Chapter 2 - A Favor I Refused to Owe

By sunrise, I had made three decisions.

The first was that Lily would not go to school that day.

The second was that I would not stay in my apartment long enough to find out whether the man in the gray cap came back.

The third was that Dominic Salvatore was not going to decide what happened next just because danger had entered the room wearing his last name.

He did not like the third decision.

He accepted it anyway.

We sat at Mrs. Alvarez’s tiny kitchen table while Lily slept curled on the sofa beneath a crocheted blanket. Dominic had sent his men downstairs after I told him five armed strangers in the hallway were not making me feel safer.

He had obeyed immediately.

That bothered me too.

Men like Dominic were easier to distrust when they acted exactly the way you expected.

“Rosie has an apartment above the diner,” I said. “Lily and I can stay there for a few nights.”

“No.”

I folded my arms.

His eyes closed for half a second.

“Sorry,” he said. “That came out as an order.”

“Because it was one.”

“Because I’m accustomed to people treating information as sufficient reason to act.”

“I’m not your people.”

“I’ve noticed.”

Despite myself, I almost smiled.

Almost.

He slid a tablet across the table.

On the screen was a corporate registration for North Briar Holdings. The company had bought my building for cash forty-two days earlier. Its registered agent was a law office downtown.

The attorney’s name was Leonard Pike.

Dominic tapped the screen. “Pike handles real estate for my uncle.”

“That still doesn’t mean your uncle bought my building because of me.”

“No. It means we don’t assume coincidence until we know.”

“We?”

He leaned back.

“You can tell me to leave. I will.”

I waited.

“So leave.”

Something unreadable crossed his face.

Then he stood.

No argument.

No threat.

No reminder that I owed him cooperation because he had brought me home safely.

He simply reached into his jacket, placed the cream card on the table again, and turned toward the door.

“Dominic.”

He stopped.

I hated that I had said his name.

“What happens if I call the police?”

“You should.”

That was not the answer I expected.

“They’ll ask why someone connected to Vincent Salvatore may be interested in you,” he continued. “Tell them the truth. Tell them you witnessed the aftermath of an attempted murder. Tell them I came to your diner. Do not protect me.”

I stared at him.

“Wouldn’t that cause problems for you?”

“Yes.”

“And you’re telling me to do it anyway?”

“I’m telling you your daughter matters more than my convenience.”

Then he left.

For three hours, I tried to convince myself that was the end of it.

It wasn’t.

At eight thirty, I called Detective Mara Chen, the number the police had given me after the car explosion. She listened without interrupting while I told her about Dominic, the traffic-camera photograph, North Briar Holdings, and the stranger at my building.

When I finished, the silence on the line stretched.

“Emma,” she said carefully, “why didn’t you tell us you saw another man at the scene?”

“I didn’t. Dominic showed me the image last night.”

“Send it to me.”

“I don’t have a copy.”

“Then ask him for one.”

I looked at the cream card.

I had moved it from Mrs. Alvarez’s table into my pocket without remembering doing it.

“Detective, is Dominic Salvatore dangerous?”

Another pause.

“Yes.”

The certainty in her voice made my stomach tighten.

“To me?”

“I can’t answer that.”

“That’s not comforting.”

“It isn’t meant to be.”

She softened slightly. “But if he really gave you evidence and told you to contact us, I want to know why.”

So did I.

I texted the number on the card.

SEND THE PHOTO TO DETECTIVE MARA CHEN.

I added her department email.

The reply came less than a minute later.

DONE.

No question. No complaint.

I spent the morning packing our lives into four grocery bags and one battered suitcase.

Lily followed me around the apartment wearing her backpack even though she was not going to school.

“Are we moving?” she asked.

“Temporarily.”

“Is temporarily longer than a sleepover?”

“Probably.”

She considered this, then added a stuffed rabbit to the suitcase.

At noon, Rosie called.

“You’re staying with me,” she announced.

“Rosie—”

“I have two bedrooms and no patience for arguments.”

I looked at Lily.

“See?” Lily whispered. “She’s scarier than that man.”

For the first time in twelve hours, I laughed.

