Chapter 6 - BENEATH THE NAME OF A DEAD WOMAN
Damian didn't speak for the entire drive back to Brooklyn.
Neither did Daniel.
Marcus had one of his men take my brother to a private clinic under a false name. I objected until Daniel, pale and exhausted, told me to go.
"They won't hurt me," he said.
"You don't know that."
He looked past me toward Damian.
"I know he hates Anthony more than he hates me."
"That's not reassuring."
"It's what I've got."
Damian said nothing.
The apartment felt different when we returned.
Not safer.
Just quieter than the places trying to kill us.
I stood in front of the windows with my arms folded.
"Your mother."
Damian poured water into a glass.
"What about her?"
"Daniel said the key opens her grave."
"He doesn't know what he's talking about."
"You reacted like you thought he might."
Damian set the glass down untouched.
"My mother died when I was sixteen."
"I'm sorry."
"Cancer."
"Where is she buried?"
He looked at me.
"No."
"No what?"
"We're not going there."
"Why?"
"Because Anthony wants us to."
"Anthony also wanted us in that warehouse. We still learned something."
"We nearly died."
"You keep bringing that up like it's unusual for you."
"It is unusual for you."
I walked closer.
"What did your father give mine?"
"I don't know."
"What could be hidden inside a grave?"
"Nothing."
"Damian."
He turned away.
For the first time since meeting him, I saw something more powerful than anger controlling him.
Grief.
"My mother's grave has been empty for twelve years."
I stopped.
"What?"
"Her body is there. The grave isn't literally empty."
"I understood the sentence."
He looked irritated.
Good.
I preferred irritation to whatever haunted expression had appeared.
"There was a compartment beneath the memorial stone," he said. "My father installed it after she died."
"For what?"
"Documents."
"You knew?"
"When I was nineteen, he showed me."
"What documents?"
"Insurance policies. Property papers. Information he didn't trust banks with."
"Criminal records?"
"Possibly."
"You never checked after he died?"
"The compartment was empty."
"When?"
"The night he was murdered."
I slowly understood.
"So he moved whatever was there."
"Or Anthony found it first."
"And your father gave my father a key."
"Apparently."
"Then maybe Anthony didn't find everything."
Damian's jaw tightened.
"That's what concerns me."
At nine the next morning, Marcus called.
Daniel was stable.
The bullet hadn't touched him; his injuries were bruises, a mild concussion, and two cracked ribs.
I should have felt relief.
Instead I felt rage.
I asked Damian to take me home.
He resisted for twenty minutes.
I threatened to call the police and tell them he was holding me.
That worked.
My apartment looked normal when we entered.
That was worse.
No overturned furniture.
No shattered drawers.
Whoever had come inside knew exactly what they wanted.
My filing cabinet stood open.
Nothing obvious missing.
Damian's men searched the rooms while I went straight to my father's watch.
It still sat inside the bedroom drawer.
I fastened it around my wrist.
Damian watched from the doorway.
"He gave you that?"
"Graduation."
"Mechanical?"
"Yes."
"My father liked mechanical watches."
"Are all mafia fathers legally required to?"
His mouth moved.
Almost a smile.
Then I remembered why we were there.
"The key."
We searched for three hours.
Closets.
Cabinets.
Books.
Kitchen tins.
The backs of framed photographs.
Nothing.
Around noon, Damian found an old photograph of my parents in the hallway.
My mother was laughing into the camera.
Dad stood beside her holding a wooden molding sample.
Damian looked at it.
"Christmas money."
"What?"
"Your mother hid money inside containers."
"Yes."
"Your father hid the key where she used to hide Christmas money."
I stared at the photograph.
The molding sample.
Then I looked down at the baseboard running around my apartment.
Dad had renovated the unit himself.
Every inch.
I dropped to my knees.
Damian crouched beside me.
"What?"
"After Mom died, Dad replaced the trim."
"All of it?"
"Yes."
I ran my fingers along the wall.
Most seams were painted smooth.
One near the bedroom door wasn't.
Tiny.
Almost invisible.
I fetched a butter knife.
Damian took it from me.
"I've got it."
"It's my wall."
"And you're about to stab yourself opening it."
He pried gently.
A six-inch section came loose.
Inside the hollow molding sat a narrow brass key wrapped in wax paper.
Neither of us moved.
Then I reached inside.
There was also a folded note.
One sentence.
Vincent's last insurance is beneath Isabella.
Damian read it.
His face became unreadable.
"Isabella?"
"My mother."
At four that afternoon we drove north.
Isabella Cross was buried in a private cemetery behind a small stone chapel in Westchester County.
No guards waited.
No shooters.
That made Marcus more nervous.
The caretaker knew Damian.
He unlocked a maintenance gate without asking questions.
The Cross family memorial stood beneath bare trees.
ISABELLA ROSE CROSS.
Beloved Wife and Mother.
Damian stopped ten feet away.
I waited.
"You haven't been here in a while," I said.
"Seven years."
"Why?"
"Dead people don't need visits."
"Living people sometimes do."
His eyes turned toward me.
I immediately regretted saying it.
Not because it was wrong.
Because it was too intimate.
Marcus interrupted.
"Compartment?"
Damian walked to the memorial.
Behind a carved stone panel was a keyhole.
The brass key fit.
For several seconds, it refused to turn.
Then it clicked.
Damian opened the compartment.
Inside sat a waterproof metal box.
Marcus swept it for wires.
Nothing.
Damian lifted it out.
We opened it inside the chapel.
Three ledgers.
Two flash drives.
A stack of photographs.
One sealed letter marked:
DAMIAN.
His hands froze above it.
"Open it," I said softly.
He did.
The letter was from Vincent Cross.
Son,
If you're reading this, Anthony succeeded in turning my worst decisions into your inheritance.
There is no version of my life I can explain that makes me innocent.
I built power by frightening people, then told myself fear kept the family safe.
Eventually I created the kind of men who believed betrayal was simply ambition with better timing.
Anthony has been stealing from the organization and building alliances against us.
Henry Marlowe discovered the financial trail accidentally. He wanted out. I promised to protect him.
If he is dead too, then I failed him.
The ledgers will expose Anthony, but they will also expose me.
Use them differently than I would.
Do not protect my name.
Protect the innocent people whose names are beside mine.
There was more.
Damian read silently.
His face changed.
Then he handed me the last page.
A list of payments appeared at the bottom.
Police officers.
A state official.
Contractors.
Anthony Bell.
And—
Detective Owen Pierce.
The man who had interviewed me at Volante.
My pulse spiked.
"Maybe it's another Pierce."
Marcus checked the date.
"Badge number's here."
Damian swore.
My phone rang.
Unknown number.
Damian reached for it.
I answered first.
"Hello?"
Detective Pierce's voice came through.
"Ms. Marlowe, I need you to come to the precinct."
I looked at the ledger.
"Why?"
"We've had a development in the shooting."
Damian shook his head.
Pierce continued.
"Noah Vance is dead."
My mouth went dry.
"How?"
"He was killed in holding."
Behind me, Marcus checked the chapel windows.
Pierce's voice lowered.
"And before he died, he wrote two words on the wall."
"What words?"
A pause.
Then:
"Isabella Cross."
Damian grabbed the phone.
"Pierce."
Silence.
Damian's expression changed.
The call disconnected.
At the same moment, the chapel doors locked from the outside.
Marcus pulled his weapon.
Smoke began slipping beneath the threshold.
And from somewhere beyond the stained-glass windows, a man's voice called:
"Leave the ledgers, Damian."
May you like
Detective Pierce.
"Or all three of you burn with your mother's secrets."
