Chương 1
"""Lily Carter had been sitting beneath the chandelier in Moretti Plaza for nearly two hours when she stepped in front of Dominic Moretti and demanded to know why he had fired her mother.
The security guard nearest the elevators moved before anyone else did, one hand lifting instinctively as if a six-year-old with a stuffed rabbit might constitute a threat.
Dominic stopped him with a glance.
The girl wore a yellow raincoat despite the clear October afternoon, and one of her shoelaces had come undone.
Her dark hair had been gathered into two uneven braids that looked as though she'd done them herself.
In her left hand she held a rabbit by one ear.
In her right was a folded sheet of Moretti Group stationery.
“Why did you fire my mom?”
Conversation died around them.
An assistant carrying coffee slowed beside the reception desk.
Two men in suits stopped pretending not to listen.
The guard lowered his hand but didn't move away.
Dominic looked at the child, then at the glass doors twenty feet behind her.
“Where are your parents?”
“My mom is home.”
“Who brought you here?”
“Nobody.”
That answer changed his face more than the accusation had.
He crouched until they were nearly eye level.
“What’s your name?”
“Lily Carter.”
“And how did you get here, Lily Carter?”
“The train.”
“By yourself?”
She seemed annoyed by the question.
“I know how.”
Dominic glanced toward the security desk.
The guard looked suddenly interested in his monitor.
“We're going to come back to that,” Dominic said.
“I have to go home before five.”
“Why?”
“Because Mom thinks I'm at Maya's.”
A woman near the elevators covered her mouth.
Dominic rubbed two fingers across his eyebrow.
He had spent the morning arguing over a forty-million-dollar refinancing agreement and had expected that to be the complicated part of his day.
“May I see what you're holding?”
Lily pulled the paper against her chest.
“Are you going to tear it up?”
“No.”
“You promise?”
“I promise.”
She studied him with the solemn suspicion children reserved for adults who had already disappointed them by association.
Then she handed it over.
Dominic unfolded the letter.
The Moretti Group logo was correct.
The employee number was correct.
The language was standard enough to be invisible.
Effective immediately.
Position eliminated as part of departmental restructuring.
Eight years of service reduced to three paragraphs and a benefits number.
Dominic reached the signature line.
He read it again.
“Who gave this to your mother?”
“Mr. Pike.”
Dominic's gaze remained on the page.
“Elliot Pike?”
“I don't know his first name.”
“What does your mother do here?”
“She fixes numbers.”
A laugh escaped someone behind them and was immediately swallowed.
Lily frowned.
“She's good at it.”
“I believe you.”
“She said sometimes people make numbers ugly because they want them to say something they don't.”
That stopped the almost-laughter completely.
Dominic folded the letter along its existing crease.
“What is your mother's name?”
“Anna Carter.”
His hand went still.
For several seconds the lobby seemed to become nothing but the faint hum of ventilation and the electronic chime of an arriving elevator.
Dominic looked at her properly then.
Not at the raincoat.
Not at the letter.
At her.
“Anna Carter?”
“My mommy worked here eight years.”
Behind him, Marco Bellini took one step closer.
Marco had known Dominic since they were boys and therefore recognized the rare moments when silence meant more than anger.
“Dom?”
Dominic stood.
“Find Pike.”
Marco looked from him to Lily.
“Now?”
“Now.”
“What happened?”
“Find him.”
Marco pulled out his phone and walked toward the elevators.
Lily tugged Dominic's sleeve.
“She has your letters too.”
He looked down.
“What letters?”
“A whole shoebox.”
“Letters from me?”
“No.”
“Then whose?”
“She wrote them.”
“To whom?”
“Mr. Moretti.”
Dominic's mouth tightened slightly.
“I am Mr. Moretti.”
Lily shook her head.
“Not you.”
She pointed vaguely upward, as if older men naturally lived on higher floors.
“The old Mr. Moretti.”
Nobody nearby moved.
Dominic's father, Vincent Moretti, had been dead for three years.
“What did your mother write to my father about?”
“She didn't tell me.”
“Did he answer?”
“No.”
“How do you know?”
“Because they're still closed.”
Dominic stared at her.
“The letters are unopened?”
“All of them.”
“How many?”
She shrugged.
“A lot.”
“Where are they?”
“In the shoebox.”
“Yes, I got that part.”
“At home.”
Dominic exhaled through his nose.
The receptionist abruptly found something urgent to do with a stack of visitor badges.
“Lily, why does your mother have letters she wrote to my father but never mailed?”
“I didn't say she didn't mail them.”
Dominic's expression sharpened.
Lily hugged the rabbit.
“They came back.”
I learned about that conversation forty-three minutes later, when I discovered my daughter was not at Maya Hernandez's apartment.
I had been asleep on the couch.
Not proper sleep.
The kind unemployment had given me over the previous nine days, when exhaustion arrived at stupid hours and disappeared the second I got into bed.
My laptop sat open on the coffee table with three rejected applications in separate tabs.
A mug of tea had gone cold beside it.
The television was playing some home-renovation show with the sound muted.
When my phone buzzed, I expected another recruiter telling me my experience was impressive before explaining why somebody else's experience was more impressive.
Instead, Maya's mother said, “Anna, is Lily with you?”
I sat up.
“What?”
“Lily.”
“What about Lily?”
There was a pause.
“You said she could come over after school.”
“Yes.”
“She never came.”
The room changed shape around me.
I stood so fast my knee hit the coffee table.
Tea spilled across two unopened utility bills.
“What do you mean she never came?”
“I thought maybe plans changed.”
“No.”
“Anna, I texted you.”
I pulled the phone from my ear.
Three messages.
I had slept through all of them.
My stomach dropped.
“What time?”
“She should've been here around three fifteen.”
May you like
The microwave clock read 4:26.
I don't remember ending the call.
