Chapter 4 - The Secret Thomas Ellis Left Behind
Grant reached the music box first.
He swept it off the table, carried it into the corridor, and placed it inside a reinforced evidence container. Dante lifted Ava from the bed while Dr. Reeve disconnected the remaining monitor.
“What is it?” Mara asked.
Grant examined a handheld scanner.
“No explosive material.”
The music continued to play inside the container.
A slow, delicate version of “You Are My Sunshine.”
Dante’s face tightened.
Elena had sung that song to Ava as an infant.
“Then what is the blinking light?” Mara asked.
“A transmitter,” Grant said. “Possibly audio, possibly location tracking.”
Dante looked toward the elevator.
“They know which hospital room she is in.”
Within five minutes, the pediatric floor was evacuated.
Ava was transferred through a maintenance corridor into a secure medical suite on another level. The official hospital records continued to show her in the original room.
Mara stayed beside her until Dr. Reeve gave her a mild medication to help her sleep.
Once Ava was resting, Dante gathered Grant and Mara in a consultation room.
The silver music box sat inside a sealed case on the table.
“Lorenzo gave this to her at my house,” Dante said. “That means he had direct access to my daughter hours before the restaurant.”
“You trusted him,” Mara said.
“I have trusted him for twenty years.”
There was no self-pity in Dante’s voice.
Only fury directed inward.
“He handled my father’s legal affairs. He arranged Elena’s estate after her death. He helped create Ava’s trust. He knows every property I own, every company connected to me, and every person authorized to act if I die.”
Grant placed a file on the table.
“We searched Lorenzo’s apartment and office. Both are empty.”
“When did he leave the hospital?” Dante asked.
“During the blackout.”
Mara looked at the music box.
“He wanted you to find this.”
Dante’s eyes narrowed.
“Why?”
“Because it frightened us and forced Ava to be moved. Maybe the transmitter was meant to track her, but it also revealed itself too easily. He may be controlling where we go.”
Grant nodded reluctantly.
“Every reaction we make gives him information.”
“Then we stop reacting,” Dante said. “We make him react.”
Mara looked again at the photograph of her father.
“First, I need to talk to my mother.”
Dante’s expression became guarded.
“Where does she live?”
“An assisted-living facility in Oak Park.”
“You said your rent is due in six days.”
Mara understood the unspoken question.
Her mother’s care cost more than Mara earned.
“I work two jobs. My mother’s pension covers part of it. I cover the rest.”
“What happened to her?”
“Early-onset dementia. Some days she remembers everything. Some days she thinks I’m still sixteen.”
“And she told you your father died.”
“Yes.”
Dante stood.
“We go now.”
Grant objected immediately.
“Ava—”
“You stay with her.”
“I’m your head of security.”
“Tonight, you are hers.”
Grant looked as if he wanted to argue, but Dante’s meaning was clear.
Ava mattered more.
Dante took two security men and drove Mara to Oak Park in an armored SUV. Dawn had begun to soften the black sky, and the city looked strangely peaceful after the violence of the night.
Mara stared out the window.
“You don’t have to come inside.”
“Yes, I do.”
“My mother may not be able to answer your questions.”
“I’m not going to interrogate her.”
“You interrogate everyone.”
Dante glanced at her.
“Not everyone.”
The assisted-living facility smelled faintly of lavender cleanser and warm oatmeal. A nurse led them to a small private room.
Evelyn Ellis sat near the window wearing a pale blue robe. Her hair, once dark like Mara’s, had turned almost completely white. A blanket covered her knees.
She looked at Mara and smiled.
“You came early.”
“Hi, Mom.”
Mara kissed her cheek.
Evelyn’s attention shifted toward Dante.
The smile vanished.
She gripped the arms of her chair.
“No.”
Mara knelt beside her.
“Mom, it’s okay.”
“No Morettis.”
Dante stopped several feet away.
“You know who I am.”
Evelyn’s eyes filled with fear.
“Thomas said they would come.”
“Thomas was my father,” Mara said gently. “I need you to tell me what happened to him.”
Her mother shook her head.
“Not here.”
“We’re safe.”
“No one is safe near Lorenzo.”
Dante’s expression became colder.
Evelyn looked at him again.
“You have Elena’s eyes when you’re angry.”
“You knew my wife?”
