Chương 15
Unsuitable.
She hated the word more than the flames.
A firefighter pulled her outside after part of the roof collapsed.
She fell to her knees in the grass, coughing until she vomited.
Ghost dragged free of Lorenzo and came to her.
He pressed his body across her back while she struggled to breathe.
Police vehicles filled the road. Officers placed Dominic and Pike in separate cars. Raul arrived with a lawyer and two detectives fifteen minutes later, pale and shaking. He had brought bank statements, names, and copies of messages stored in an old email account.
Nina saw him across the field.
He lifted one hand.
She did not return the gesture.
Dr. Park arrived before the animal transport vans. She examined Ghost beneath a plastic canopy while Lorenzo held a flashlight and Nina kept one hand on the dog’s chest.
“He has a concussion,” Dr. Park said. “Possible rib injury. Sedatives in his system. We need imaging.”
“Will he be all right?” Nina asked.
“I don’t know yet.”
Lorenzo looked at the doctor.
She met his gaze. “That is the answer.”
Ghost’s eyes opened.
Nina hummed.
His breathing slowed.
At the emergency clinic, Ghost was treated for two cracked ribs, dehydration, and a deep cut above his eye. The sedative dose had been dangerous but not fatal. He remained overnight.
Nina and Lorenzo sat in a private waiting room at three in the morning.
Nina wore a paper scrub top given to her after the smoke ruined her shirt. Lorenzo’s suit jacket was gone. Dirt marked his black trousers. His lower lip had swollen.
Neither spoke for nearly twenty minutes.
A vending machine hummed against the wall.
Nina bought coffee. It tasted like hot plastic.
She handed him one.
“I don’t drink vending-machine coffee,” he said.
“You do tonight.”
He took it.
After one sip, he looked offended.
Nina laughed softly.
Lorenzo stared into the cup. “You gave him to me.”
“I told you to get him outside.”
“You could have left.”
“There were dogs in cages.”
“You could have died.”
“So could they.”
“That is not a useful answer.”
“It’s the only one I have.”
He rubbed his thumb across the cardboard cup. His silver watch was gone, lost somewhere in the barn.
“The ledger is with police,” he said.
Nina looked at him.
“Rocco gave them the original.”
“Did you tell him to?”
“No.”
“Are you angry?”
“Yes.”
“Will you hurt him?”
“No.”
The answer came after a pause, which made it more believable.
“What happens to you?” Nina asked.
“Questions. Searches. People who have waited years to become brave.”
“You say that like bravery is an inconvenience.”
“Often it is.”
“Did you know about the other dogs?”
“No.”
“Would you tell me if you did?”
Lorenzo stared at the waiting-room floor.
“I do not know,” he said.
It was the most honest thing he had offered her.
Nina sat beside him.
They drank the bad coffee without speaking.
In the morning, investigators interviewed them separately. Nina gave a statement that lasted four hours. She described the penthouse, the photographs, the veterinary records, the envelope, Raul’s confession, the call, the farm, and the fire.
She did not protect Lorenzo.
She did not embellish his crimes.
When the detective asked why Lorenzo Castellano had been at the farm, Nina said, “For the same reason I was. Dominic had Ghost.”
The detective waited for more.
Nina folded a paper cup between her fingers.
“That does not make him good,” she said.
“No one asked if it did.”
“You were going to.”
The detective almost smiled.
News reached the internet by afternoon. A helicopter had filmed the burning barn and the line of injured dogs being loaded into rescue vans. Dominic Vella’s name appeared first. Lorenzo’s appeared an hour later.
Nina’s face appeared by evening.
Someone had found photographs from her catering company’s website. A headline described her as a SERVER WHO INFILTRATED CRIME BOSS’S HOME, which was wrong in three separate ways.
Camila read it aloud in Ghost’s hospital room.
“Apparently you planned the entire thing.”
“I can barely plan groceries.”
“Another website says you are Lorenzo’s secret girlfriend.”
Nina looked at Ghost. “He has worse taste in coffee than I can tolerate.”
Lorenzo stood outside the glass door speaking to attorneys.
Camila lowered her voice. “He heard you.”
“Good.”
Ghost opened one eye.
Camila reached toward him, then stopped. “Can I?”
Nina guided her hand to the safe side of his neck.
Ghost sniffed her fingers and sighed.
Camila’s eyes filled. “Hi, Gordo.”
His ears moved.
Lorenzo entered.
Ghost lifted his head despite the bandage wrapped around his ribs.
Lorenzo touched two fingers to the dog’s brow.
“I need to leave,” he said.
“Are you being arrested?” Camila asked.
Nina closed her eyes. “Camila.”
“What? It’s a normal question today.”
Lorenzo looked at her cousin. “Not yet.”
Camila nodded. “Good luck with that.”
After she left to find food, Lorenzo placed a document on the chair beside Nina.
It was an acknowledgment that Nina Vasquez had been Ghost’s lawful owner before his theft and that Lorenzo relinquished any ownership claim.
Nina read it twice.
“You signed this?”
“Yes.”
“Your lawyers allowed it?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because truth and proof are different things.”
She looked up.
“You had both,” he said.
Nina touched the paper. “What about his bond with you?”
“That does not create ownership.”
“It creates responsibility.”
Lorenzo’s expression tightened. “Molly Chen has prepared a transition schedule.”
“You already spoke to her?”
“At six this morning.”
“You don’t sleep.”
“Neither do you.”
Ghost shifted, then winced.
Both of them reached for him.
Their hands met against his shoulder.
Lorenzo withdrew first.
Nina looked at the signed document again. “This doesn’t mean you never see him.”
“I am aware.”
“You could ask.”
“I do not ask for what belongs to someone else.”
“That may be the first lesson you learned this week.”
May you like
His face hardened, but there was no real anger in it.
Nina folded the document carefully. “Two visits a week at first. Neutral place. Molly present.”
