Chapter 2 - The Badge on the Concrete
Beatrice woke to the smell of antiseptic and coffee.
For a moment, she thought she was back in St. Catherine's Hospital four years earlier.
She expected to see Grace curled in a plastic chair.
Expected a physician to enter carrying the expression doctors used when words were about to divide a life into before and after.
Then pain in her side brought her fully awake.
This room wasn't a hospital.
The ceiling was too high.
The curtains were expensive.
A cardiac monitor stood beside the bed, but the walls belonged to a private apartment.
Dominic's building.
She remembered the garage.
The purse.
The badge.
Daniel's name in Dominic's mouth.
Beatrice opened her eyes.
Dominic sat near the window.
His jacket was gone.
His white shirt sleeves were rolled to his elbows.
Daniel's leather badge case rested on the table beside him.
“You're alive,” Dominic said.
“You sound disappointed.”
“You've been awake twelve seconds and you're already insulting me.”
“Thirteen.”
His mouth moved.
Not quite a smile.
Then his face hardened again.
“The metal missed anything important. Eight stitches. Bruised ribs. Doctor says you're lucky.”
“I've been called worse.”
“I know.”
The word landed differently than she'd expected.
Dominic stood.
He picked up the badge.
“Your husband.”
Beatrice said nothing.
“Detective Daniel Clark. Boston Police Department. Organized crime unit.”
Her pulse climbed.
Dominic noticed.
“You knew who he was.”
“I know now.”
“You said his name in the garage.”
“I'd heard it before.”
“Where?”
Dominic approached the bed.
“Four years ago.”
Beatrice's hand tightened beneath the blanket.
“From who?”
“That's what I'm trying to remember.”
“Convenient.”
His eyes cooled.
“You saved my life six hours ago. That buys you patience. It does not buy you permission to lie to me.”
“And employing me didn't buy you my life story.”
“No. But the badge of a dead organized-crime detective hidden in your purse changes the terms.”
Beatrice stared at him.
There it was.
Dominic Rossi's world.
Everything a transaction.
Everything measured.
Everything owed.
She pushed herself higher.
Pain exploded across her ribs.
Dominic moved instinctively.
“Don't.”
Beatrice held up a hand.
“I can sit up without your permission.”
“I'm not giving permission. I'm trying to keep your stitches closed.”
“That would be touching.”
“Beatrice.”
“What?”
“Stop trying to turn this into an argument you can win.”
She studied him.
“You think I came here to investigate you.”
“Did you?”
She did not answer.
That was answer enough.
Dominic looked toward the window.
Boston morning was beginning outside.
The storm had moved east, leaving the city washed gray.
“You asked me for fifty thousand dollars upfront.”
“I remember.”
“Carmine thought it was a joke.”
“So did everyone.”
“I didn't.”
“No. You just stared at me for thirty seconds.”
“I was deciding whether you were insane.”
“And?”
“I decided insane people usually negotiate badly.”
Against her will, Beatrice almost laughed.
It hurt.
She pressed a hand to her ribs.
Dominic saw.
His expression softened for half a second.
“Why fifty?”
“Because I needed fifty.”
“For what?”
“Grace.”
“Your daughter.”
Beatrice froze.
“You looked through my purse.”
“I had men identify an emergency contact while you were unconscious.”
“Where is she?”
“Home. Safe. She thinks you were in a traffic accident.”
“Does she know where I work?”
“No.”
Relief loosened something in Beatrice's chest.
Dominic continued.
“She is eighteen. First year at Northeastern. Biology major.”
“Stop.”
“She has nothing to do with this.”
“Then don't say her name like she's part of your investigation.”
Dominic's jaw tightened.
“I'm trying to establish who you are.”
“I told you who I am.”
“You told me you're Beatrice Clark, forty-two, widowed, twenty years driving professionally, clean record, no criminal convictions, one daughter.”
“All true.”
“You left out the dead detective.”
“I left out my husband.”
“Why?”
Beatrice looked at the badge in his hand.
Because Daniel had believed names were dangerous.
Because after his death, strangers had gone through their house without taking jewelry, electronics, or cash.
They had taken only Daniel's work notebook.
Because a man had called Beatrice two weeks after the funeral and told her, very politely, that widows lived longer when they let the dead stay dead.
She had spent four years pretending she'd listened.
