Chapter 2 - The Man Who Knew Wade Mills
Grace stared at Adrian as the train pulled away behind them.
The platform felt colder without its fluorescent warmth.
“You know Marcus?”
“I know of him.”
“That isn’t what I asked.”
Adrian looked toward the stairwell.
“No. I’ve never met him.”
“Then how do you know he’s been looking for me?”
A pair of commuters hurried past.
Adrian waited until they were out of earshot.
“Because two weeks ago, someone paid Wade Mills to locate a woman named Grace Holloway.”
The floor seemed to move beneath her.
“Paid him?”
“Yes.”
“You expect me to believe those two idiots are private investigators?”
“No.”
“Then what are they?”
“Men who find people who don’t want to be found.”
Grace remembered Wade reaching for her bag.
His sudden fear when Adrian spoke his name.
“Who are you?”
Adrian’s eyes met hers.
“You should go somewhere safe.”
“You knew my name before we got off the train.”
“Yes.”
“You knew Wade.”
“Yes.”
“You knew someone was searching for me.”
“Yes.”
“And now you’re telling me to trust you?”
“No.”
That stopped her.
Adrian continued.
“I’m telling you not to trust anyone tonight.”
For reasons she could not explain, that frightened her less than an attempt at reassurance would have.
Grace looked toward the stairs.
Marcus was gone.
But he had wanted her to see him.
That was the part she understood immediately.
If he had wanted to hurt her tonight, he could have approached.
Instead he had stood across the platform.
Smiling.
The same smile he used six years ago when he found her packed suitcase beneath the bed.
Going somewhere?
Grace swallowed.
“I need to go home.”
“That’s where he expects you to go.”
“My apartment is three blocks away.”
“Which means he knows where you live.”
“You don’t know that.”
“You received a message saying he saw you.”
She froze.
Adrian’s gaze dropped toward her phone.
“You looked at it before Wade approached.”
Grace took another step backward.
“You read my phone?”
“No. I saw your reaction when it vibrated on the train.”
“That message came earlier.”
“Then I was wrong about when.”
“But somehow right about what?”
“No.”
For the first time, Adrian looked frustrated.
“I knew Marcus Holloway had located Chicago. I did not know he had contacted you.”
Holloway.
Hearing Marcus’s surname—her old surname—spoken aloud made Grace feel ill.
“You’re lying.”
“About which part?”
“All of it.”
She turned.
Adrian did not stop her.
That should have reassured her.
It didn’t.
She reached the stairs before noticing two men standing near the street-level exit.
Neither looked at her directly.
Both wore dark jackets.
Both were pretending to scroll through their phones.
Grace slowed.
One glanced toward her.
Then toward Adrian behind her.
His expression changed.
He nudged the other man.
They left.
Grace turned.
Adrian remained several yards away.
“You know them too?”
“No.”
“Do they know you?”
“Probably.”
“Why?”
Adrian exhaled.
“Because my last name is Vale.”
She stared blankly.
He seemed surprised.
“You genuinely don’t know.”
“Should I?”
A humorless smile touched his mouth.
“No. That may be the best thing I’ve heard tonight.”
Grace frowned.
Then the name surfaced from somewhere.
A newspaper headline at the bookstore.
A whispered conversation between two customers.
A man who owned nightclubs, freight companies, parking garages, restaurants, and half a dozen properties along the river.
A man tabloids called a businessman because lawyers objected to the other words.
“Adrian Vale.”
“Yes.”
Her stomach dropped.
“Oh, God.”
“Usually people say worse.”
“You’re—”
“Don’t.”
“The papers say—”
“The papers say many things.”
“They call you—”
“Grace.”
His voice remained quiet, but the warning in it ended the sentence.
Chicago’s most feared mafia boss.
She didn’t need to say it.
His expression told her he knew exactly what she had almost said.
Grace laughed once, shakily.
“This is insane.”
“Yes.”
“I get harassed by two men on a train, the most dangerous man in Chicago decides I’m his future wife, and then my ex-boyfriend appears after six years.”
“Ex-husband.”
She stared at him.
Adrian’s face changed again.
“You were married.”
Grace’s pulse accelerated.
“You didn’t know?”
“No.”