We reached Rosie’s apartment through the diner’s back stairwell shortly after one. The place smelled like cinnamon, old books, and the lavender soap she bought in bulk. Lily immediately claimed the small guest room and lined her stuffed animals along the windowsill.

I went downstairs for my shift at four.

Rosie protested.

I worked anyway.

Fear had already taken my apartment. I refused to give it my paycheck too.

For most of the evening, nothing happened.

Then, at 9:12, a man sat down at the counter.

Gray cap.

My hand froze around the coffee pot.

He was younger than Mrs. Alvarez had described. Maybe thirty-five. Clean-shaven. Ordinary face. The kind of man your eyes slid past in a grocery store.

He smiled.

“Coffee, please.”

I set down the pot but did not pour.

“Property management?” I asked.

His smile vanished.

The bell over the diner door rang.

Detective Chen walked in wearing a dark coat over plain clothes.

The man at the counter stood immediately.

“Sit down,” Chen said.

He ran.

Not toward the front door.

Toward the kitchen.

I moved before I thought.

I grabbed the stainless-steel tray beside the pie case and slammed it against the swinging door just as he pushed through. The metal edge caught his shoulder. He stumbled. Rosie shouted something about her floor.

Chen caught him near the freezer.

Thirty seconds later, he was face-down on cracked tile with his hands cuffed behind him.

My heart was hammering so hard I could hear it.

Chen searched his pockets.

Wallet.

Phone.

Keys.

A folded photograph.

She opened it.

Her face changed.

“What?” I asked.

She turned the picture toward me.

It was Lily.

Walking out of school two days earlier.

I gripped the counter until my fingers hurt.

“Who are you?” Chen demanded.

The man said nothing.

On his right hand was a heavy silver ring.

Black stone.

A tiny engraved crest.

I had seen it before.

Not on him.

Three weeks earlier, in rain and smoke, while I dragged Dominic across the pavement, one of the men approaching the wreck had raised a handgun.

Lightning had flashed across wet metal.

And for one instant, the same black stone had gleamed on his hand.

My breath caught.

“That ring.”

Chen looked at me.

“What about it?”

I pointed.

“He was there.”

The man’s head turned.

For the first time, real fear broke through his expression.

Not fear of Detective Chen.

Fear that I remembered.

Chen saw it too.

She pulled out her phone.

“Call Salvatore,” I said.

Her eyes narrowed.

“Why?”

“Because whoever sent this man thought I could identify someone from the night of the explosion.”

I looked at the ring again.

“And Dominic needs to know they were right.”

He arrived twenty-six minutes later.

No convoy this time.

One car. One driver.

He entered through the back while uniformed officers photographed the kitchen.

When he saw the ring sealed inside an evidence bag, all the color left his face.

“You know it,” I said.

His gaze stayed on the black stone.

“Yes.”

“Who wears it?”

Dominic looked at Detective Chen, then at me.

“My family used to give those rings to men who had earned absolute trust.”

“Used to?” Chen asked.

“My father stopped the tradition before he died.”

“How many exist?”

“Seven.”

“And how many men who received them are alive?”

His jaw tightened.

“Three.”

I watched him carefully.

“Your uncle?”

Dominic did not answer immediately.

He didn’t need to.

Chen folded her arms. “Name the other two.”

“Enzo Bellini and Carlo DeLuca.”

“Where are they?”

“Enzo lives in Tampa. Carlo is in a federal prison in Pennsylvania.”

Chen’s eyes sharpened.

“So unless somebody stole a ring—”

“It points to Vincent,” Dominic said.

The arrested man suddenly laughed from the chair where an officer had seated him.

Everyone looked over.

He smiled at Dominic.

“You really think this is about the waitress?”

Dominic went very still.

The man’s smile widened.

“She wasn’t the target.”

My stomach dropped.

He looked at me.

“Her kid wasn’t either.”

Chen stepped between us. “Stop talking.”

But he had already said enough.

I looked at Dominic.

“If I wasn’t the target, why follow me?”

His eyes met mine.

Understanding moved across his face before I reached it.

Because I was bait.

Not to kill.

To pull Dominic somewhere they could predict.

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I had spent all day trying to keep his danger away from my life.

I had never considered that someone might be using my life to control his.