Chapter 3 - The Man in the Hallway
Marcus Vale had been part of Dominic Kane's life for twenty-three years.
They met as teenagers.
Dominic was sixteen, angry, rich, and determined to prove he did not need his father's name.
Marcus was seventeen, broke, fearless, and living with an uncle who hit harder when he drank.
They fought behind a boxing gym over forty dollars.
Dominic won.
Marcus laughed through a split lip and asked if he wanted to get something to eat.
That was the beginning.
Marcus became more than an employee.
More than a lieutenant.
He became family.
When Anthony Kane died, Marcus stood beside Dominic at the grave.
When Dominic was shot, Marcus spent three nights outside the intensive care unit.
When doctors explained that Dominic might never walk again, Marcus punched a wall hard enough to fracture two fingers.
Dominic trusted very few people.
Marcus had always been one of them.
Now a photograph showed Marcus entering Linda Harper's hospital room hours after the event that destroyed her memory.
Ethan watched Dominic read the visitor log again.
“You need to consider the possibility that there's an explanation.”
Dominic laughed without humor.
“You don't believe that.”
“No.”
“Neither do I.”
“What are you going to do?”
“Nothing.”
Ethan frowned.
“Nothing?”
“Not yet.”
Dominic picked up the photograph.
“If Marcus did this, he's been waiting years to see whether Linda remembered something.”
“And now Emma walks into the house carrying the key.”
“Which means if Marcus knows about her—”
“He'll move.”
Dominic turned toward the window.
“Then we let him.”
Ethan understood.
“You want Emma used as bait?”
Dominic's head snapped around.
“No.”
“That's effectively what you're proposing.”
“I'm proposing we watch Marcus.”
“While Emma goes to work, rides buses, visits her mother—”
“She'll have protection.”
“She doesn't even know she's in danger.”
“She knows enough.”
“No, Dominic. She thinks a silver key might relate to your shooting. She doesn't know someone may have poisoned her mother.”
Dominic's voice hardened.
“And she's not going to.”
Ethan stared.
“You can't keep that from her.”
“I can until I know more.”
“She'll find out.”
“Then she'll hate me later.”
Ethan folded his arms.
“You seem strangely comfortable planning a future in which Emma Harper has enough contact with you to hate you.”
Dominic looked at him.
“Careful.”
Ethan almost smiled.
There it was.
The smallest crack.
The man who had threatened to build a pool just to bury Ethan beneath it was now protecting a maid he had known less than one night.
Dominic noticed Ethan's expression.
“Get out.”
“Gladly.”
Emma returned the next evening.
Dominic had half expected her not to.
At exactly ten minutes past nine, the study doors opened.
She walked inside carrying a bucket.
Her limp was slightly worse.
Dominic looked up from his desk.
“You're late.”
“Bus broke down.”
“You have two men following you in a car.”
“I told them to stop.”
“They don't work for you.”
Emma placed the bucket down.
“Neither do I.”
“You literally do.”
“You know what I mean.”
Dominic watched her.
She looked different.
Still tired.
But less afraid.
Anger suited her better.
“You could have stayed home.”
“I need the money.”
“I'll pay you for the week.”
“No.”
Dominic raised an eyebrow.
“You enjoy making your life difficult?”
“I enjoy earning what I get.”
“That's an expensive moral principle.”
“I'm finding that out.”
She began dusting.
Dominic said, “How is your mother?”
Emma stopped.
“Why?”
“Normal question.”
“Nothing about you is normal.”
A faint twitch touched Dominic's mouth.
Emma noticed.
“You almost smiled.”
“No.”
“You did.”
“Clean something.”
She smiled to herself.
Dominic immediately regretted giving her the satisfaction.
Emma moved toward the shelves.
“She's about the same.”
“Does she speak?”
“Sometimes.”
“About the past?”
“Fragments.”
“What kind of fragments?”
Emma looked over.
“You're asking about the key again.”
“Yes.”
“She says names.”
“Whose?”
“Mine. Her sister's. People from when she was young.”
“Anyone named Anthony?”
Emma went still.
Dominic saw the answer before she spoke.
“Yes.”
His heart rate changed.
“What has she said?”
“Usually just the name. Once she said, ‘Anthony shouldn't have trusted him.’”
Dominic leaned forward.
“Who?”
“She didn't say.”
“Anything else?”
“She kept repeating ‘red door.’”
Ethan entered at that moment.
Dominic glanced toward him.
Ethan heard enough.
“Mercer Street,” he said.
Emma frowned.
“What?”
Dominic looked at Ethan sharply.
But it was too late.
Ethan sighed.
“Halcyon Storage had a red service door.”
Emma stared at both men.
“What's behind it?”
Dominic answered.
“Possibly the lock your key opens.”
Emma's eyes widened.
“You still have it?”
“Yes.”
“I want to go.”
“No.”
Her expression changed immediately.
“Excuse me?”
“To Mercer Street.”
“I heard you.”
“If my mother wanted me to have that key—”
“You're not going.”
“You don't get to decide.”
“I do when the building may be connected to the person who put a bullet through me.”
“Then come with me.”
The room became silent.
Dominic's expression closed.
Emma realized too late what she had said.
He looked at the wheelchair.
Emma's face softened.
