Chapter 2 - WHAT LILY TOLD HIM BEFORE I ARRIVED
Dominic Moretti remained standing across from me while I held Lily against my chest.
“She’s safe,” he repeated.
I nodded because I couldn’t trust my voice.
Then Lily pulled back.
“Mommy, I told him you cry.”
I closed my eyes.
Of course she had.
“Wonderful.”
Dominic’s expression changed almost imperceptibly.
Not amusement exactly.
Something softer.
Lily continued, because five-year-olds regard privacy as a bizarre adult superstition.
“Only at nighttime.”
“Lily.”
“When you think I’m sleeping.”
“Thank you.”
“And sometimes in the bathroom.”
“Lily Grace Donovan.”
She finally recognized the warning.
“Sorry.”
Dominic looked away, which somehow preserved more dignity than pretending he hadn’t heard.
My name is Claire Donovan.
Thirty-two.
Emergency-room nurse.
Widowed mother.
And apparently the first woman in Manhattan history whose blind date began with her five-year-old daughter providing the man a complete emotional background check.
I picked up Lily’s coat.
“We’re leaving.”
Dominic’s eyes returned to me.
“I had a car brought around.”
“That won’t be necessary.”
“Claire.”
It was the first time he used my name.
I hated that I noticed how it sounded.
“I appreciate what you did,” I said. “More than I can explain. But I need to get Lily home, find out exactly how she got here, and then probably spend the next six hours having a nervous breakdown.”
Lily tugged my sleeve.
“Can I have my cake?”
“No.”
“It’s paid for.”
I stared.
Dominic sat slowly.
“She negotiated that point aggressively.”
“I used my own money,” Lily explained.
“You used money you stole from your piggy bank.”
“That’s my money.”
Dominic’s mouth moved.
I pointed at him.
“Do not encourage her.”
“I didn’t say anything.”
“Your face did.”
That almost made him smile.
Then everything changed.
A man entered through the restaurant’s front door.
Gray coat.
Wet hair.
Nothing remarkable.
I barely looked at him.
Dominic did.
His expression hardened instantly.
Not dramatically.
His shoulders simply settled.
His eyes became still.
The warmth disappeared.
He looked past me toward a second man standing beneath the awning outside.
Then he turned to Lily.
“What did you tell me about the man near your school?”
My stomach dropped.
“What man?”
Lily looked at him.
“The shiny-ring man.”
I knelt.
“What shiny-ring man?”
She seemed confused by my reaction.
“The one who asked if you still work nights.”
Every organ in my body seemed to stop simultaneously.
“When?”
“Tuesday.”
“Lily.”
“At pickup.”
“Who was with you?”
“Mrs. Delaney.”
“Did she see him?”
“She was talking to Miss Sarah.”
Dominic stood.
“What did the ring look like?”
Lily made a circle with her fingers.
“Snake.”
Dominic looked at me.
“We’re leaving.”
I didn’t argue this time.
“What does that mean?”
“Not here.”
He lifted his coat from the booth.
The man near the entrance had moved closer.
Dominic didn’t look at him again.
He didn’t need to.
Two other men in suits appeared from opposite sides of the dining room.
I hadn’t noticed either of them before.
Bodyguards.
Of course.
Dominic crouched until he was at Lily’s level.
“Do you like kitchens?”
She nodded.
“Want to see a restaurant kitchen?”
Her eyes lit up.
“Yes.”
“Good.”
He held out one hand.
Then stopped.
Looked at me.
Permission.
I appreciated that more than I wanted to.
I nodded.
Lily took his hand.
Mr. Buttons went under her other arm.
We moved through Beluchi’s kitchen while cooks pretended not to notice Dominic Moretti passing between stainless-steel counters with a five-year-old in a red coat.
Rain hit us the second we reached the alley.
A black SUV waited.
One of Dominic’s men opened the rear door.
I stopped.
“I’m not getting into a stranger’s car.”
Dominic looked at me.
“We’re past the stranger portion of the evening.”
“You know practically nothing about me.”
“Your daughter provided extensive documentation.”
“Dominic.”
His name slipped out.
His eyes changed slightly.
Then he said quietly:
“The man inside works for Vincent Caruso.”
I knew that name too.
Everyone in New York knew names like Moretti and Caruso, though civilized people pretended they didn’t.
“What does Vincent Caruso want with me?”
