Chapter 4 - The Name Rochester Feared
Anthony walked into my shop like the temperature had dropped ten degrees around him.
I had seen him calm.
I had seen him amused.
I had seen him embarrassed.
This was different.
He did not look angry.
Angry would have been easier.
He looked precise.
He took the envelope from me without touching anything unnecessarily.
One of his men photographed the contents.
Another checked the front windows.
Mia stood beside the industrial printer, staring as though she had accidentally wandered into a television show.
Anthony read the message.
TELL RUSSO TO WALK AWAY.
Then he turned over the second photograph.
Me leaving my apartment.
His jaw tightened once.
“Daniel.”
A man near the door stepped forward.
I recognized him from Riverside.
Mid-forties.
Gray suit.
Glasses.
Less intimidating than the others until he spoke.
“Already calling police liaison.”
Anthony nodded.
“Get building cameras from Emma’s street. Shop cameras. Adjacent businesses. Traffic cameras if we can.”
Daniel looked at me.
“Ms. Hayes, do you still have the envelope it arrived in?”
Anthony held it up.
“Good.”
Daniel pulled out his phone.
I stared at Anthony.
“You’re calling the police?”
His eyes met mine.
“Yes.”
I hadn’t expected that.
Maybe the rumors had infected my brain more than I realized.
“You sound surprised,” he said.
“I am.”
“Threatening photographs are a police matter.”
“Is that how your world usually handles problems?”
Daniel glanced between us and quietly walked away.
Anthony took a breath.
“My world is more complicated than that.”
“That is not an answer.”
“I know.”
I lowered my voice.
“People say things about you.”
“I know.”
“They say you run illegal gambling.”
He didn’t answer.
“They say businesses pay your people for protection.”
Still nothing.
“They say your family has hurt people.”
A long pause.
Then Anthony said, “My family has done things I am not going to defend.”
It was the first answer he had given that genuinely scared me.
“Have you?”
He looked at me.
Not offended.
Not evasive.
Just tired.
“I have threatened people.”
My stomach tightened.
“I’ve used leverage. I’ve allowed men who worked for me to believe consequences would be worse than they were. I’ve operated businesses in legal gray areas I should have walked away from sooner.”
“That sounds carefully worded.”
“It is.”
“Have you killed anyone?”
Mia inhaled sharply behind us.
Anthony’s gaze never left mine.
“No.”
I searched his face.
“Ordered it?”
“No.”
“Covered it up?”
“No.”
“Then why are people so afraid of you?”
That question landed differently.
Anthony looked toward the window.
“My father built fear carefully.”
“And you inherited it.”
“Yes.”
“Do you use it?”
He looked back at me.
“Yes.”
No hesitation.
That honesty unsettled me more than denial might have.
“Why?”
“Because sometimes fear keeps worse people from testing boundaries.”
“Or it gives you power.”
“Yes.”
Again.
No defense.
Just truth.
I hated how difficult that made him to categorize.
Villains were supposed to lie.
Good men were supposed to be easy to trust.
Anthony seemed determined to be neither.
A uniformed police officer entered fifteen minutes later with a detective named Carla Mendoza.
Anthony stepped back and let me speak.
That mattered.
He didn’t interrupt.
Didn’t answer for me.
Didn’t use his name to control the conversation.
Detective Mendoza bagged the photographs and asked questions.
Had I noticed anyone following me?
No.
Had I received unusual calls?
No.
Was I romantically involved with Anthony Russo?
I looked at him.
He looked at me.
“No,” I said.
Something moved in his expression.
Mendoza noticed.
She wrote anyway.
“Any reason someone might assume otherwise?”
I almost laughed.
“Apparently Rochester has eyes.”
Mendoza glanced at Anthony.
“Mr. Russo, anything you’d like to add?”
“Grant Holloway’s companies have been attempting to acquire Riverside Neighborhood Center.”
Her pen paused.
“Holloway.”
“Yes.”
“That’s a significant accusation.”
“It wasn’t an accusation.”
Anthony slid a folder Daniel had handed him across the counter.
“It’s property data.”
Mendoza opened it.
Several corporate names.
Transactions.
Maps.
Shell companies.
“You got this quickly.”
“I already had concerns.”
“Why?”
“His acquisitions overlap freight property I monitor.”
Mendoza raised an eyebrow.
“Monitor.”
Anthony ignored the implication.
“Emma became visible to whoever is watching Riverside because she was photographed speaking with me at the fundraiser.”
“Or because she’s close to you.”
“We are not—”
I interrupted.
“She asked me.”
Anthony went quiet.
Mendoza’s mouth almost twitched.
After police left, I told Mia to go home.
She refused.
“I am absolutely not leaving you here.”
“Mia.”
“What if scary photograph guy comes back?”
Anthony said, “He won’t.”
