Chapter 3 - The Invitation With No Strings
Aurora did not sleep.
At six in the morning, she made coffee.
At six-ten, she forgot where she had placed it.
At seven, she checked the lock again.
At eight, her phone rang.
Teresa.
“Aurora? Don't come in today.”
Aurora sat upright.
“Why?”
“Someone threw a brick through the front window around four this morning.”
Her blood turned cold.
“Was anyone hurt?”
“No. Police are here. But there was something taped to it.”
Aurora already knew.
“What?”
Teresa hesitated.
“A note with your name.”
Aurora closed her eyes.
“What did it say?”
“Just call the police, honey.”
“What did it say?”
Another pause.
“**Stop digging.**”
Aurora hung up and immediately called Michael.
He answered on the first ring.
“Yes?”
The sound of his voice steadied something she hated needing steadied.
“They hit the restaurant.”
A silence.
“Are you home?”
“Yes.”
“Stay there.”
“Michael—”
“I’m not giving an order. I'm asking for fifteen minutes.”
The line disconnected.
Aurora stared at the phone.
Fourteen minutes later, someone knocked.
Not Michael.
Marco stood outside.
Beside him was an older woman in a charcoal suit carrying a leather folder.
Aurora did not open the door fully.
“Where is Michael?”
“With Zach.”
That answer mattered more than she wanted it to.
Marco gestured to the woman.
“This is Rebecca Sloan. Attorney.”
Rebecca lifted one hand.
“I work for Michael Moretti’s legitimate businesses, not his family’s historical interests. That distinction is important.”
Aurora blinked.
“That was strangely specific.”
“I've been a lawyer for twenty-seven years. Specificity pays my mortgage.”
Despite everything, Aurora almost laughed.
Rebecca continued.
“Mr. Moretti asked me to offer you options. Not instructions.”
“What options?”
“Police protection. Temporary hotel accommodation under a name not connected to yours. Direct contact with the financial-crimes investigator handling the Moretti account audit. Or nothing at all.”
Aurora stared at her.
“Nothing?”
“You're an adult. Mr. Moretti is aware of this despite occasional evidence to the contrary.”
Marco coughed suspiciously.
Rebecca smiled.
“He also asked me to tell you that he will not enter your apartment, request the flash drive, or send anyone inside without permission.”
Aurora looked toward the bedroom.
The drive remained hidden.
“Why is he doing this?”
Rebecca’s expression grew serious.
“Because his son’s name entered a threat directed at you.”
Not romance.
Not curiosity.
Zach.
Aurora understood that.
“And because,” Rebecca added, “Michael has spent the last three years dismantling certain portions of what his father left behind.”
Aurora folded her arms.
“Is that supposed to make him a hero?”
“No.”
Rebecca's answer was immediate.
“It makes him a complicated man trying to make better choices than the ones he inherited.”
Aurora appreciated the honesty.
An hour later, she was sitting in the living room of a furnished apartment owned by one of Michael’s legitimate companies.
It wasn't a penthouse.
It wasn't glamorous.
It was a quiet two-bedroom unit in a secure building with a doorman and cameras.
Michael arrived at noon.
Alone.
Aurora opened the door.
“You promised fifteen minutes.”
“I sent help in fourteen.”
“You're impossible.”
“So I've been told.”
He held up a paper bag.
“Zach insisted.”
Inside were pancakes from a diner.
Aurora stared at him.
“Pancakes?”
“He considers them emergency food.”
That finally made her smile.
Michael noticed.
Neither mentioned it.
They sat across from each other at the kitchen table.
Aurora had brought the flash drive.
It remained inside her pocket.
Michael never asked.
That earned him more trust than any promise could have.
“Tell me about Vincent,” she said.
Michael folded his hands.
“Vincent Caruso and my father did business twenty years ago. Restaurants. Property. Construction.”
“Illegal business?”
“Some.”
Aurora appreciated that he did not decorate the truth.
“When I took control, I began separating companies that could operate legitimately from the ones that couldn't.”
“And Vincent didn't like that.”
“Vincent likes leverage.”
“What happened to Felix?”
Michael looked down briefly.
“I truly don't know.”
“But you suspect something.”
“I suspect Felix discovered Vincent was moving money through accounts associated with multiple companies—including mine.”
Aurora frowned.
“Why use your name?”
“Protection. If authorities found the transactions, suspicion would land on the Moretti family first.”
“And it did.”
“Yes.”
“Then why would Felix disappear?”
“He may have tried to blackmail Vincent.”
Aurora shook her head.
“Felix wasn't like that.”
“You knew him well?”
“Not really. But he was nervous all the time. He wanted out.”
Michael’s eyes sharpened.
“He told you that?”
“Once.”
“What exactly did he say?”
Aurora searched her memory.
They had been closing Bellissimo.
Felix had sat alone at the bar, staring into untouched whiskey.
He had said, Sometimes the only way out is to make sure the truth survives you.
At the time, Aurora thought he was drunk.
Now the sentence chilled her.
She repeated it.
Michael went silent.
“What?”
“He may have intentionally left the laptop open.”
Aurora stared.
“For me?”
“For anyone he thought looked honest enough to notice.”
“That’s ridiculous.”
“He disappeared three days later.”
The implication made her stomach twist.
Perhaps Aurora had not accidentally stumbled into Felix's records.
