Chapter 5 - The Price of Running
Mara stared at the photograph until the screen blurred.
Marco took the phone.
“You're not going.”
“Yes, I am.”
“No.”
“You sound like Dante.”
“That's because he's usually right.”
“Luca wants the ledger.”
“He'll kill you after you give it to him.”
“Then we don't give him the real ledger.”
Marco stopped.
Isabella understood first.
“You make a copy.”
Mara shook her head.
“No.”
She pointed toward the ledger.
“We give him exactly what he wants.”
Marco stared at her.
“Explain.”
“Luca wants evidence destroyed.”
“Yes.”
“So we let him destroy it.”
Understanding slowly crossed Marco's face.
Federal investigators already possessed digital copies.
Luca didn't know.
If Mara arrived with the original, he would believe he had won.
“We track it,” Marco said.
“And me.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
Mara looked at him.
“He told me to come alone. If he sees you, Dante dies.”
Marco cursed quietly.
Two hours later, Mara drove toward an abandoned shipping terminal.
The ledger rested on the passenger seat.
A tracker had been sewn into its binding.
Mara wore another tracker beneath her shoe.
Marco's team remained several minutes away.
Everything depended on Luca believing she was alone.
She entered the warehouse.
Dante sat beneath a hanging light.
His hands were tied.
A bruise darkened his cheek.
“Mara.”
The fear in his voice was immediate.
“Why are you here?”
Luca emerged.
“Love.”
Dante glared.
“If you touch her—”
“You'll what?”
Mara approached.
“I brought it.”
She held up the ledger.
Luca smiled.
“Give it to me.”
“Release him first.”
“No.”
“Then we're done.”
Mara turned.
Luca's smile vanished.
“Stop.”
She continued.
“Mara,” Dante said carefully.
She stopped.
Luca approached.
“You're carrying a Moretti child.”
“My child.”
“Dante's child.”
“My child,” she repeated.
Something in her voice made even Luca pause.
“You men keep talking about this baby like it's an inheritance document.”
Dante's eyes changed.
Pride.
Luca extended his hand.
“Ledger.”
“Dante first.”
Luca pulled a gun.
Mara's heart hammered.
She didn't move.
Dante did.
He stood despite his restraints.
“Point that at me.”
Luca laughed.
“Sit down.”
“Point it at me.”
Mara realized what Dante was doing.
Keeping Luca's attention away from her.
She threw the ledger.
Not toward Luca.
Toward the floor.
It slid beneath a metal shelf.
Luca cursed and turned.
Dante moved.
The chair crashed.
Mara ran.
A gunshot echoed.
She screamed.
Marco's team stormed through two entrances.
Everything became noise.
Men shouting.
Boots.
Metal crashing.
Then silence.
Mara turned.
Dante was on the floor.
“No.”
She ran toward him.
“Dante!”
He rolled onto his back.
No blood.
The bullet had struck the chair.
Mara dropped beside him.
“You idiot.”
“Me?”
“You stood up.”
“You came to a warehouse while pregnant.”
“I had a plan.”
“So did I.”
“Your plan involved getting kidnapped.”
“That wasn't part of it.”
She began laughing and crying simultaneously.
Dante stared at her.
Then laughed too.
Marco cut his restraints.
Luca was arrested.
Vittorio remained in federal custody.
For the first time, the threat seemed finished.
But Dante's legal problems weren't.
His cooperation protected him from the worst charges, but not all responsibility.
He spent months meeting investigators.
Mara returned to her apartment.
She refused Dante's offer of the penthouse.
Not because she didn't love him.
Because she needed to know who they were without fear deciding for them.
Dante accepted it.
He visited.
He learned to cook.
Badly.
He attended every doctor's appointment he could.
At twelve weeks, they heard the heartbeat together.
Dante stared at the ultrasound screen.
Mara watched his face.
“Are you crying?”
“No.”
“You are.”
“Equipment malfunction.”
“Your eyes are equipment?”
“Possibly.”
She laughed.
The doctor pretended not to.
Outside the clinic, Dante became quiet.
“What?”
“My father never got this.”
“What do you mean?”
“A choice.”
He looked toward the street.
“He inherited everything. So did I.”
Mara took his hand.
“This baby doesn't have to.”
Dante looked at her.
“No.”
For the first time, Mara believed him.
Dante sold his interests in every questionable business.
Legitimate companies were transferred into transparent management structures.
A compensation fund was created for employees harmed by old Moretti operations.
It cost him millions.
He didn't care.
Then one afternoon, Dante arrived at Mara's apartment carrying a cardboard box.
“What happened?”
“I moved.”
“From the penthouse?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Too large.”
She stared.
“You own fourteen bathrooms.”
“I discovered I only use one.”
She laughed.
“Where are you living?”
“A house.”
“Where?”
“Near you.”
“How near?”
Dante hesitated.
“Across the street.”
Mara walked to the window.
A moving truck was parked outside the townhouse directly opposite hers.
She turned.
“You bought the house across the street?”
“I didn't want to pressure you.”
“So you bought surveillance distance?”
“When you phrase it that way, it sounds questionable.”
She laughed so hard her stomach hurt.
Their relationship slowly became something ordinary.
Coffee.
Appointments.
Arguments about baby names.
Dante assembling a crib incorrectly.
Mara refusing to let him hire six people to assemble it.
For the first time, happiness didn't feel dangerous.
Then, at twenty-seven weeks, Mara received a letter.
No threats.
No photographs.
A legal envelope.
She opened it.
Inside were court documents.
Vittorio Moretti requested permission to speak with her.
Mara immediately refused.
Then she saw the handwritten note attached.
Mara,
You think Luca was the last secret.
He wasn't.
Ask Dante why your father died.
Her hands began shaking.
Her father had died when she was nine.
A supposed workplace accident.
Mara read the sentence again.
Ask Dante why your father died.
That evening Dante arrived carrying groceries.
He saw her face.
Then the letter.
He stopped.
“Mara.”
She held it up.
“Did you know my father?”
Dante didn't answer.
Her stomach dropped.
“Dante.”
His silence was enough.
“You knew.”
“Mara, I can explain.”
She backed away.
“Tell me right now.”
Dante placed the groceries down.
“Your father's name was Thomas Bennett.”
“Yes.”
“He worked at Pier Twelve.”
“Yes.”
“For my father.”
Mara stared.
“My father worked for the Morettis?”
Dante nodded.
“And his accident?”
Dante looked devastated.
“It wasn't an accident.”
Mara's eyes filled.
“Who killed him?”
Before Dante could answer, someone knocked.
Three slow knocks.
Dante turned toward the door.
Marco's voice came from outside.
“Dante, don't tell her anything yet.”
Mara looked from the door to Dante.
May you like
Then Marco said the words that made her blood turn cold.
“Because Thomas Bennett may still be alive.”
