speak, the elevator doors were forced apart from outside.
A hand appeared in the gap.
Then a familiar voice called her name.
“Emma.”
She knew that voice too.
Carlo.
The man who had stared at her before leaving Vincent’s office.
The doors opened wider.
Carlo stood there with four armed men.
He looked directly at Emma.
May you like
Then he smiled.
“Your father sent me.”
