Chapter 3 - The Safe Apartment
Adrian did not take us to a hotel.
He took us to an apartment on the thirty-second floor of a building overlooking Lake Michigan, with floor-to-ceiling windows, silent elevators, and security guards who knew his name before he spoke.
The apartment was beautiful in the way expensive things often are.
Everything was pale stone, dark wood, and clean lines. There were no photographs. No toys. No shoes by the door. No evidence that anyone actually lived there.
“It’s one of the company residences,” Adrian explained.
I stood near the entrance with Josie and Willa pressed against my legs.
“We can’t stay here.”
“You can stay tonight.”
“I can’t afford this.”
“You are not paying.”
“That makes it worse.”
Adrian looked at me for a moment.
“You have every right not to trust me,” he said. “But your home may be compromised, Travis has access to financial fraud connected to your identity, and someone sent you a threat within minutes of his arrest.”
He paused.
“You do not have to trust me. You only need to let my security team keep your daughters safe for one night.”
Willa looked up at me.
“Are there sprinkles here?”
The question was so unexpected that Luca, standing by the window, smiled.
“I’ll find out,” he said.
“I want rainbow ones,” Willa declared.
“Of course you do.”
Josie was quieter.
She had barely spoken since the supermarket. Her hand stayed wrapped around mine, and every time a door clicked or the elevator chimed, she flinched.
I crouched in front of her.
“Sweetheart, do you want to sit down?”
She shook her head.
“Do you want your bunny from home?”
A tear slid down her cheek.
“I want Daddy not to be mad.”
My throat closed.
“He is not your responsibility,” I said carefully. “None of this is because of you.”
“But he said we made you leave.”
I looked at Adrian.
His jaw tightened.
Travis had told the girls that.
Of course he had.
Abusers loved turning children into witnesses against their own mothers.
I gathered Josie close, holding both girls as tightly as I could.
“Your father made choices,” I whispered. “Bad choices. But you did nothing wrong. You hear me? Nothing.”
A knock came at the door.
Luca entered carrying a grocery bag.
“Emergency supplies,” he said. “Milk, vanilla ice cream, rainbow sprinkles, juice boxes, crackers, and an unreasonable amount of chocolate syrup.”
Willa looked at him with awe.
“You found sprinkles?”
“I have contacts.”
For the first time that night, she smiled.
Adrian watched the girls eat ice cream at the kitchen island while Luca found them children’s spoons from somewhere. I sat across from them, unable to touch the bowl he placed in front of me.
My hands were still shaking.
Adrian entered the kitchen with a thin folder.
“Travis was involved in a bribery scheme,” he said. “He worked with a subcontractor called Lennox Urban Group.”
“I’ve never heard of them.”
“You were not supposed to.”
He opened the folder.
“Lennox used shell companies to inflate invoices on city housing projects. Travis approved payment requests, then received a percentage through accounts created under stolen identities.”
“My identity.”
“Yes.”
I stared at the documents.
There were bank statements. Tax forms. Copies of my signature.
My name sat beneath numbers so large they looked unreal.
$96,000.
$148,000.
$211,000.
“I never saw any of this,” I whispered.
“He intercepted your mail. Changed your email address on some filings. Used an old laptop registered to you.”
I remembered.
Two years earlier, Travis had insisted on handling our taxes. He told me I was “too stressed” to understand paperwork. He said I should focus on the girls.
I had been exhausted, pregnant with twins, working double shifts, trying to survive his moods.
He had been building a cage around me with forms and passwords.
“What happens now?” I asked.
“First, we prove you were a victim. Then we find the people above Travis.”
“Above him?”
Adrian’s eyes went distant.
“Travis is not important enough to organize something this large.”
The apartment grew quiet.
Willa licked melting ice cream from her spoon.
Josie leaned against me, slowly falling asleep.
Then Adrian’s phone rang.
He listened for less than ten seconds before his face went hard.
“What?” I asked.
He ended the call.
“Your apartment was broken into.”
My stomach dropped.
“Was anyone there?”
“No.”
“My girls’ things?”
“Most of the apartment was untouched.”
“Then why—”
“Someone left something.”
Luca placed a photograph on the counter.
It showed me walking out of the supermarket holding both girls’ hands.
Someone had taken it from across the street.
Written across the bottom in red marker were the words:
MORETTI CAN’T SAVE YOU.
Adrian looked at me.
“This is no longer only about Travis.”
And even though I had known Adrian Moretti for less than six hours, I believed him.
Someone was watching.
Someone powerful.
May you like
And they were not afraid of him.
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