For the first time she believed him completely.
Because Adrian Vale looked genuinely surprised.
“That’s why my surname is Holloway.”
“You kept his name?”
“I couldn’t afford to change everything when I left.”
Something dark crossed Adrian’s face.
“Where is the divorce record?”
“There isn’t one.”
Silence.
“We were married for eleven months,” Grace said. “I left. I filed eventually, but Marcus disappeared before he could be served. My attorney told me there were other options, but I had no money. Then my mother got sick. Then…”
She stopped.
Life had happened.
Survival had consumed paperwork.
“You’re still legally married to him?”
“As far as I know.”
Adrian looked toward the stairs.
“That changes things.”
“What things?”
He didn’t answer.
Grace’s fear turned to anger.
“You keep doing that.”
“Doing what?”
“Knowing pieces of my life and then deciding which ones I deserve to hear.”
His jaw tightened.
“You’re right.”
Another surprise.
He reached inside his coat.
Grace flinched.
Adrian immediately stopped.
Then slowly removed a business card with two fingers.
He held it out.
She did not take it.
He placed it on the metal railing instead.
“Go anywhere except your apartment. A friend. Hotel. Police station. Somewhere public.”
“You think the police can protect me?”
“I think visibility helps.”
“That sounds comforting.”
“It wasn’t meant to.”
Grace looked at the card.
No logo.
No company.
Just:
ADRIAN VALE
A phone number.
Nothing else.
“What do you want from me?”
“Tonight? Nothing.”
“And tomorrow?”
Adrian looked at her for a long moment.
“Answers.”
“To what?”
“Why Marcus Holloway is paying men connected to organized cargo theft to find his wife.”
Grace’s blood chilled.
“Cargo theft?”
“And why three people who asked questions about him during the last year disappeared.”
The sounds of the city seemed to recede.
Grace whispered, “Marcus sells insurance.”
“He used to.”
“What does he do now?”
“That,” Adrian said, “is one of the questions.”
Grace picked up the card.
She hated herself for doing it.
Adrian noticed.
He said nothing.
“I have a friend,” Grace said. “Nora. She lives in Lincoln Square.”
“Does Marcus know her?”
“No.”
“You’re sure?”
“They’ve never met.”
“Good.”
Adrian gestured toward the exit.
“I’ll have a car take you.”
“No.”
“It will be safer.”
“No.”
He accepted that immediately.
“Then I’ll stay behind you until you get into a cab.”
“I don’t need—”
“Not negotiable.”
Grace’s eyes narrowed.
Adrian caught himself.
A faint breath escaped him.
“Bad choice of words.”
“Terrible.”
“I’m accustomed to people following instructions.”
“I’m not one of your people.”
“No.”
Something in the way he said it made her chest tighten unexpectedly.
No ownership.
No entitlement.
Just fact.
They reached street level.
Rain had begun falling, turning the Chicago pavement black and glossy.
Grace ordered a rideshare.
Six minutes away.
Adrian stood several feet from her beneath the station awning.
“Why did you help me?” she asked.
“On the train?”
“Yes.”
“Because they were bothering you.”
“That simple?”
“That simple.”
“And afterward?”
“That became complicated.”
Her phone buzzed.
Grace nearly dropped it.
Unknown number.
A picture message.
Her apartment building.
Taken from across the street.
Beneath it:
You always did make bad choices in men.
Grace stopped breathing.
Adrian saw her face.
“What?”
She handed him the phone.
His expression became unreadable.
Then another message appeared.
Ask Adrian what happened to Daniel Voss.
Adrian went completely still.
Grace looked at him.
“Who is Daniel Voss?”
Nothing.
“Adrian.”
His eyes lifted to hers.
For the first time, she saw something more dangerous than anger in them.
Guilt.
“He was my brother.”
Grace felt the air leave her lungs.
The rideshare pulled to the curb.
Neither moved.
Six years ago, Grace had fled Marcus Holloway believing the worst thing he had ever done was what he did behind closed doors.
Standing beneath a Chicago train station with Adrian Vale staring at the name of his dead brother, Grace realized something terrifying.
She had never truly known Marcus at all.
May you like
And whatever Adrian Vale wanted from her now had started long before that train ride.
---
