Chapter 5 - The Price of Silence
Daniel lowered the gun.
Emma grabbed his arm.
“No.”
“Emma—”
“He’ll kill us anyway.”
Vale smiled.
“She really is your daughter.”
Emma stared at the man she had known as Leonard.
“How long?”
“Excuse me?”
“How long were you pretending?”
“From the first interview.”
“You hired me because of my father.”
“I hired you because your father loves you.”
Emma felt sick.
Every friendly conversation.
Every extra shift.
Every sympathetic comment about her finances.
All calculated.
Vale opened the SUV door.
“Daniel comes with me. Emma stays.”
“No,” Emma said.
Daniel touched her cheek.
“I already lost twenty years.”
“Then don’t lose another second.”
His eyes filled.
It was the first time Emma had seen her father cry.
“You were safer believing I was dead.”
“I wasn’t safer. I was just grieving.”
Daniel closed his eyes.
Then he stepped from the vehicle.
Vale’s men surrounded him.
Vincent remained motionless.
Emma turned on him.
“Do something.”
“I am.”
It took her a second to understand.
Vincent’s hand was beneath his coat.
Not reaching for a gun.
Pressing something.
A transmitter.
Frank suddenly accelerated.
The SUV shot backward.
Vale shouted.
Gunfire erupted.
Emma ducked.
Vincent pulled her down.
Carlo returned fire through the open window.
They crashed through wooden construction barriers and emerged onto another street.
Emma screamed, “My father!”
“We’ll get him back,” Vincent said.
“You left him!”
“He wanted us to.”
“And Sophie?”
Vincent looked at Frank.
“Find her.”
Frank was already calling people.
For the next hour, Manhattan became a chessboard.
Vincent activated contacts Emma never knew existed.
Traffic cameras.
Private security feeds.
Delivery records.
Cell-phone towers.
Emma watched a criminal empire turn itself toward finding one kidnapped woman and one man who had spent twenty years hiding.
She hated how effective it was.
She also understood why people feared Vincent.
At 11:43 p.m., Frank found Sophie.
The live video had contained a reflection in a metal cabinet.
A logo.
An abandoned catering warehouse in Queens.
Vincent sent men.
Police were anonymously notified after Sophie was secured.
She was alive.
Emma spoke to her briefly.
Sophie cried.
Emma cried harder.
Then Sophie said something strange.
“Emma, he kept asking me about Coney Island.”
Emma froze.
“What?”
“He asked where your dad took you when you were little.”
Emma looked at the cuff link.
Coney Island.
Vale had understood part of the clue.
Daniel had not surrendered only to save Sophie.
He was leading Vale away from something.
Emma grabbed her coat.
“Where are you going?”
“Coney Island.”
Vincent followed.
It was after midnight when they arrived.
The amusement district was mostly quiet.
Emma stood near the boardwalk, trying to reconstruct a childhood memory.
Apartment 41.
Locker 18.
Bus 12.
Her father had said the numbers told her where the key was.
Not where the records were.
Emma closed her eyes.
She remembered Daniel taking her to Coney Island on her eighth birthday.
They rode the carousel.
He bought her cotton candy.
Then they stopped at an old arcade.
Daniel had given her a token.
“Always keep one lucky coin, Peanut.”
Emma opened her eyes.
“The arcade.”
The old building had been renovated, but part of the original structure remained.
They entered through a side door Vincent’s people opened.
Rows of modern games flashed in the darkness.
Emma found an old wall preserved near the rear.
Metal lockers.
Numbers.
She searched.
The lock had been replaced.
Vincent forced it.
Inside was nothing except a rusted metal box.
Emma opened it.
One old arcade token.
She picked it up.
Too heavy.
Vincent examined it.
A seam ran around the edge.
He twisted.
The token separated.
Inside was a tiny key.
Emma stared.
“Where does it go?”
Vincent looked around.
“I don’t know.”
Then Emma remembered the final number.
Not bus route twelve.
Machine twelve.
Her father’s favorite game.
She searched the arcade.
Machines had changed.
Numbers hadn’t.
Number twelve was an old skee-ball lane retained as decoration.
Emma knelt.
Beneath it was a small keyhole.
The panel opened.
Inside sat a waterproof package.
Daniel’s original ledger.
Twenty years of secrets.
Emma lifted it.
A note lay underneath.
For Emma.
If you found this, I failed to keep the past away from you.
I’m sorry.
Do not use this for revenge.
Use it to become free.
Dad.
Emma cried silently.
Vincent looked away.
She opened the ledger.
Names filled the pages.
Some dead.
Some alive.
Then she saw one that made Vincent freeze.
VINCENT MORETTI.
Several payments appeared beside his name.
Emma looked at him.
“You said you weren’t involved in murder.”
“I wasn’t.”
“These payments happened before three men died.”
Vincent took the book.
His expression shifted from confusion to horror.
“I never authorized these.”
“Your name is there.”
“Anthony used my accounts.”
Emma stepped back.
“How convenient.”
Vincent closed the ledger.
“You don’t have to believe me.”
“I don’t.”
His phone rang.
Carlo.
Vincent answered.
Listened.
Then handed the phone to Emma.
Daniel’s voice came through.
“Emma?”
“Dad.”
“I don’t have long.”
“Where are you?”
“Vale has me.”
“I found the ledger.”
Silence.
Then Daniel whispered:
“No.”
“What?”
“That’s what he wanted.”
Emma’s stomach tightened.
“Why?”
“The ledger isn’t enough to convict him.”
“What is?”
“You.”
Emma went cold.
“What do you mean?”
“Your mother hid the last piece.”
“My mother?”
“She recorded Vale’s father confessing everything.”
“Where?”
Daniel breathed heavily.
“Your mother kept it somewhere nobody connected to me could reach.”
“Tell me.”
“Emma, listen. Vale doesn’t know where it is. That’s why you must—”
A sound interrupted him.
Someone entered wherever Daniel was being held.
Vale’s voice came through.
“Time’s up.”
The line went dead.
Emma stared at the phone.
Then another call arrived.
Unknown number.
She answered.
A recorded voice played.
Her mother’s voice.
“Emma, sweetheart, if you’re hearing this, Daniel’s secret finally found you.”
Emma stopped breathing.
May you like
Her dead mother had left her a message.
And it had just been activated.
