Chapter 2 - The Name She Buried
Sadie had spent three years imagining the moment she would refuse Roman Vale.
She had pictured herself strong.
Calm.
Untouchable.
She would look him in the eye, say no, and walk away.
She had never pictured the moment happening while a mysterious sedan waited across the street.
“I’m not going anywhere with you.”
Roman buttoned his coat.
“Then go somewhere without me.”
“What?”
He looked toward the restaurant windows.
“Leave through the kitchen. Take a cab. Change cabs twice. Don’t go home.”
Sadie folded her arms.
“You expect me to take security advice from the reason I’ve spent three years hiding?”
Roman’s expression tightened.
“You were hiding from the wrong person.”
“You keep saying that.”
“Because you keep refusing to hear it.”
Tommy approached.
“They’re moving.”
Roman immediately turned.
Across the street, the black sedan pulled away from the curb.
Instead of driving off, it rolled slowly past Lombardi’s front windows.
Sadie could not see the driver.
The rear windows were tinted.
The car disappeared around the corner.
Tommy looked at Roman.
“Could be nothing.”
“You don’t believe that.”
“No.”
Arthur watched nervously from several tables away.
Roman glanced toward Sadie.
“We can argue later.”
“There is no later.”
“Fine.”
His voice remained controlled.
“Then survive tonight and hate me tomorrow.”
She hated that the sentence worked.
Ten minutes later, Sadie was in the restaurant’s kitchen pulling on her coat.
She had refused Roman’s car.
Refused Tommy’s offer to escort her.
Refused nearly everything except the rear exit.
Her coworker Maya stared at her.
“What is happening?”
“Nothing.”
Maya looked toward the dining room.
“Nothing just made Arthur offer to personally polish a mobster’s shoes.”
Sadie shoved her phone into her bag.
“I have to go.”
“Are you in trouble?”
The question stopped her.
Maya was twenty-two, a culinary student, and one of the few people Sadie had allowed close enough to become something resembling a friend.
Sadie forced a smile.
“No.”
Maya narrowed her eyes.
“You’re terrible at lying.”
“So I’ve been told.”
The kitchen door opened.
Roman entered.
Every cook suddenly discovered an urgent reason to look busy.
Sadie sighed.
“I said I didn’t want an escort.”
“I heard you.”
“Then why are you here?”
“To make sure the alley is clear.”
She stared at him.
“You don’t own every room you walk into.”
“I’m working on that.”
For the briefest moment, the old Roman appeared.
Dry humor.
Impossible confidence.
The version of him she had once loved.
It vanished quickly.
Sadie walked toward the exit.
Roman opened the door first.
Cold air rushed inside.
The alley was empty.
Dumpsters lined one brick wall. Steam drifted from a vent. Somewhere beyond the buildings, traffic murmured.
Sadie stepped outside.
Roman followed.
“I can handle myself.”
“I know.”
“Stop agreeing with me.”
“I remember you preferred arguments.”
She turned.
“I preferred you before I knew what you were.”
Roman absorbed that without flinching.
“Fair.”
She hated that answer too.
He had once defended everything.
Now he seemed to accept every accusation.
It made her suspicious.
Sadie started walking.
Roman remained beside the door.
He did not follow.
After several steps, she looked back.
That surprised him.
“What?” she asked.
“Nothing.”
“You’re not following?”
“You told me not to.”
The absurdity almost made her smile.
Almost.
She turned again.
A taxi approached the corner.
Sadie raised her hand.
Then she noticed the headlights behind it.
Another black sedan.
Her blood went cold.
The taxi slowed.
Roman stepped away from the door.
The second vehicle accelerated.
Tommy appeared in the alley entrance.
“Roman.”
Sadie heard urgency in his voice.
Roman moved fast.
He crossed the distance between himself and Sadie, grabbed her around the waist, and pulled her behind a concrete loading pillar.
The sedan shot past the alley.
Nothing happened.
No gunshots.
No attack.
It simply kept moving.
Sadie shoved Roman away.
“Don’t touch me.”
He immediately released her.
“Sorry.”
Her breath came rapidly.
Tommy walked into the street far enough to read the departing license plate.
“Stolen tags.”
Roman looked at Sadie.
“You still want a taxi?”
She hated him for being right.
Mostly she hated herself for being afraid.
“Where?”
“My house.”
“No.”
“Tommy’s?”
“No.”
“A hotel under a different name?”
“No.”
Roman exhaled.
“You’ve become difficult.”
“I learned from you.”
This time the faintest smile actually appeared.
It disappeared when Sadie said, “My apartment.”
“That’s the first place they’ll check.”
“No one knows where I live.”
Roman said nothing.
Sadie stared.
“You know.”
“Yes.”
Rage pushed past fear.
“How?”
“I found you eleven months ago.”
She went very still.
“Eleven months?”
“Yes.”
“You knew where I was for eleven months?”
“Yes.”
“And you never came?”
“No.”
The answer stunned her.
“Why?”
Roman looked toward the street.
“Because you left me.”
“That never stopped you before.”
“It should have.”