“My husband died in a car accident,” she said.
Dominic watched her.
“You don't believe that.”
“No.”
“Police report says wet road.”
“Daniel drove in Boston winters for twenty-three years.”
“Good drivers crash.”
“His brake line didn't cut itself.”
Silence.
Dominic placed the badge on the table.
“You have proof?”
“I had questions.”
“And those questions brought you to me.”
“Yes.”
The word seemed to alter the temperature in the room.
Dominic stared at her for a long time.
“Did you think I killed your husband?”
Beatrice could have lied.
Instead, she said, “I thought you might have ordered it.”
The muscles in Dominic's face became still.
“That makes what you did last night very interesting.”
“I didn't have time to hold a committee meeting.”
“You saved a man you believed murdered your husband.”
“I saved the man sitting beside me.”
“There's a difference?”
“There was last night.”
Dominic turned away.
Beatrice did not know what he was feeling.
That unsettled her more than anger would have.
After a while he said, “How did you get the job?”
“You hired me.”
“Don't be cute.”
“I answered an advertisement from one of your transportation companies.”
“There were eighty-seven applicants.”
“I know.”
“You had no executive-security background.”
“I had twenty years commercial driving, courier work, medical transport, and no speeding tickets in fourteen years.”
“You also demanded fifty thousand dollars before getting behind the wheel.”
“You keep returning to that.”
“Because normal people ask for dental insurance.”
Beatrice looked at him.
“My husband had fifty thousand dollars set aside for Grace's education.”
Dominic waited.
“After Daniel died, the money disappeared.”
“From the bank?”
“From our lives.”
She swallowed.
“The insurance company delayed payment. His pension was frozen while Internal Affairs reviewed allegations against him. Someone leaked a story claiming Daniel had accepted money from organized crime.”
Dominic's expression sharpened.
“How much?”
Beatrice stared at him.
“Fifty thousand.”
The room went silent.
Dominic sat again.
“The exact amount.”
“Yes.”
“Who supposedly paid him?”
“A shell company.”
“What company?”
“Bellini Freight Holdings.”
For the first time, Dominic genuinely lost control of his face.
It lasted only a second.
But Beatrice saw it.
“Carmine,” she said.
Dominic looked toward the door.
“Carmine told me that company was dissolved twelve years ago.”
“It wasn't.”
“How do you know?”
“Because Daniel knew.”
Dominic's voice lowered.
“What else did he know?”
“Enough to get himself killed.”
Dominic stood.
“Stay here.”
“I'm not your prisoner.”
“No.”
He picked up the badge.
“But until I know who attacked me last night, you're the only person in this building who has both saved my life and entered it under false pretenses.”
“That's almost flattering.”
“Beatrice.”
He was halfway to the door when she spoke again.
“Why did you hire me?”
Dominic stopped.
“You really want to know?”
“Yes.”
He turned.
“Because during your interview, Carmine laughed when you asked for fifty thousand.”
“I remember.”
“You didn't look at Carmine.”
“No.”
“You looked at the reflection in the glass behind him.”
Beatrice's breath caught.
Dominic continued.
“You noticed the man entering the hallway before any of my security people did.”
She said nothing.
“You asked me why somebody was carrying a catering box into a building with no kitchen delivery scheduled.”
“You checked?”
“Yes.”
“And?”
“There wasn't food inside.”
Beatrice remembered.
She had never learned what had been inside the box.
Dominic's expression became almost rueful.
“My men saw a woman they could laugh at. You saw the room.”
He opened the door.
“That is why I hired you.”
For the next hour, Beatrice lay awake.
She replayed every moment of the interview.
Every drive.
Every question Dominic had asked.
Had he suspected her from the beginning?
Had he known Daniel?
The door opened again.
Dominic returned carrying a folder.
He shut the door behind him.
Something in his expression had changed.
The warmth was gone.
So was the suspicion.
What remained looked far worse.
He laid a photocopy on the bed.
An old incident report.
Four years old.
Beatrice recognized Daniel's handwriting immediately.
At the bottom was an interview note.
SUBJECT: DOMINIC ROSSI.
Her heart slammed.
Dominic tapped the page.
“I remember your husband now.”
Beatrice looked up.
May you like
Dominic's voice was quiet.
“He came to see me eleven days before he died.”
