Chapter 4 - The Child Who Remembered the Song
Gabriel moved before the second sentence finished.
He slammed the storage-unit door shut while Dean pulled Chloe behind the steel cabinet.
Gunfire tore through the thin metal.
Chloe covered her ears.
She thought of Mia.
That was all she could think about.
Mia laughing over cereal.
Mia falling asleep at the diner.
Mia asking why Grandma sometimes forgot her name.
If Chloe died inside a dusty storage unit because of secrets buried before she was born, her daughter would grow up with questions exactly like the ones Chloe had carried all her life.
“No,” she whispered.
Dean glanced at her.
“What?”
“I am not dying here.”
“Excellent plan.”
Another round struck the lock.
Gabriel crouched near the side wall.
“There should be a maintenance corridor behind these units.”
Dean nodded.
“Already looking.”
Together they shifted a shelving rack.
Behind it was plywood.
Gabriel kicked through.
A narrow passage appeared.
“Go.”
Chloe hesitated.
“What about you?”
“I'll follow.”
She started through.
Gabriel caught her wrist.
“Take the ledger.”
She looked at him.
“You trust me with it?”
“I trust that they'll chase me before they chase you.”
“That is not the comforting answer you think it is.”
A brief smile crossed his face.
“Go.”
They escaped through the service corridor and emerged behind another row of storage buildings.
Gabriel's men had been ambushed but not killed. One had been shot in the shoulder.
The attackers disappeared before police arrived.
No identification.
No plates.
Professionals.
Back at the hospital that afternoon, Chloe found Mia drawing beside Evelyn's bed.
Carmen had brought her.
Mia ran into Chloe's arms.
“Mommy!”
Chloe held her so tightly that Mia complained.
“You're squishing me.”
“Good.”
Mia giggled.
Then she saw Gabriel standing in the doorway.
Her smile disappeared.
“You're the ring man.”
Dean coughed to hide a laugh.
Gabriel looked almost offended.
“I have a name.”
“I know.”
“What is it?”
Mia thought carefully.
“Mr. Scary.”
Dean turned away.
Chloe covered her mouth.
Gabriel stared at the six-year-old.
Then he nodded once.
“Fair.”
Evelyn woke from her nap.
For several minutes she seemed lucid.
She looked at Gabriel and reached toward him.
“Your brother used to sing terribly.”
Gabriel approached the bed.
“Leo?”
“Couldn't carry a tune.”
His face softened.
“What did he sing?”
Evelyn smiled.
“Blue Moon.”
Mia looked up from her drawing.
“Grandma sings that.”
Chloe froze.
“What?”
“When she thinks I'm asleep.”
Evelyn's smile vanished.
Mia began humming.
Four slow notes.
Gabriel stared at her.
Dean did too.
“What?” Chloe asked.
Dean pulled out his phone.
“That tune.”
“It is Blue Moon.”
“No. The way she paused.”
Mia hummed again.
Gabriel grabbed a pen.
“Do it one more time.”
Mia frowned.
“Why?”
“Because you're smarter than all of us.”
That worked.
She sang the melody.
Evelyn interrupted suddenly.
“Seven.”
Everyone turned.
She pointed toward Mia.
“Seven, two, nine, four.”
Gabriel crouched near the bed.
“Evelyn, what are those numbers?”
“Song.”
“What song?”
“Thomas made songs out of numbers.”
Dean looked at the ledger.
“Codes.”
Evelyn's eyes focused.
“The accounts.”
Gabriel leaned closer.
“Where?”
She whispered, “St. Jude.”
Chloe's heart raced.
“The church?”
Evelyn nodded.
“Under the angel.”
Then she looked frightened.
“Vincent knows.”
Gabriel straightened.
Dean's face hardened.
“Vincent Marchetti.”
Chloe looked between them.
“Who is Vincent?”
Gabriel answered.
“My father's consigliere.”
“Was?”
“Is.”
The room went silent.
Chloe understood before he explained.
“If Thomas's letter is true, the man who killed your brother has been standing beside your family for twelve years.”
Gabriel looked toward the window.
“Yes.”
“And he knows my mother is alive.”
“Yes.”
“And Mia.”
His jaw tightened.
“Yes.”
Chloe stood.
“Then we leave Chicago.”
Gabriel turned.
“Where?”
“I don't care.”
“He'll find you.”
“You seem very confident about that.”
