Chapter 3 - SOMEONE HAD ALREADY BEEN INSIDE MY APARTMENT
Dominic did not take us home.
I objected.
Loudly.
For approximately ninety seconds.
Then his driver circled my block.
My apartment door was open.
Not wide.
Two inches.
Enough.
I stopped arguing.
The SUV continued past without slowing.
I stared through the rain.
“I locked it.”
“I believe you,” Dominic said.
“Maybe Mrs. Delaney—”
“She doesn’t have your key, does she?”
“No.”
“Anyone else?”
“No.”
Lily slept against my chest.
I suddenly wanted to be sick.
Everything important to me was inside that apartment.
Birth certificate.
Photographs.
My husband Adam’s things.
Lily’s school papers.
The yellow mug she made me for Mother’s Day with MOM written backward.
Normal objects become precious the second you understand strangers have touched them.
“Call the police.”
Dominic nodded.
One of his men already was.
That surprised me.
Apparently I expected organized crime to reject emergency services on principle.
Twenty minutes later, two officers entered my apartment while we waited several blocks away.
Nothing had been obviously stolen.
But drawers had been opened.
Closets searched.
My mattress shifted.
One officer called me.
“Ms. Donovan, did you leave a filing box under your bed?”
“Yes.”
“It’s open.”
“What’s inside?”
“Looks like papers.”
My stomach tightened.
Adam’s papers.
My late husband had worked as a forensic accountant for a midsized investment firm downtown.
He died eighteen months earlier when a delivery truck crossed the center line in Westchester and hit his car head-on.
At least that was what I had been told.
For months afterward I barely functioned.
I learned to get Lily dressed.
Go to work.
Come home.
Cry quietly.
Repeat.
I never examined his work files.
I couldn’t.
Dominic watched my face.
“Who is Adam?”
I looked at him.
“How do you know his name?”
“You said it.”
I hadn’t realized.
“My husband.”
“Where is he?”
“Dead.”
Something changed in Dominic’s expression.
“I’m sorry.”
“Car accident.”
“When?”
“Eighteen months ago.”
His eyes held mine for a second too long.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“That was not nothing.”
He looked out the window.
“Let police finish first.”
I hated that answer.
We went to a hotel Dominic owned.
Not a penthouse.
Not some ridiculous mafia fortress.
A quiet suite on the twenty-second floor with two bedrooms and security posted outside.
Lily woke while Dominic’s assistant brought food.
She took one look around.
“Are we rich now?”
I covered my face.
Dominic answered before I could.
“Temporarily.”
“Cool.”
“Lily.”
“What?”
She climbed onto the sofa.
“Mr. Buttons wants noodles.”
“Mr. Buttons has no digestive system.”
“That’s rude.”
Dominic turned away.
His shoulders moved.
“You’re laughing.”
“No.”
“You absolutely are.”
Lily pointed at him.
“He likes me.”
“That’s what worries me.”
We ordered noodles.
After Lily ate, I put her in bed.
She immediately asked:
“Are we having a sleepover with Mr. Dominic?”
“No.”
From the living room Dominic said:
“I can hear you.”
“Good.”
Lily giggled.
I closed the bedroom door halfway.
Then returned.
Dominic had placed the brass key on the coffee table.
His expression was different now.
Businesslike.
“Tell me about Adam.”
I sat opposite him.
“Why?”
“Because men working for Caruso searched your apartment within hours of Lily appearing with Enzo’s key.”
“That doesn’t connect to Adam.”
“It may.”
I folded my arms.
“Explain.”
Dominic was silent.
Then:
“Enzo was investigating financial leaks.”
My pulse changed.
“What kind?”
“Money moving between companies connected to my organization and companies controlled by Vincent Caruso.”
I didn’t love how calmly he said my organization.
“Enzo believed someone close to me was giving Caruso access.”
“And the key?”
“I don’t know.”
“You gave it to him.”
“Blank.”
I frowned.
“What?”
“The key was blank when I gave it to him.”
He picked it up.
“No number. No bird.”
“Why would you give someone a blank key?”
“It belonged to an old safe-deposit system my father used. Enzo asked whether any remained.”
“You just handed it over?”
“He earned the right to ask questions.”
Dominic looked toward Lily’s bedroom.
“Two weeks later, he was hit by a car.”
My skin prickled.
“Like Adam.”
Dominic looked at me.
“Yes.”
“No.”
“I didn’t say—”
“Don’t.”
I stood.
“My husband fell asleep driving home after working seventy hours that week.”
“Claire.”
“The truck driver lost control.”
“You were told that?”
“Police told me that.”
“Did you see the report?”
I stopped.
