Chương 4
Dahlia gave another broken laugh and pressed her knuckles against her mouth.
Nathaniel watched them without comment.
The secure property was not a mansion. Wren had expected gates, stone lions, perhaps the vulgar confidence of a man who assumed no one would ever search his home. Instead, the SUV entered an underground garage beneath a converted textile building near the river.
Nathaniel led them through a private elevator into a large apartment with exposed brick, low furniture, and windows facing black water. Nothing personal sat in the open. No family photographs. No mail. No shoes by the door.
It looked expensive and unlived in, which made Wren suspect it belonged to him.
A woman in navy medical scrubs waited beside the kitchen island. She carried a small case and did not seem surprised by Brutus or by Nathaniel’s blood-spattered cuff.
“Caleb?” she asked.
“On his way to Miriam.”
“He refused me again?”
“He was shot.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
Nathaniel removed his jacket. “Dahlia has glass in her shoulder.”
“I do?” Dahlia touched the torn fabric and winced.
The woman approached. “Sit down.”
“I’m fine.”
“Everyone says that right before I charge them for being difficult.”
Dahlia sat.
Nathaniel looked at Wren’s soaked pants and scraped palms. “You too.”
“No.”
The woman opened her case. “I’m Dr. Lena Armitage. I’m not employed by him, if that helps.”
“It does not.”
“It shouldn’t. I’m his cousin.”
Nathaniel loosened his cuffs.
Wren watched him move through the apartment. He set his phone on the counter, placed a compact pistol beside it, then poured water from a glass bottle. Each action was precise, almost ritualized.
Brutus stayed with Wren.
Dr. Armitage cleaned Dahlia’s shoulder while Dahlia complained about the price of the floral dress and insisted the blood was mostly restaurant sauce. The doctor removed two slivers of glass, bandaged the cut, and told her she might need a tetanus booster.
“I got one when I stepped on a nail at a vineyard,” Dahlia said.
“Why were you barefoot at a vineyard?”
“It was a wedding.”
“That does not answer the question.”
“It was after the wedding.”
Wren listened because ordinary conversation kept the edges of the room from closing around her.
Nathaniel stood at the windows with his phone to his ear. He spoke quietly about hospital entrances, traffic cameras, and a man named Morris who had not answered.
Wren could not hear every word. She did not need to.
A machine existed around Nathaniel—drivers, officers, doctors, cameras, people who knew which entrance to use and which calls not to log. Tonight, that machine had reached into her small life and pulled her from a restaurant floor.
Her rent was nine days late.
A collection agency had called twice during her shift.
Her manager had written her up for wearing the apron outside the restaurant because she had not had time to change before meeting Dahlia.
Those had been the dimensions of her danger that afternoon.
Now a retired police lieutenant wanted her dead, and a mastiff refused to leave her knees.
Dr. Armitage crouched in front of Wren. “Hands.”
“They’re fine.”
“Let me confirm your diagnosis.”
Wren held them out.
The doctor cleaned a cut near her thumb. It stung. Wren watched the cotton turn pink.
“You’re breathing too shallowly,” Dr. Armitage said.
“I’m breathing.”
“You’re rationing it.”
“I have bills.”
“That was not a medical answer.”
“It’s the answer to most things.”
The doctor looked up. Her face softened without becoming sympathetic. Wren appreciated that.
“Any dizziness?”
“No.”
“Nausea?”
“No.”
“Ear ringing?”
“A little.”
“From the gunshots?”
“Probably.”
Nathaniel ended his call.
“What did the police say?” Wren asked.
“The restaurant’s security system failed thirty-eight seconds before Morrow entered.”
“Failed?”
“It was disabled remotely.”
“By one of your people?”
“Possibly.”
Dahlia turned on the stool. “You say that like employees remotely disabling murder cameras is a normal management issue.”
“In my life, it is not unusual.”
“That may be the worst sentence anyone has ever said to me.”
Nathaniel poured another glass of water and placed it in front of Wren.
She did not touch it.
“Call the police,” she said.
“I have.”
“Call police who do not work for you.”
His eyes rested on her.
“That will be more difficult.”
“Then call the FBI.”
Dahlia whispered, “Wren.”
“No. He brought a man with a gun to a restaurant and now he’s acting like this is a private scheduling problem.”
Nathaniel leaned one hand against the counter. “The FBI has investigated me for twelve years.”
“Convenient. You probably have a number.”
“The agents assigned to me are more interested in proving that I control the port unions than protecting a witness from a retired detective.”
“A witness to what?”
“That is the question.”
Wren stared at him. “You said I could identify Morrow.”
“You can.”
“That doesn’t explain why he waited four years.”
“No.”
“Then explain.”
Nathaniel glanced toward Dr. Armitage.
The doctor closed her case. “I’ll find a shirt for Dahlia.”
“I want to hear,” Dahlia said.
“You may hear more comfortably without blood drying on your dress.”
“That sounded like something he would say.”
“We’re related.”
The doctor led Dahlia toward the hallway. Dahlia looked back twice before disappearing.
Nathaniel waited until a door closed.
Then he reached inside his shirt and removed the Saint Francis medal.
He placed it between them.
Wren looked at the bent edge. “That is not evidence.”
“No. But it is where this began.”
“It began before I got there.”
“Yes.”
Brutus settled at her feet, though his eyes remained on Nathaniel.
“Gabriel was twenty-nine,” Nathaniel said. “He handled accounting for several family-owned companies. Restaurants. Warehouses. A trucking firm. Some legal, some less so.”
“You mean some criminal.”
“Yes.”
She hated his willingness to agree.
“Gabriel found payments made through a security contractor,” Nathaniel continued. “The money appeared to be bribes to port inspectors. He assumed they were mine.”
“Were they?”
“Some were.”
May you like
Wren let out a breath through her nose.
Nathaniel looked almost impatient. “My honesty is not a request for absolution.”