“Because Vincent built half the network I inherited.”
She stared.
“So what am I supposed to do? Move into your fortress?”
“Yes.”
She blinked.
“I was being sarcastic.”
“I wasn't.”
“No.”
Gabriel crossed his arms.
“You have a better option?”
“I could call federal authorities.”
“With what evidence?”
“The ledger.”
“Names in a notebook won't be enough.”
“Then the storage unit.”
“Which has already been compromised.”
Chloe clenched her jaw.
“I am not raising Mia inside a mafia compound.”
Gabriel's eyes went cold.
“Neither am I.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means I'm ending this.”
Dean looked sharply at him.
“Gabriel.”
“I should have done it years ago.”
“Not here.”
Chloe stepped closer.
“Ending what?”
Gabriel looked at her.
“The organization.”
Dean closed the hospital-room door.
“You cannot dismantle thirty years of Costa operations because of one letter.”
Gabriel's expression hardened.
“Leo died because of it.”
“We don't know that yet.”
“Thomas's ledger—”
“Could be fabricated.”
Evelyn suddenly laughed.
Everyone turned.
She was staring at Dean.
“You always were careful.”
Dean went pale.
“You know me?”
Evelyn's smile faded.
“Your father wasn't.”
The room became still.
Dean's voice lowered.
“What about my father?”
Evelyn looked frightened again.
“He drove the other car.”
Gabriel stared at Dean.
Dean looked as shocked as anyone.
“My father died when I was nineteen.”
Evelyn closed her eyes.
“Not soon enough.”
Dean backed away from the bed.
Chloe saw pain move across his face.
Something old.
Something buried.
Gabriel put a hand on his shoulder.
“We verify everything.”
Dean nodded slowly.
“Everything.”
That evening, Gabriel moved Evelyn, Chloe and Mia to a secure house near Lake Forest.
It wasn't a fortress.
It was worse.
It was beautiful.
Stone walls.
Tall windows.
Private security.
A kitchen larger than Chloe's apartment.
Mia ran into the living room and stared at the fireplace.
“Do rich people always have rooms nobody sits in?”
Gabriel, standing behind her, said, “Mostly.”
“That's silly.”
“Yes.”
“Can I sit in it?”
“Yes.”
She climbed onto the white sofa.
Gabriel watched her with a strange expression.
Chloe noticed.
“You don't spend much time around children.”
“No.”
“Do they scare you?”
“Yes.”
She laughed.
He looked at her.
“I wasn't joking.”
That night, after Mia and Evelyn fell asleep, Chloe found Gabriel on the back terrace.
Rain had stopped.
The lake was black beyond the trees.
“You could have let us disappear,” she said.
He didn't turn.
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because Thomas spent twelve years being hated for something he may not have done.”
“That doesn't explain us.”
Gabriel looked at her.
“It does to me.”
Chloe studied his face.
“You feel guilty.”
“I don't know what I feel.”
“You hated my father.”
“Yes.”
“You would have killed him.”
“Yes.”
She appreciated that he never lied simply to make himself easier to like.
“Do you think he is dead?”
Gabriel looked toward the lake.
“I don't know.”
That answer surprised her.
“After twelve years?”
“No body.”
“Do you think he's alive?”
“I think men like Thomas don't vanish accidentally.”
Chloe wrapped her arms around herself.
“My mother said he would come back.”
Gabriel looked at her.
“When?”
“Every birthday until I was ten.”
“And after that?”
“She stopped talking about him.”
Silence settled between them.
Then Mia screamed from upstairs.
Chloe ran.
Gabriel reached the room first.
Mia was sitting upright in bed.
Evelyn stood beside the window.
The curtains were open.
And written in the condensation on the outside of the glass were four words.
THE GIRL IS NOT HIS.
Chloe stared.
“Not whose?”
Gabriel examined the window.
Second floor.
No balcony.
Whoever had written it had climbed the exterior wall.
Dean entered with two guards.
He read the message.
Then looked at Chloe.
“The girl.”
Chloe instinctively pulled Mia against her.
Gabriel's eyes stayed on the words.
“Maybe it doesn't mean Mia.”
Chloe's blood went cold.
“You think it means me.”
Gabriel did not answer.
Evelyn began humming Blue Moon.
Then she whispered:
“Thomas wasn't your father.”
May you like
Chloe felt the entire world stop.
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