Chapter 2 - The Photograph My Father Hid
I had never seen the photograph before.
That bothered me almost as much as the message written across it.
Noah looked seventeen or eighteen, thin and smiling, one arm thrown around Dad’s shoulders. Dad looked younger than I remembered him, his hair still mostly brown.
Adrian stood several feet behind them.
He couldn’t have been more than twenty-five.
“What were you doing with my family?”
Adrian studied the photograph.
“I don’t remember this being taken.”
“That’s convenient.”
“It’s the truth.”
“Stop saying that like it automatically makes me believe you.”
Daniel shifted near the door.
Adrian ignored him.
He turned the photograph over again.
“Where exactly was the car?”
“Warehouse on South Morgan,” Daniel said. “Abandoned property.”
“Who owns it?”
“We’re checking.”
“Check faster.”
I grabbed my coat.
Adrian looked at me.
“Where are you going?”
“To the warehouse.”
“No.”
I laughed bitterly.
“There’s that word again.”
“It could be a trap.”
“For you?”
“For either of us.”
“That’s my brother’s car.”
“And somebody wanted us to find it.”
I hated that he made sense.
I hated even more that I was beginning to understand the difference between Adrian’s calmness and indifference.
He wasn’t indifferent.
He was calculating everything.
Every door.
Every person.
Every possibility.
That probably explained why he was still alive.
“I’m going,” I said.
Adrian stared at me for several seconds.
“Then you’re coming with me.”
Twenty minutes later, I sat beside him in the back of a black SUV.
Nobody spoke.
Rain blurred the city outside.
The emerald ring suddenly felt heavy on my hand.
Dad had carried a secret for twenty-two years.
Maybe longer.
And Noah had apparently discovered it.
“What happened after my father saved you?”
Adrian looked toward me.
“You really want to do this now?”
“Yes.”
He looked back through the window.
“My father was Carlo Moretti.”
“I’ve heard the name.”
Most Chicagoans had.
Carlo Moretti had been a wealthy developer who died in a boating accident when Adrian was nineteen.
At least, that was the public version.
“My father had enemies,” Adrian said. “Thomas witnessed something he wasn’t supposed to see the night he rescued me.”
“What?”
“Men trying to kill a twelve-year-old boy.”
I swallowed.
“Did he testify?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because the people responsible weren’t men you testified against.”
“And your mother gave him the ring?”
“Yes.”
“Why not money?”
“She offered.”
“Dad refused.”
Adrian looked surprised.
“You knew?”
“That sounds like him.”
A faint expression crossed Adrian’s face.
“Thomas said accepting money would turn saving a child into a transaction.”
That sounded exactly like Dad.
My eyes burned unexpectedly.
I turned toward the window.
“What happened to your mother?”
“She died six years later.”
“I’m sorry.”
Adrian looked at me.
It was the first gentle thing either of us had said to the other.
“Thank you.”
The warehouse appeared ten minutes later.
Police weren’t there.
Adrian’s people had arrived first.
Noah’s old Honda sat beneath a broken exterior light.
The driver’s door was open.
I climbed out before Adrian could stop me.
“Mara.”
I ran toward the car.
“Noah!”
Nothing.
The front seat contained coffee cups, receipts and the ordinary garbage Noah accumulated everywhere he went.
But on the passenger floor was something strange.
A hotel key card.
I recognized the logo immediately.
Halston Hotel.
My hotel.
I picked it up.
Adrian saw my face.
“What?”
“This is from work.”
“Could Noah have visited you?”
“Not without me knowing.”
Daniel approached.
“Boss, you need to see this.”
Inside the warehouse, a folding table had been placed beneath a hanging work light.
On it sat three cardboard boxes.
The first contained copies of Moretti Logistics invoices.
The second contained bank records.
The third contained files marked with dates stretching back more than twenty years.
My father’s name appeared on one.
THOMAS ELLIS.
My hands trembled as I opened it.
Inside were photographs.
Carlo Moretti.
Adrian’s mother, Isabella.
Dad.
And a fourth man.
I recognized him.
Not because I knew him personally.
Because his face appeared in Chicago business magazines.
Richard Vale.
Billionaire developer.
Philanthropist.
Chairman of Vale Holdings.
Adrian saw the picture.
His expression became unreadable.
“You know him,” I said.
