Chương 15
“Would Vincent know?”
“Possibly.”
“Where did she go the week before the crash?”
Dominic’s eyes unfocused slightly. Memory arriving through pressure, not invitation.
“She told me she was meeting an interior designer.”
“Where?”
“A property near the river. An old printing warehouse.”
Chen took out her phone.
“Address?”
“North Branch. Elston, near Cortland.”
“North Meridian property?” Lena asked.
Dominic’s silence answered.
Chen made a call.
Dominic was already putting on his shoes.
“You stay here,” he told Lena.
“No.”
“Vincent called you because he believes you matter to me.”
“He called because he thinks I’m weak.”
“He thinks both.”
Chen ended the call. “Federal team is twelve minutes out.”
“Too long,” Dominic said.
“You don’t know he’s there.”
“I know Vincent. He returns to places where he believes he won.”
Dominic left.
Chen swore and followed.
Lena followed Chen.
No one invited her.
The printing warehouse occupied half a block beside a dark branch of the river. Its windows had been painted over. Rusted letters still marked the brick, though several had fallen away.
Dominic’s SUV stopped across the street.
Chen’s unmarked car arrived behind it. She ordered Lena to remain inside.
This time Lena obeyed for almost a minute.
Then her phone rang.
Vincent.
Chen saw the screen through the windshield.
“Answer,” she said. “Speaker.”
Lena pressed the button.
“Where is Dominic?” Vincent asked.
“Looking for you.”
“Of course.”
“Is Aaron alive?”
“For now.”
Chen signaled silently to officers gathering behind the vehicles.
“What do you want?” Lena asked.
“The same thing I wanted before. Dominic must understand what happens when he mistakes guilt for reform.”
“You want him to keep the business.”
“I want him to preserve what his father built.”
“By kidnapping his daughter.”
“By preventing a civil war that would kill people he never sees.”
“You sound proud of knowing that.”
“I am tired of people who benefit from ugly work pretending they were never part of it.”
Lena looked through the rain-streaked windshield at Dominic standing behind an SUV door.
“Did Bianca pretend?”
Vincent was silent.
“She knew about North Meridian,” Lena continued. “She met a prosecutor in that warehouse.”
“I liked Bianca.”
“Did you kill her?”
“No.”
“Did you change her maintenance records?”
A longer silence.
“I delayed their release.”
“Why?”
“She was building a case against Dominic.”
“Against you.”
“Against all of us.”
“Did you sabotage her car?”
“No.”
The denial came sharper this time.
Lena believed he believed it, which was not the same as believing him.
“What happened?”
Vincent exhaled.
“The driver had been drinking. Bianca dismissed him at a gas station and drove herself. The brake warning had been reported two days earlier. The repair was postponed because the vehicle was being used to move documents she planned to deliver.”
Lena looked at Dominic.
He could hear every word through Chen’s radio relay.
“Who postponed it?”
“I did.”
The rain struck the car roof.
“Did you know the brakes could fail?”
“I knew the warning light was unreliable.”
“That isn’t what I asked.”
“No,” Vincent said. “I did not believe she would die.”
“But afterward you blamed a rival.”
“I gave Dominic an explanation he could survive.”
“You gave him an enemy.”
“Yes.”
“And when he stopped becoming the man you needed, you used Lily to give him another.”
Vincent’s voice lowered.
“You think this is about money because money is the only corruption people like you recognize. Dominic cannot simply resign. Routes, unions, contracts, debts, and promises do not disappear because a widower becomes tired. Men who depended on him will turn on one another. Businesses will collapse. People who never knew his name will lose work.”
“So you’re saving everyone.”
“I am preventing chaos.”
Lena looked at Chen.
The detective’s face showed no triumph. Only attention.
“Where is Aaron?”
“You don’t care about Aaron.”
“I care that you keep deciding which people count.”
Vincent laughed once.
“That is why Dominic likes you.”
“He doesn’t like me.”
“He sent Daniel to watch your building before the first reporter found it. He reviewed your rent. He replaced a sweater you could have bought yourself. Powerful men call surveillance concern when they become sentimental.”
Lena felt heat rise in her face.
“You’re trying to embarrass me.”
“I’m trying to explain your position.”
“My position is outside.”
Silence.
Then Vincent said, “You’re here.”
Chen’s head snapped toward the warehouse.
Vincent could see them.
A light appeared in a painted second-floor window and went out.
“Tell Dominic to come inside alone,” Vincent said.
“No,” Chen mouthed.
Lena said, “He won’t.”
“He will for Aaron.”
“Dominic doesn’t risk himself for employees.”
Across the street, Dominic looked at her. Even at a distance, she saw the insult register.
Vincent said, “He will for the documents Aaron carried.”
“What documents?”
“The only copies Bianca kept outside the house.”
Chen wrote on a pad: KEEP HIM TALKING.
“Why does Aaron have them?”
“He took them from the car the day she died. He has been selling pieces of truth ever since.”
“Then you need him alive.”
“For the next few minutes.”
Dominic began moving toward the warehouse.
Chen opened her door and hissed for him to stop.
He did not.
Lena said into the phone, “If you hurt Aaron, Dominic will never protect your organization again.”
“I don’t need protection. I need succession.”
The meaning arrived slowly.
“You want Dominic removed.”
“I want him remembered before he dismantles himself.”
“You want him arrested or dead.”
“I want him to choose the family over his shame.”
“He already chose Lily.”
“No. He chose fear after losing Bianca. You gave him a chance to pretend it was courage.”
Dominic reached the warehouse entrance.
Lena opened the car door.
Chen grabbed her wrist. “Stay here.”
“He wants Dominic inside.”
“That is why you stay here.”
Lena pulled free.
“Vincent,” she said into the phone, “I found something in Lily’s teddy bear.”
The warehouse door remained closed.
Dominic stopped.
“What?” Vincent asked.
“A second ticket.”
May you like
Chen stared at her.
Lena had invented it.
