Chapter 5 - The Men Behind the Offer
Claire ran before anyone could stop her.
Dorian caught her at the stairs.
“Claire.”
“My daughter!”
“She’s with Petra.”
“You don’t know that!”
“I do.”
“How?”
His phone rang.
Petra’s voice came through.
“We’re outside. Maddie’s safe.”
Claire nearly collapsed.
Dorian held her upright.
Above them, Bull shouted that the fire was small.
Someone had thrown a bottle through the front window.
Gasoline.
The rain prevented the flames from spreading far.
Ten minutes later, firefighters arrived.
Twenty minutes after that, Claire stood across the street wrapped in a blanket, staring at the blackened front of Pearl’s Corner Cafe.
Maddie sat beside her.
“You okay?”
Maddie nodded.
Claire checked again.
Hands.
Face.
Hair.
Everything.
“I’m okay, Mom.”
Claire pulled her close.
Across the street, Dorian stood with firefighters.
He looked calm.
Too calm.
Claire had started to understand that the quieter he became, the more dangerous the situation was.
Petra sat beside her.
“He won’t do anything stupid.”
Claire looked at her.
“That was not convincing.”
Petra sighed.
“He’ll try not to.”
“Worse.”
Maddie looked up.
“Are we homeless?”
Claire’s heart cracked.
“No.”
“But the café—”
“We’re not homeless.”
Claire hugged her.
The apartment upstairs had smoke damage.
They couldn’t stay there.
Dorian offered a hotel.
Claire refused.
He offered an apartment.
Claire refused.
He offered Petra’s house.
Claire accepted.
Dorian noticed.
“You trust her more than me.”
“Yes.”
“Fair.”
The next morning, Claire returned to inspect the damage.
The front window was gone.
The counter was scorched.
Toby stood inside holding a broom.
Bull had already boarded the window.
Claire stopped.
“What are you doing?”
“Cleaning.”
“You keep doing that.”
Bull shrugged.
“My mother would haunt me.”
Toby carried out broken glass.
“You can’t open today.”
“I know.”
“You shouldn’t open tomorrow either.”
“I know.”
“Maybe next week.”
Claire stared.
Toby lifted both hands.
“Just saying.”
Dorian arrived last.
He carried coffee from another café.
Claire looked personally betrayed.
“You bought coffee somewhere else?”
“Yours is currently full of smoke.”
“That’s still offensive.”
He handed her a cup.
She drank it anyway.
They spent the morning reviewing what they knew.
Orsini wanted the property.
Jonathan Pell had likely given someone access to the storage unit.
Daniel Whitaker had hidden something in the basement.
That something was gone.
Wade said it was a ledger.
And someone had threatened Maddie.
Claire looked at Dorian.
“You believe Vincent has it.”
“Maybe.”
“Then why threaten me?”
“Because maybe he found an empty compartment too.”
Claire thought.
“So somebody else got there first.”
“Yes.”
“Who?”
Dorian looked toward Wade, who had been sitting silently by the broken window.
Wade raised both hands.
“Not me.”
Claire believed him.
That surprised her.
Dorian did too.
“Your mother,” he said.
Claire turned.
“What?”
“Pearl lived eleven years after Daniel died.”
“So?”
“She knew enough to hide my involvement from you.”
Claire slowly understood.
“You think Mom moved it.”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
Maddie spoke from the stairs.
“Grandma’s recipe book.”
Everyone turned.
Claire frowned.
“What?”
Maddie sat on the bottom step.
“Grandma hid money in the recipe book.”
Claire smiled faintly.
“She hid twenty-dollar bills.”
“Maybe she hid other stuff.”
Dorian looked at Claire.
Claire looked back.
Then both moved.
Pearl’s recipe books were stored in the apartment.
Smoke had damaged the kitchen, but the cabinet remained intact.
Claire pulled down six notebooks.
Nothing.
Maddie climbed onto a chair.
“There.”
She pointed to an old blue binder on top of the refrigerator.
Claire reached.
Inside were handwritten recipes.
Apple pie.
Chicken soup.
Cornbread.
Meatloaf.
Then she found an envelope taped beneath the back cover.
Dorian stared.
Claire opened it.
Not a ledger.
A key.
Small.
Brass.
Attached was a handwritten tag.
Union Station — 318.
Dorian checked his watch.
“Locker.”
Claire already had her coat.
They arrived at Union Station with six guards trying not to look like guards.
They failed.
Locker 318 was old.
The key fit.
Inside sat a leather folder.
Claire removed it.
Dorian didn’t touch it.
“This was your father’s.”
Claire opened the folder herself.
Names.
Dates.
Payments.
Property transfers.
Vehicle registrations.
Photographs.
The evidence connected Vittorio Ferrante and Anthony Orsini to multiple illegal schemes.
And one handwritten page contained plans for the 2007 attack.
Dorian read silently.
Claire watched his face.
Then she found something else.
A note from Daniel.
Dorian,
If you ever find this, don’t waste the life I pulled out of that car.
Expose them.
Don’t become them.
Claire read it twice.
Dorian walked away.
He stood near the lockers with both hands in his coat pockets.
Claire followed.
“My dad knew you might find this.”
“Yes.”
“He also knew what you might do.”
“Yes.”
“What would you have done ten years ago?”
Dorian looked at her.
“You don’t want the answer.”
“Probably not.”
They returned to Pearl’s.
Dorian made calls.
Lawyers.
Investigators.
People Claire couldn’t identify.
But nobody disappeared.
Nobody was threatened.
Nobody got dragged into an alley.
Instead, files were copied.
Documents sent to authorities.
Evidence placed with three separate law firms.
Claire noticed.
“You listened.”
“To your father.”
She crossed her arms.
“Only him?”
Dorian looked at her.
“To you too.”
For a moment, neither spoke.
Something shifted.
Not romance.
Not yet.
Trust.
Fragile.
Real.
Then Mason entered.
“We have a problem.”
Claire sighed.
“Of course we do.”
Mason placed a tablet on the counter.
Security footage from the night of the fire.
A car parked across the street.
Claire recognized the driver.
Jonathan Pell.
Her lawyer.
But the passenger mattered more.
Wade stood.
“No.”
Claire looked closer.
Vincent Orsini sat beside Pell.
And in the back seat was someone Claire had never seen.
Dorian had.
His face changed.
“Who is that?” Claire asked.
Dorian didn’t answer.
Petra whispered the name.
“Vittorio.”
Claire stared.
“Your uncle?”
Dorian nodded.
“He’s alive?”
“Yes.”
“You told me—”
“I told you he disappeared.”
The footage continued.
Vittorio exited the car.
Older now.
Silver hair.
Cane.
He walked toward the café.
Then stopped beneath a streetlight.
And looked directly into the security camera.
Almost as if he knew Dorian would eventually watch.
Mason enlarged the frame.
Vittorio held something in his hand.
Maddie’s stuffed rabbit.
Claire went white.
“That’s hers.”
Maddie looked down.
Her rabbit had disappeared during the fire.
Claire turned toward Dorian.
Before either could speak, his phone rang.
Unknown number.
Dorian answered.
Vittorio’s voice came through.
“Bring me Daniel Whitaker’s ledger.”
Dorian looked at Claire.
“And if I don’t?”
A pause.
Then Vittorio laughed softly.
“You already know what happens to Whitakers who help Ferrantes.”
The call ended.
Claire’s face hardened.
Dorian expected fear.
Instead, she reached for her coat.
“Where are you going?”
May you like
“To finish something my father started.”
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