I hadn’t.
Adam’s brother handled most of the paperwork because I could barely get through a morning without crying.
Dominic continued carefully.
“Do you remember the trucking company?”
“No.”
“Insurance carrier?”
“No.”
“I want someone to look.”
“Why?”
“Because coincidences become less convincing when people start searching a widow’s apartment.”
Anger arrived before fear.
“You don’t get to turn my husband’s death into one of your conspiracy theories because my daughter found a key.”
“I’m not asking you to believe anything.”
“You’re implying he was connected to criminals.”
“I’m asking what he did for a living.”
“Forensic accounting.”
Dominic’s face changed.
“What company?”
“Bennett-Kline Advisory.”
He stood.
That frightened me more than if he had shouted.
“Dominic.”
“Did Adam ever mention Moretti Shipping?”
“No.”
“Caruso Holdings?”
“No.”
“North Bay Logistics?”
I stopped.
That name.
I knew it.
Adam had taken a call during dinner once.
Lily had been three.
He walked onto the balcony and argued with someone.
When he came back, I asked what happened.
He said:
North Bay is going to get somebody killed.
I stared at Dominic.
“What?”
He saw the answer.
“He knew North Bay.”
I sat down slowly.
“He said the name once.”
“When?”
“A month before he died.”
Dominic took out his phone.
He made a call.
“Marco. Pull everything on Bennett-Kline Advisory. Eighteen to twenty-four months. I want Adam Donovan.”
He listened.
“No. Quietly.”
Then he hung up.
I stared.
“You just investigated my dead husband in front of me.”
“Yes.”
“At least you’re transparent.”
“I’m trying.”
“Try softer.”
He nodded.
Fair.
I looked toward Lily’s room.
“What happens now?”
“Police secure your apartment.”
“And the key?”
“We find what it opens.”
“How?”
“Enzo would have left a trail.”
“You’re assuming he intended you to find it.”
“No.”
His gaze shifted toward Mr. Buttons sitting crookedly on the sofa.
“I think he intended whoever found Lily to find it.”
That sentence made my stomach turn.
“Why would he involve a child?”
“He wouldn’t.”
“Then why give it to her?”
“Maybe he didn’t.”
I thought back.
The hospital hallway.
Lily wandering.
Security returning her.
Maybe Enzo had dropped the key.
Maybe Lily picked it up.
Dominic’s phone buzzed.
He looked down.
Then at me.
“What?”
He turned the screen around.
A photograph of Adam.
Office badge.
Bennett-Kline Advisory.
Below it was an internal client list.
One name highlighted.
NORTH BAY LOGISTICS — SPECIAL AUDIT.
I couldn’t breathe.
Dominic sat across from me.
“Claire.”
“No.”
“Adam audited a Caruso company.”
“No.”
“He did it six weeks before he died.”
I stared at Adam’s photograph.
My Adam.
Sunday pancakes.
Terrible dancing.
Reading the same dinosaur book to Lily seventeen nights in a row.
Nothing about him belonged in Dominic Moretti’s world.
Then another message arrived.
Dominic read it.
His expression hardened.
“What?”
“The truck that hit Adam.”
I felt cold.
“Who owned it?”
He looked at me.
“North Bay Logistics.”
The room disappeared around me.
“No.”
Dominic spoke quietly.
“I’m sorry.”
I stood so quickly the table shifted.
“No.”
“Claire.”
“My husband died in an accident.”
“I hope you’re right.”
“You just said—”
“I said the truck belonged to them. That isn’t proof.”
I wanted him to be wrong.
Needed it.
Then my phone rang.
Mrs. Delaney.
I answered immediately.
“Are you okay?”
Her voice shook.
“Claire?”
“What happened?”
“The police are here.”
I stood.
“Why?”
“Someone came looking for you.”
My blood turned cold.
“When?”
“About twenty minutes ago.”
“What did he say?”
“He said he was Adam’s old friend.”
Dominic was already watching me.
Mrs. Delaney continued.
“I didn’t let him in.”
“Good.”
“He left something outside your door.”
“What?”
“The police opened it.”
Her voice broke.
“Oh, honey.”
“What is it?”
“A photograph.”
My heart stopped.
“Of what?”
“You and Adam.”
I closed my eyes.
Our wedding photograph.
Then she said:
“There’s writing across his face.”
“What does it say?”
Mrs. Delaney began crying.
I gripped the phone.
“What does it say?”
Finally:
HE SHOULD HAVE STOPPED DIGGING.
I lowered the phone.
Dominic knew before I spoke.
I looked at him.
May you like
For eighteen months, I had mourned an accident.
That night I began mourning a murder.