“That’s what I intend to find out.”
“I don’t know him.”
“I believe you.”
“Then why—”
“Because the ring Lily described belongs to men who work directly for him.”
My heart began pounding.
I looked at my daughter.
She was trying to make Mr. Buttons wave at the driver.
“Could this be some mistake?”
“No.”
The certainty frightened me.
Dominic saw it.
His voice softened.
“Claire, I am not asking you to trust me because of my reputation.”
“That would be an unusual sales pitch.”
A faint smile.
“I’m asking you to trust the fact that someone asked your child about your schedule.”
That ended the argument.
I climbed in.
Dominic sat across from us.
His men took the front.
Lily leaned against me.
Five minutes later, she was asleep.
Children can cross Manhattan alone in a taxi, casually meet an alleged organized-crime figure, eat chocolate cake, expose their mother’s private crying habits, and then fall asleep as if they merely spent an afternoon coloring.
I envied her nervous system.
Dominic watched the city through rain-streaked glass.
“Tell me about the last month at St. Catherine’s.”
I frowned.
“What?”
“Unusual patients.”
“It’s an emergency department in Manhattan. Define unusual.”
“Anyone who frightened you.”
“No.”
“Anyone who asked for you specifically.”
I started to say no.
Then stopped.
Dominic noticed.
“Who?”
“Three weeks ago.”
“What happened?”
“A man was brought in after a hit-and-run.”
His eyes sharpened.
“Name?”
“Anthony Bell.”
Dominic’s face changed.
“You knew him?”
He didn’t answer immediately.
“Describe him.”
“Late fifties. Gray hair. Surgical scar along his jaw.”
Dominic sat back.
“That wasn’t Anthony Bell.”
My stomach tightened.
“Who was he?”
“Enzo Marchetti.”
“Should that mean something?”
“He worked for my family for twenty-eight years.”
The phrase my family had a different weight when Dominic said it.
“What happened to him?”
“He died.”
“I know.”
“I mean before the hospital.”
“I don’t.”
Dominic leaned forward.
“Did Enzo give you anything?”
“No.”
“Say anything?”
I thought.
The ER had been chaos that night.
Blood.
Sirens.
A resident calling for imaging.
Enzo had drifted in and out of consciousness.
“He kept asking for someone.”
“Who?”
“I couldn’t understand.”
“Try.”
I closed my eyes.
Memory returned.
His hand gripping mine.
His voice barely there.
“Something about a bird.”
Dominic went completely still.
“A bird?”
“Maybe.”
“What else?”
“Blue.”
His jaw tightened.
“Blue bird?”
“Yes.”
Dominic looked toward Lily.
Then Mr. Buttons.
For reasons I didn’t understand, he asked:
“Did Lily come to the hospital that night?”
I frowned.
“She waited in the staff lounge for forty minutes because Mrs. Delaney was late picking her up.”
“Did she come near Enzo?”
“No.”
Then I remembered.
Lily had wandered from the lounge once.
I found her near the medication-room hallway.
A security guard brought her back.
She was holding Mr. Buttons.
And something else.
A tiny brass key.
She told me she found it.
I had been too overwhelmed to care.
My pulse accelerated.
“Lily.”
Dominic looked at me.
“What?”
I reached toward the stuffed rabbit.
Around its neck, hidden beneath nearly bald gray fur, was a thin pink ribbon.
Something hung from it.
A small brass key.
I had seen it dozens of times.
Never really looked.
Lily called it Mr. Buttons’ necklace.
Dominic stared.
“Where did she get that?”
“She said she found it at the hospital.”
He took a slow breath.
“May I?”
I removed the ribbon myself and handed him the key.
A number was stamped into the metal.
214.
Dominic looked like someone had punched him.
“What?”
He turned the key over.
A tiny blue bird had been engraved into the back.
My mouth went dry.
“Dominic?”
“Enzo didn’t lose this.”
“How can you know?”
“Because I gave it to him.”
The SUV suddenly slowed.
Dominic looked toward the windshield.
“What happened?”
The driver’s voice came back.
“Car behind us has been on us since Beluchi’s.”
Dominic looked through the rear window.
My arms tightened around Lily.
“What does that mean?”
His eyes met mine.
“It means your daughter didn’t just walk into my blind date tonight.”
May you like
He closed his fingers around the key.
“She walked in carrying something men are willing to kill for.”