Mia looked at him.
“How do you know?”
Anthony paused.
“Because there are six people watching the block.”
She looked through the window.
“I only see two.”
“That’s the point.”
I closed my eyes.
“This cannot become normal.”
“It won’t,” Anthony said.
“How can you know that?”
“I’ll end it.”
There it was.
The sentence I had been waiting for.
My chest tightened.
“What does that mean?”
Anthony understood immediately.
“Legally.”
“Say it better.”
“I will use attorneys, investigators, police contacts, property filings and public records to determine who sent this. I will not hurt anyone.”
Mia whispered, “This is the strangest conversation I’ve ever heard.”
I agreed.
Later, after she finally left with her boyfriend, Anthony stayed.
Not inside.
Outside.
He stood beneath my shop sign while one of his security people waited near the corner.
I locked the register.
Turned off the copier.
Stacked tomorrow’s jobs.
I watched him through the glass.
The most feared man in Rochester stood on a sidewalk under a sign missing one tiny piece of red vinyl from the letter C.
He noticed me looking.
Tapped the damaged letter.
Then pointed at me accusingly.
I opened the door.
“What?”
“You criticize signs professionally and allow this?”
“Go away.”
“That C is collapsing.”
“I’ve been busy.”
“This is how civilization ends.”
I tried not to laugh.
Failed.
For three seconds, we were back at the restaurant.
Then I remembered the photograph.
My smile disappeared.
Anthony’s did too.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
“For the sign?”
“For you being dragged into this.”
“You didn’t send the photograph.”
“No.”
“But your life made me useful.”
He had no response to that.
I picked at the chipped paint on the doorframe.
“Why Riverside?”
“What do you mean?”
“Why twenty-five thousand dollars? Why care?”
He looked toward the street.
“My mother took me there.”
I blinked.
“When?”
“When I was twelve.”
I waited.
“My father was not an easy man to live with,” Anthony said carefully. “My mother would find reasons to leave the house. Riverside had a free dinner program on Wednesdays.”
“Your family needed free dinners?”
“No.”
His expression darkened.
“She needed somewhere he wouldn’t come looking.”
That changed everything slightly.
I pictured a twelve-year-old Anthony sitting in Riverside’s cafeteria.
Not feared.
Not powerful.
Just a boy hiding beside his mother.
“Louise knew?”
“She probably doesn’t remember me.”
“Louise remembers everyone.”
Anthony smiled faintly.
“My mother died when I was nineteen. I stopped going long before that.”
“So you repaired the sign.”
“She liked it.”
His voice was barely above the traffic.
“When it was lit, she used to say you could see it from three blocks away and know you were almost somewhere safe.”
My throat tightened.
That line stayed with me.
Somewhere safe.
Anthony cleared his throat and returned to business.
“We need to move you somewhere tonight.”
“No.”
“Emma.”
“My apartment is my home.”
“Someone photographed it.”
“Which means they already know where it is.”
“Exactly.”
“And if I leave with you, whoever is watching learns I’m actually important to you.”
Silence.
I realized what I had said.
So did he.
“I didn’t mean—”
“Yes, you did.”
His voice was quiet.
Not teasing.
I looked away.
He stepped closer but stopped several feet from me.
“Stay with Louise.”
“What?”
“Not me. Not one of my properties. Louise has a spare room. Security can watch the building from a distance.”
That was reasonable.
Annoyingly reasonable.
“How do you know Louise has a spare room?”
“She told Daniel she takes in visiting volunteers.”
“You know too much.”
“It’s a problem.”
I agreed to Louise.
Before I left, Anthony handed me a card.
A phone number written on the back.
“What is this?”
“Direct security line.”
“I have your number.”
“If you call me and I don’t answer—”
“You always answer.”
His expression became serious.
“Not always.”
Something in the way he said it chilled me.
I put the card in my purse.
Then I looked at him.
“Anthony.”
“Yes?”
“If you want me to trust you even a little, no revenge.”
His eyes held mine.
“No revenge.”
“No making people disappear.”
“No.”
“No threats.”
A pause.
“Anthony.”
“No threats.”
I nodded.
Then I left.
At Louise’s house that night, I slept badly.
At 2:13 a.m., my phone buzzed.
I sat upright.
Unknown number.
A photograph loaded.
Not of me.
Of Anthony.
He was leaving Corner Print & Copy after I had gone.
The message beneath it contained only one sentence.
YOU’RE NOT THE ONLY ONE WHO CAN LOSE SOMETHING.
I stared at those words.
Whoever was doing this had changed the game.
They were no longer using me to frighten Anthony.
They were telling me Anthony could be taken too.
May you like
And despite every sensible part of my brain screaming that this man was dangerous, complicated and built from a world I wanted nothing to do with, my first reaction was terrifyingly simple.
I was afraid for him.