“She was kind to Thomas. Kinder than your father.”
Mara’s heart pounded.
“Mom, where is Dad?”
Evelyn began twisting the edge of her blanket.
“He found the false accounts. Lorenzo moved money through charities. Elena found out. She asked Thomas to make copies because she didn’t trust the family lawyers.”
Dante took one slow step forward.
“What false accounts?”
“Children’s foundations. Hospitals. Homes for widows.” Evelyn’s voice broke. “Lorenzo stole from all of them.”
Mara felt sick.
“What happened after Dad made the copies?”
“Thomas said Elena was going to tell you. But Lorenzo knew.”
Dante’s hands curled into fists.
“My wife died before she spoke to me.”
“Thomas tried to warn her not to take the lake road. The brakes—”
Evelyn stopped.
Her eyes lost focus.
“Mom?”
“I have to pack your lunch, sweetheart. You’ll miss the school bus.”
Mara closed her eyes.
The clear moment had vanished.
Dante turned away, jaw rigid.
Mara knew Elena’s death had been ruled an accident. Heavy rain. A sharp curve. A vehicle that went through a guardrail and into the lake.
Now the accident looked entirely different.
Evelyn suddenly grabbed Mara’s wrist.
“Music box.”
“What?”
“Your music box. The one with the dancing girl.”
Mara remembered it. A cheap wooden box her father had given her on her tenth birthday.
“It’s in my apartment.”
“Thomas hid the truth under the song.”
Her mother released her and began humming.
The same melody that had played from Lorenzo’s silver box.
“You Are My Sunshine.”
Dante looked at Mara.
“We’re going to your apartment.”
They left one guard with Evelyn and drove back toward the city.
Mara lived on the third floor of a narrow brick building beside a laundromat. The hallway light had burned out weeks earlier.
Dante entered first.
The apartment door was closed, but the lock had been scratched.
He motioned for Mara to remain behind him.
One security man drew his weapon.
Dante opened the door.
The apartment had been searched.
Drawers were overturned. Cushions had been ripped open. Books lay scattered across the floor. The mattress had been pulled from the bed and cut along one side.
“They were looking for the music box,” Mara whispered.
“Where is it?”
“In a storage bin above the refrigerator.”
The cabinet was open.
The bin was empty.
Mara’s heart sank.
Then she remembered the winter she had nearly thrown the box away because its hinge had broken. Her mother had stopped her and placed it inside an old flour canister.
She went to the pantry.
The canister remained behind two bags of rice.
Inside was the wooden music box.
Its paint had faded. The tiny ballerina no longer stood upright. Mara wound the key.
“You Are My Sunshine” played in slow, uneven notes.
“Under the song,” Mara murmured.
She removed the metal cylinder.
Beneath it was a thin brass key and a tightly folded strip of paper.
Dante unfolded the paper.
Three lines had been written in Thomas Ellis’s handwriting.
UNION STATION. LOCKER 317.
DO NOT TRUST THE VALE SIGNATURE.
ELENA’S DEATH WAS ONLY THE BEGINNING.
A floorboard creaked in the bedroom.
Dante spun around.
A masked man rushed from the doorway.
The first security guard tackled him into the wall. A second attacker smashed through the kitchen entrance and grabbed Mara by the shoulders.
She drove her elbow backward.
He cursed and tightened his hold.
Dante struck him once, hard enough to send him into the counter.
The first attacker broke free and lunged toward Mara with a knife.
Dante stepped between them.
The blade cut across his side.
Mara screamed.
Dante caught the attacker’s wrist, twisted it, and slammed him to the floor. The security guard pinned him down.
Blood spread along Dante’s white shirt.
“We need an ambulance,” Mara said.
“No.”
“You’ve been stabbed.”
“It’s shallow.”
“You don’t know that.”
Dante pressed one hand against the wound and looked at the captured man.
“Take off his mask.”
The guard pulled it away.
Mara recognized him.
He was Caleb Vale, Lorenzo’s nephew and a junior attorney who had attended Ava’s birthday dinner.
Caleb laughed breathlessly.
“You’re already too late.”
Dante grabbed him by the collar.
“For what?”
Caleb’s eyes moved toward the window.
Mara followed his gaze.
May you like
Black smoke was rising in the distance.
From the direction of St. Catherine’s Hospital.