Perhaps he had chosen her.
Which meant Vincent might believe she possessed more than she actually did.
Aurora slowly removed the flash drive.
Michael looked at it.
He did not reach for it.
“What’s on here?”
“Everything I copied.”
“May I?”
Aurora hesitated.
Then placed it between them.
Michael called Rebecca.
They viewed the contents on an isolated laptop.
Invoices.
Spreadsheets.
Account records.
Shell corporations.
Then they found something Aurora had never noticed.
A folder marked B.M.
Michael clicked.
Inside were scanned letters.
The first carried the letterhead of Moretti Development.
Michael read two lines and went pale.
“These are forged.”
“How do you know?”
“My signature.”
Aurora looked closer.
The signature appeared perfect.
Michael opened another.
And another.
Millions of dollars had supposedly been authorized by Michael Moretti.
Transfers.
Property acquisitions.
Consulting payments.
The dates stretched across five years.
Including two years after Michael said he began shutting down his father's illegal network.
Someone had been building a paper trail designed to make Michael look guilty.
Rebecca leaned closer.
“Oh, hell.”
Aurora looked at her.
“Lawyer vocabulary?”
“Technical term.”
Another folder appeared.
INSURANCE.
Inside were photographs of buildings.
Restaurants.
Warehouses.
One image stopped Michael.
A burned-out storefront.
Aurora recognized it from local news.
The restaurant had caught fire two years earlier.
No one had died.
Michael stared at the transaction sheet beside it.
“Vincent collected on that property.”
Rebecca looked grim.
“And the shell company paid him three days before the fire.”
Aurora’s hands went cold.
She closed the laptop.
“No more.”
Michael immediately moved back.
“Okay.”
“I don't want to know.”
“You already know.”
“I don't want Zach anywhere near this.”
Something changed in Michael’s eyes.
“He won't be.”
“You can't promise that.”
“I can promise what I'll do.”
“That’s not the same thing.”
“No.”
Michael looked toward the window.
“You're right.”
Aurora studied him.
“Why is Zach with you so often?”
The question surprised him.
“My mother says I work too much.”
“She’s probably right.”
“She usually is. Painfully.”
Aurora smiled faintly.
Michael continued.
“After his mother died, I decided he wouldn't be raised by employees while I spent my life in offices.”
“So you take him to meetings?”
“Not important ones.”
“To restaurants?”
“He likes restaurants.”
“He likes proposing to waitresses.”
Michael sighed.
“That is apparently new.”
Aurora laughed.
For several seconds, the fear eased.
Then her phone buzzed.
She froze.
Michael waited.
Aurora checked the screen.
This time the message was different.
A photograph of Felix Caruso.
Alive.
Older.
Standing beside a newspaper dated three days earlier.
Aurora gasped.
Michael took the phone only after she handed it to him.
Beneath the photograph was one sentence.
He wants to talk to the girl he chose.
Aurora stared.
“Felix is alive.”
Michael zoomed in.
“Maybe.”
“What do you mean?”
“Photographs can be staged.”
“The newspaper—”
“Can be added.”
A second message arrived.
An address.
Then:
Come alone tomorrow at noon if you want answers.
Michael’s expression hardened.
“You're not going.”
Aurora stood.
“You don't get to decide.”
“No. But I'm allowed to tell you when something is obviously a trap.”
“What if Felix really needs help?”
“What if the person waiting there is Vincent?”
“What if Felix has spent eleven months hiding because nobody helped him?”
Michael stood too.
They faced each other across the kitchen.
Aurora could feel the argument coming.
Instead Michael surprised her.
“I'll make you a deal.”
“What kind?”
“You decide whether to go.”
Aurora narrowed her eyes.
“And?”
“I decide whether I follow.”
“That’s not a deal.”
“No, it's compromise.”
She nearly smiled.
“I thought powerful men didn't compromise.”
“Only stupid powerful men.”
Aurora stared at him.
“You'd really let me choose?”
“Yes.”
“Even if I choose something you hate?”
Michael’s answer came quietly.
“If you're going to trust me, it can't begin with me taking your choices away.”
Something shifted inside Aurora.
Not love.
Not yet.
But something dangerous enough.
Respect.
She looked down at the address.
An abandoned print shop near Red Hook.
Tomorrow.
Noon.
Aurora made her decision.
“I’m going.”
Michael closed his eyes briefly.
Then nodded.
“Of course you are.”
A knock sounded at the apartment door.
Marco entered with Zach.
The little boy rushed toward Aurora.
“Miss Aurora!”
She caught him in a hug before remembering she was supposed to be frightened of becoming attached.
Zach pulled away.
“Dad said you had an emergency.”
Michael gave his son a look.
“I did not use that word.”
“You did with your face.”
Aurora laughed.
Zach reached into Mr. Buttons’ backpack.
He pulled out the tiny ring box.
“I brought your promise.”
Aurora crouched.
“Keep guarding it for me.”
Zach nodded seriously.
Then he whispered, “Dad worries too much.”
Aurora glanced at Michael.
“Yes,” she whispered back. “I’m beginning to notice.”
Michael heard.
His expression suggested he was offended.
But his eyes were warm.
For the first time in months, Aurora did not feel alone.
And that frightened her in a completely different way.
Because tomorrow she was walking into a trap.
May you like
And Michael Moretti was going with her.
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