Chapter 5 - The House With Two Masters
Finding Ruby took eleven hours.
Brendan had created her identity well.
Too well.
Maeve Keane appeared as emergency guardian in one sealed school record under a different county.
Ruby’s surname was Hale.
Age now seventeen.
She lived with a foster family in western Massachusetts.
I stared at the photograph on Callum’s laptop.
Red hair.
Freckles.
Serious eyes.
She had been twelve when Brendan rescued her.
Five years.
He had never told me.
Anger and love can occupy the same body.
That was what grief taught me.
“You’re not contacting her directly,” Callum said.
I looked at him.
“You really enjoy ruining sentences right before they become orders.”
His jaw tightened.
“Someone has searched her school record twice this month.”
“Frank.”
“Likely.”
“We need to move her.”
“Federal protection.”
I blinked.
“You’re calling federal agents?”
“Yes.”
“Are you ill?”
“No.”
“You hate federal agents.”
“I hate funerals more.”
That answer mattered.
Callum contacted an attorney who contacted an FBI task force already investigating trafficking through Northeast ports.
No names from the ledger yet.
Only Ruby.
Agents arrived at the foster home.
Too late.
Ruby had disappeared that morning.
The foster parents believed Maeve Keane had picked her up.
Me.
Someone had impersonated me.
The surveillance camera showed a woman in sunglasses.
Dark hair.
Approximate height.
Enough resemblance from a distance.
Ruby got into the car willingly.
I felt sick.
“She thought I was Brendan’s sister.”
Callum immediately understood.
“He told her about you.”
Probably.
My brother had made me into a promise without asking.
Frank now weaponized that promise.
Then Lucia called.
Callum’s mother.
Her voice shook.
“Callum.”
“Where are you?”
“I’m okay.”
“Where?”
“Frank let me go.”
“Why?”
“Because he has the girl.”
I closed my eyes.
Ruby.
Lucia continued.
“He wants Enzo.”
Callum’s face changed.
“What?”
“He never wanted the ledger.”
“Then why demand it?”
“To make you gather everyone.”
Frank was not simply hiding evidence.
He wanted revenge against the Moretti family.
Lucia arrived at the estate under escort.
She was sixty-one.
Elegant despite exhaustion.
Callum hugged her.
Briefly.
Awkwardly.
Beautifully.
She looked at me afterward.
“Maeve.”
“You know me?”
“I knew Brendan.”
Of course.
Apparently my brother had enjoyed collecting Morettis.
We sat in the study.
Lucia told the rest.
Raven had two masters.
Dominic built the smuggling operation.
Frank turned it into human trafficking.
But another man financed expansion.
Enzo Moretti.
Callum’s uncle.
Salvatore discovered it.
He planned to expose Enzo and hand Frank to authorities despite the damage to the organization.
Enzo poisoned him first.
“Why didn’t you tell Callum?”
Lucia closed her eyes.
“I had no proof.”
“You had Brendan.”
“He disappeared.”
“You had Finn.”
“I did not trust him.”
Finn sat across the room.
Fair.
Lucia continued.
“After Salvatore died, Enzo told me if I spoke, Callum would be next.”
Callum stared at her.
“So you left.”
“Yes.”
“For six years.”
“I thought distance protected you.”
His laugh held no humor.
“Everyone in this family thinks abandonment is protection.”
Lucia flinched.
I looked at Callum.
That sentence was not only for her.
He had built a mansion full of guards because everyone he loved had either died or left.
And he had confused being unreachable with being safe.
We located Enzo in Palm Beach.
Callum called him.
No answer.
Then a text arrived.
I know Frank has Ruby. Do nothing.
Callum’s expression hardened.
“He knows.”
Lucia whispered, “Of course.”
“Why would he tell me to do nothing?”
Because Ruby could identify him.
Enzo wanted Frank to solve the problem.
Frank, however, had changed the game.
He sent a video.
Ruby sat in what looked like an abandoned motel room.
Unharmed.
Angry.
Not crying.
“Maeve,” she said directly into the camera.
My heart stopped.
“If you’re really watching, Brendan told me one thing.”
She glanced off-camera.
Someone prompted her.
Ruby ignored them.
“He said you hate raisins.”
I stared.
Callum looked confused.
I laughed despite terror.
“I do.”
Ruby continued.
“He said if anybody ever says they’re you, ask what happened at Lake George.”
My throat tightened.
Only Brendan and I knew.
I was fourteen.
Fell off a dock.
Lost my swimsuit top.
Brendan spent ten years threatening to tell every boyfriend.
Ruby looked straight at the lens.
“The woman who picked me up didn’t know.”
Smart girl.
“I knew before we reached the highway.”
Someone shouted.
Ruby continued quickly.
“They’re at the Blue Heron.”
Video ended.
Callum searched.
There were twelve Blue Heron businesses in Massachusetts.
Motels.
Bars.
Marinas.
One was near abandoned rail property outside Worcester.
Finn recognized it.
“Frank owns it through a cousin.”
Callum stood.
I did too.
He pointed.
“No.”
“Callum.”
“No.”
I walked closer.
“Look at me.”
The words stopped him.
I lifted his chin with two fingers.
A mirror of what he had done in the study.
His eyes locked onto mine.
“Ruby believes I’m coming.”
“I’ll bring her back.”
“She does not know you.”
“She knows Brendan trusted you.”
“That is not enough.”
He stared.
I continued.
“You do not get to make me safe by removing me from my own choices.”
His expression softened painfully.
“You could die.”
“So could you.”
“That is different.”
“It is not.”
For a long moment, we stood too close again.
Feelings neither of us had named sat between us.
Callum finally whispered,
“I don’t want anything to happen to you.”
There it was.
Not authority.
Not staff.
Me.
My voice softened.
“I know.”
“That scares me.”
I smiled sadly.
“Good. Now you know how the rest of us feel around you.”
He nearly laughed.
Then pressed his forehead against mine.
One second.
No kiss.
Somehow more intimate.
Then he stepped away.
“You stay behind me.”
“I make no promises.”
“Maeve.”
“Callum.”
Finn groaned from across the room.
“If both of you survive, please become less exhausting.”
We left for the Blue Heron.
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But Enzo Moretti was already there.
And Frank Russo had no intention of letting two generations of Morettis leave alive.