“I didn't mean—”
“Don't.”
“I wasn't saying you couldn't.”
“Yes, you were.”
“No. I was saying you know the building.”
Dominic's eyes became cold.
“Ethan can go.”
Emma hesitated.
Then quietly said, “I asked you.”
Dominic looked at her.
No pity.
No challenge.
Just a simple invitation.
Something inside him resisted.
He had not returned to Mercer Street since the shooting.
He had avoided that entire section of Harbor City.
The unfinished building where the shooter stood had been demolished.
Halcyon Storage remained.
Dominic hated the thought of being there.
Which was exactly why he said, “Tomorrow.”
Ethan stared at him.
Emma blinked.
“Tomorrow?”
“Ten in the morning.”
“I work at the diner.”
“Call out.”
“I can't afford—”
“I'll pay whatever you'd earn.”
“That isn't the point.”
“Emma.”
She sighed.
“Fine.”
The next morning, a black armored SUV stopped outside Mae's Corner Diner at nine forty-five.
Every customer near the windows turned to stare.
Emma walked outside wearing jeans, boots, and an old blue sweater.
Dominic waited inside the vehicle.
His wheelchair had already been secured in the center cabin.
Emma climbed in.
“You couldn't send something less noticeable?”
“This is less noticeable.”
She looked at the armored doors.
“I would hate to see noticeable.”
Marcus sat in the front passenger seat.
Emma recognized him from the estate.
He turned and smiled.
“Morning.”
Dominic watched him carefully.
“Emma, this is Marcus Vale.”
Marcus extended a hand.
Emma shook it.
The moment she said her name, something flickered behind Marcus's eyes.
Gone almost immediately.
Dominic saw it.
“Harper?” Marcus asked.
Emma nodded.
Marcus smiled again.
“Common name.”
“Not particularly,” Dominic said.
Marcus looked back at him.
For several seconds neither man spoke.
The vehicle moved toward Mercer Street.
Halcyon Storage sat between abandoned industrial buildings near the river.
The red door was still there.
Rust marked the edges.
Emma stood beside Dominic while Ethan inspected the lock.
Marcus remained near the vehicle.
Dominic watched him.
“Key,” Ethan said.
Dominic handed it over.
It fit.
The lock turned.
Emma's breath caught.
The red door opened into a narrow stairwell.
A concrete ramp had been installed years earlier for moving carts.
Dominic rolled inside.
Dust covered everything.
The lower level smelled like paper and damp stone.
At the end of a corridor stood a metal door.
Another lock.
The same key opened it.
Inside were dozens of filing cabinets.
A wooden desk.
And a chair.
Nothing had been disturbed in years.
Emma walked slowly toward the desk.
There was a photograph resting face down.
She picked it up.
Her mother stood beside Anthony Kane.
Not at a company event.
At this very desk.
Emma looked at Dominic.
“Why were they here?”
“I don't know.”
Ethan opened one cabinet.
“Financial records.”
Another.
“Property.”
A third.
Then his expression changed.
“Dominic.”
He pulled out a folder.
At the top was a list of names.
Payments.
Dates.
Dominic recognized several politicians.
Two police officials.
Three union leaders.
Then one name stopped him.
Marcus Vale.
Payments dating back more than a decade.
Not payments from Dominic's father.
Payments to someone else.
A rival organization.
Emma leaned closer.
“What is that?”
Before Dominic could answer, a sound echoed from the corridor.
Metal.
A door closing.
Ethan reached for his gun.
The lights went out.
Emma gasped.
Dominic's voice cut through the darkness.
“Get behind me.”
“Dominic—”
“Now.”
Footsteps sounded beyond the door.
Marcus's voice came from the hallway.
“Dominic?”
Dominic did not answer.
Another sound.
A gun being chambered.
Ethan whispered, “Someone followed us.”
Then a shot exploded through the darkness.
Emma screamed.
Dominic felt her hand grab his shoulder.
A second bullet slammed into the cabinet.
Ethan returned fire.
For thirty violent seconds, the underground archive filled with gunfire and shouting.
Then silence.
Emergency lights flickered on.
Ethan stood near the door, weapon raised.
Emma was crouched beside Dominic's chair.
Dominic looked at her.
“Are you hit?”
“No.”
“You sure?”
“Yes.”
He touched her face.
His hand trembled.
Emma noticed.
Dominic did not.
Marcus appeared in the doorway.
“Everyone okay?”
Dominic looked past him.
One attacker lay dead in the corridor.
Another had escaped.
Marcus's jacket sleeve was torn.
Blood marked his forearm.
“Who was it?” Ethan demanded.
“Couldn't see.”
Dominic's gaze stayed on Marcus.
Then Emma whispered, “Dominic.”
She was holding something.
A folded page she had found beneath the desk during the shooting.
It was written in Linda Harper's handwriting.
Emma unfolded it.
There were only four lines.
She read them aloud.
“If anything happens to me, Anthony was right. The betrayal began inside the Kane family. The shooter is only the weapon.”
Emma's voice faltered.
Then she read the final line.
“Dominic must never trust the man who calls him brother.”
Nobody moved.
Ethan slowly looked toward Marcus.
Marcus stared at the note.
May you like
And then the emergency lights went out again.
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