“Yes.”
“How?”
“He was my father’s business partner.”
I looked at the date.
Twenty-two years earlier.
“What does he have to do with Noah?”
Adrian picked up another document.
“Maybe everything.”
Daniel opened the second box.
“Boss.”
Inside was a ledger.
Dozens of transactions.
Companies.
Dates.
Amounts.
Then Noah’s handwriting appeared across one page.
THE MONEY ISN’T THE POINT. FOLLOW VALE.
My heart hammered.
“Noah wrote that.”
“You’re certain?”
“Yes.”
Adrian turned several pages.
Another message.
DAD WAS RIGHT.
I grabbed his arm.
“What does that mean?”
“I don’t know.”
“You knew my father.”
“Not well.”
“You knew enough.”
Adrian looked down at my hand gripping his sleeve.
I released him.
“Sorry.”
He shook his head.
“Don’t be.”
For the first time, the space between us felt different.
Still dangerous.
But no longer because of him.
A sound came from the rear of the warehouse.
Metal scraping concrete.
Adrian immediately stepped in front of me.
Daniel moved toward the sound.
“Who’s there?”
Silence.
Then a figure emerged.
A man.
Thin.
Soaked.
Terrified.
I recognized him immediately.
“Evan?”
Evan Pierce had been Noah’s best friend since high school.
He raised both hands.
“Don’t.”
I pushed around Adrian.
“Where is Noah?”
Evan looked at me.
His eyes filled with guilt.
“Mara.”
“Where is my brother?”
“He told me not to contact you.”
“Is he alive?”
Evan nodded.
My legs weakened.
Adrian caught my elbow.
I barely noticed.
“Where?”
“I don’t know anymore.”
“What does that mean?”
“He called me four days ago. He said he found evidence that somebody inside Moretti Logistics had been moving money for years.”
Adrian’s expression hardened.
“Who?”
“He wouldn’t tell me.”
“Why?”
“Because he didn’t know who he could trust.”
Evan looked at me.
“He said somebody had used Mara’s information to open accounts so she would take the blame if anything went wrong.”
My stomach turned.
“So Noah was protecting me?”
“He was trying to.”
Tears burned my eyes.
“Then why disappear?”
“Because he found something about your father.”
Adrian stepped closer.
“What?”
Evan reached inside his jacket.
Daniel tensed.
“It’s just a flash drive.”
He placed it on the table.
“Noah told me if anything happened to him, I should give this to Mara.”
I grabbed it.
“What’s on it?”
“I don’t know. It’s encrypted.”
Adrian examined it.
“We can open it.”
Evan shook his head.
“Noah said only Mara can.”
“Why?”
“Because the password is something only she knows.”
I stared at the drive.
A secret from my brother.
A secret about my father.
And somehow Adrian Moretti stood in the middle of both.
Then Evan said something else.
“There’s more.”
“What?”
“Noah said if Adrian Moretti ever saw the ring, Mara should ask him one question.”
Adrian and I exchanged a look.
“What question?” I whispered.
Evan swallowed.
“He said ask Adrian what happened at Saint Vincent’s Hospital on November seventeenth, twenty-two years ago.”
Adrian’s face changed instantly.
Victor’s story had placed Dad’s rescue on that same night.
“What happened there?” I asked.
Adrian didn’t answer.
“Adrian.”
His eyes remained on the flash drive.
Finally he said, “That was the night your father saved my life.”
“I know.”
“No.”
He looked at me.
“That isn’t what I mean.”
A terrible feeling moved through me.
Adrian continued.
“Thomas didn’t bring me to a police station after the attack.”
“Where did he bring you?”
“Saint Vincent’s.”
“And?”
Adrian looked at my ring.
“When my mother arrived, Thomas was already there with two children.”
My breath stopped.
“Noah and me?”
Adrian shook his head.
“One was Noah.”
“Who was the other?”
His answer came quietly.
“A newborn baby girl.”
The warehouse disappeared around me.
I could hear only my own heartbeat.
“My mother died when I was seven.”
Adrian’s eyes held mine.
“I know what you were told.”
“What are you saying?”
“I’m saying the baby Thomas Ellis carried into Saint Vincent’s that night was wearing an identification bracelet.”
I could barely speak.
“What name?”
Adrian looked at me.
May you like
“Mara Moretti.”
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