The simplicity of the admission hurt more than defensiveness would have.
Sadie stared at him.
“Then why tonight?”
“Because three days ago someone broke into a storage property connected to an accountant named Elias Mercer.”
Her stomach tightened at the surname.
Roman watched her reaction.
“You know the name.”
Sadie looked away.
“Maybe.”
“Nora.”
“Sadie.”
“Elias Mercer disappeared four years ago.”
“I don’t know him.”
Roman stepped closer but left space between them.
“His name appears in the ledger you described.”
Sadie felt the alley narrowing around her.
The black ledger.
She had found it inside Roman’s locked office three years ago.
Not because she had been spying.
Because she had been looking for her passport.
Roman had taken it from the safe after they returned from Europe.
He claimed he was protecting important documents.
She had joked that he was controlling.
He had kissed her and told her she already knew that.
The memory made her sick now.
Inside the office, she had found the ledger behind a false panel.
Mercer Holdings.
Initials.
Shipping routes.
Cash transfers.
Names she recognized from newspaper articles about missing businessmen, vanished informants, bribed officials.
And one page containing her brother’s initials.
D.C.
Daniel Callahan.
Nora’s older brother had died in what police called a random robbery two years before she met Roman.
The ledger made it look like something else entirely.
She had confronted no one.
Instead, she had listened outside Roman’s study that night.
Roman had been arguing with Victor Hale.
Find her before sunrise.
She can never walk out with what she knows.
She had run before hearing anything more.
Sadie looked at Roman.
“You said Mercer disappeared.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“I thought Victor killed him.”
Her skin prickled.
Victor Hale.
Roman’s adviser.
His mentor.
The man who had taught Roman nearly everything about the organization after Roman’s father died.
“You thought?”
“I was wrong.”
“About what?”
“Mercer wasn’t murdered four years ago.”
Roman paused.
“He died last week.”
Sadie stared at him.
“That’s impossible.”
“We found the body.”
“Then where was he?”
“Hiding.”
“From you?”
Roman’s eyes held hers.
“From Victor.”
The name landed like a stone.
Sadie remembered Victor clearly.
Silver hair.
Tailored suits.
Soft voice.
He had always treated her with elaborate courtesy.
Too elaborate.
“Nora,” Roman said, “if Mercer stayed hidden for years and suddenly surfaced, there’s a reason.”
“What does that have to do with me?”
“We searched his storage property.”
“And?”
Roman reached into the inside pocket of his coat.
Sadie immediately tensed.
He slowly removed an envelope.
Old.
Creased.
Her name was written across the front.
Not Sadie.
NORA CALLAHAN.
Her handwriting recognition came instantly.
Elias Mercer had written it.
“How?”
Roman held it out.
“We found this yesterday.”
Sadie did not take it.
“What’s inside?”
“I don’t know.”
“You opened it.”
“No.”
“You expect me to believe that?”
“It was addressed to you.”
“Privacy never bothered you before.”
Again, Roman accepted the blow.
“People can learn.”
She stared at the envelope.
Three years ago she would have grabbed it immediately.
Now everything felt like a trap.
Tommy watched the street.
“We shouldn’t stay here.”
Roman continued holding the envelope.
Sadie finally took it.
It was heavier than expected.
Something solid was inside.
She tore open the flap.
A small brass key fell into her palm.
Along with a folded note.
Sadie opened it.
The handwriting shook slightly.
Nora,
If you are reading this, Roman found you before Victor did.
That may be the only reason you are still alive.
Sadie’s pulse pounded.
She continued.
The ledger was never Roman’s.
Ask him about December 14.
Ask him who really ordered Daniel Callahan killed.
And whatever Roman tells you, do not let Victor Hale find the key.
Sadie stopped breathing.
Roman watched her.
“What does it say?”
She lifted her eyes.
December 14.
The date her brother died.
“What happened on December fourteenth?”
Roman’s expression changed.
Not confusion.
Recognition.
Sadie saw it instantly.
“You know.”
Roman looked toward Tommy.
Tommy lowered his eyes.
Sadie’s voice broke.
“You both know.”
“Nora—”
“Who killed Daniel?”
Roman’s face went pale beneath the alley light.
And suddenly Sadie realized the truth she had feared for three years might have been only half the story.
Roman took a slow breath.
“I didn’t order your brother’s death.”
She almost laughed.
“Then who did?”
Roman looked directly at the brass key in her hand.
“Victor Hale.”
Sadie felt the world tilt.
Roman continued quietly.
“And Daniel wasn’t killed because of you.”
He paused.
“He was killed because he discovered what Victor was building underneath my organization.”
Sadie closed her fingers around the key.
“What was he building?”
Roman’s answer came softly.
“An empire even I didn’t know existed.”
And somewhere beyond the alley, a car door slammed.
Tommy reached inside his jacket.
Roman turned toward the sound.
Sadie stood between the man she had spent three years fearing and a secret her dead brother had apparently died trying to expose.
For the first time, running no longer felt like the safest choice.
May you like
It felt like exactly what Victor Hale wanted her to do.
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