Chapter 4 - The Debt My Father Left Behind
The stranger’s name was Victor Moretti.
I learned that because Tommy said it by accident.
He came back into Reed’s office an hour later carrying a diaper bag someone had apparently purchased in addition to formula, wipes, baby food, and two stuffed animals.
“Moretti shouldn’t have been allowed past the bar,” Tommy muttered.
Reed looked up sharply.
“Not in front of her.”
Tommy glanced at me.
Then at Ava.
“She knows enough already.”
“No,” Reed said. “She does not.”
I stood beside the sofa.
“Who is Victor Moretti?”
Neither man answered.
That told me enough.
“Fine,” I said. “I’ll use the internet.”
Reed’s jaw tightened.
“You will do no such thing.”
“Then explain why a stranger came into your office, looked at my daughter, and said she makes you predictable.”
“He was trying to scare you.”
“It worked.”
For a moment, Reed looked almost angry.
Not at me.
At himself.
Then he sat across from me.
“Victor Moretti runs a competing organization.”
“A rival mafia family?”
Tommy coughed.
Reed ignored him.
“Yes.”
“And he thinks Ava matters to you?”
“He thinks anything that distracts me can be used against me.”
I held my daughter closer.
“She does not matter to you.”
Reed’s gaze met mine.
“She matters because she is innocent.”
I wanted to believe that.
But I had spent too much of my life learning that powerful men defined innocence however it suited them.
Ava fell asleep against my shoulder.
For a few minutes, the office was quiet.
Then Reed opened a drawer and removed another folder.
“Your father,” he said.
My body went tense.
“What about him?”
“His name was Martin Hale.”
“Yes.”
“He died four years ago.”
“Yes.”
“Before he died, he worked for Moretti Shipping.”
I stared at him.
“My father drove trucks.”
“He did.”
“So?”
“So Moretti Shipping was used to move more than freight.”
I felt sick.
My father had not been a good man.
He drank too much. He lied to my mother. He disappeared for weeks at a time when I was a teenager.
But he had been my father.
And he had died in a highway accident after telling me, only days before, that he wanted to “make things right.”
“What does this have to do with Ava?” I asked.
Reed opened the folder.
Inside was a photograph of my father standing beside Victor Moretti.
The image was old.
Maybe six years old.
My father looked nervous.
Victor looked pleased.
“Your father stole records,” Reed said. “Financial records. Routes. Names.”
“Why?”
“Because he was trying to get out.”
My hands began to shake.
“Out of what?”
“Moretti’s organization.”
I remembered my father’s last phone call.
His voice slurred.
His promise that he had enough money to pay off what he owed.
The next morning, police told me his truck had crossed a median in bad weather.
Accident.
That was the word they used.
Always accident.
“Did Moretti kill him?” I whispered.
Reed did not answer.
He did not need to.
My throat closed.
“My mother told me he died drunk.”
“Your mother may have believed that.”
“And you knew?”
“I knew parts of it.”
“For how long?”
“Since before you started working here.”
I stood so quickly that Ava stirred against me.
“You knew who I was?”
“Yes.”
“You hired me because of my father?”
“No.”
“Then why?”
“Because Elena said you were the best cook she had interviewed.”
I laughed bitterly.
“Convenient.”
Reed stood too.
“I kept you employed because you worked harder than anyone in that kitchen. I looked into your background after you came here because I recognized your last name.”
“And you said nothing.”
“Because I believed silence kept you safe.”
I stared at him.
The arrogance of it.
The certainty.
Men like Reed always believed they had the right to decide what truths other people could handle.
“My whole life has been ruined by men keeping things from me,” I said.
Reed’s face changed.
“Then I will tell you everything.”
Before I could respond, his phone rang.
He listened for less than ten seconds.
Then all color disappeared from Tommy’s face.
“What?” I asked.
Reed ended the call.
“Your apartment building,” he said.
My heart stopped.
“What about it?”
“Someone set fire to the front stairwell.”
Ava woke and began crying.
May you like
And Reed Callaway looked at me with the expression of a man who already knew exactly who had done it.
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