Chapter 2 - The Girl Who Knew Too Much
Nick caught Rachel around the waist just as the sedan’s rear window dropped.
The first shot shattered the diner’s back-door light.
Rachel gasped as Nick dragged her behind the dumpster.
A second round struck brick.
“Stay down.”
“I was planning on it.”
Even terrified, she sounded irritated.
Nick leaned around the dumpster just enough to see the sedan rolling forward.
He fired once at its front tire.
The car swerved.
A man shouted.
Nick fired again, not toward the passenger compartment but at the pavement beside the wheel. The sedan accelerated toward the intersection and disappeared.
For several seconds, only rain remained.
Rachel stared at Nick.
“You shot at them.”
“They shot first.”
“That is not as comforting as you think.”
Nick shoved the Glock beneath his jacket.
“We need to move.”
“We?”
“Yes.”
“No.”
Rachel stood.
Nick grabbed her tote bag before she could walk away.
She stared at his hand.
“Give me my bag.”
“Whoever was in that car saw you with me.”
“So?”
“So Mickey came into the diner to kill me. You helped me escape. Now his friends just saw you standing beside me.”
Her expression changed.
Barely.
But Nick caught it.
Fear.
Real fear.
He handed the tote back.
“Where do you live?”
“That is absolutely none of your business.”
“Fine. Go home.”
Rachel blinked.
Nick nodded toward the street.
“Walk back to your apartment alone. Take your usual route. Open your usual door. Turn on your usual lights. And hope the men who just fired at us aren't waiting there.”
She hated that he was right.
Nick could see it.
“What do you suggest?”
“I have a place.”
Rachel laughed once.
“No.”
“You have a better option?”
“The police.”
“You recognized Mickey.”
Her mouth tightened.
“If you trusted the police, you would have called them the second you saw him.”
Silence.
That told Nick more than any answer could have.
He led her through two alleys before reaching a battered Chevrolet parked beside a closed laundromat.
Rachel stopped.
“You drive this?”
“What were you expecting?”
“I don’t know. Something with bulletproof windows and a license plate that says CRIME.”
Nick almost smiled.
Almost.
They drove without speaking.
Twenty minutes later, he pulled into the underground garage of an anonymous brick building in Astoria.
The apartment upstairs was almost empty.
One couch.
One table.
A refrigerator.
No photographs.
No mail.
No evidence that Nick Santoro existed.
Rachel stepped inside and slowly looked around.
“This is depressing.”
“It’s safe.”
“That doesn’t make it less depressing.”
Nick locked three separate bolts.
Rachel remained by the door.
“I’m leaving when the trains start running.”
“If it’s safe.”
“I wasn't asking permission.”
Nick pulled Mickey’s burner phone from his pocket.
“Then help me make it safe.”
He set the phone on the table.
Rachel’s face changed again.
“You took that from him?”
“You know the number?”
“No.”
“You recognize the phone?”
“No.”
“Then why are you looking at it like that?”
Rachel looked away.
Nick’s voice hardened.
“Rachel.”
Her eyes snapped toward him.
She had never told him her name.
Nick saw the realization land.
“You checked my name tag.”
“Yes.”
For some reason, that answer unsettled her more than it should have.
Nick placed both palms on the table.
“Tell me what you know.”
“I already did.”
“No. You told me enough to make me leave the diner.”
She folded her arms.
“You're remarkably ungrateful for a man who isn't dead.”
“And you’re remarkably calm for a waitress who just got shot at.”
“I’m not calm.”
“You hide it well.”
“So do you.”
That stopped him.
Rachel walked toward the window but stayed away from the glass.
“My father was a cop.”
Nick’s expression hardened.
“NYPD?”
“Yes.”
“Name?”
“Daniel Adams.”
Nick knew it.
Not personally.
But he knew the story.
Detective Daniel Adams had died eight years earlier after his car went through a guardrail near Red Hook. Officially, it had been an alcohol-related accident.
Unofficially, rumors had said Adams was investigating organized crime.
Rachel watched Nick’s face.
“You recognize it.”
“I’ve heard the name.”
“My father didn't drink.”
Nick said nothing.
“He was investigating Salvatore DeLuca before he died.”
Sal.
The lieutenant whose crew had just tried to kill Nick.
Rachel continued.
“Dad knew Mickey. I saw him twice when I was a teenager. Once outside our house. Once following Dad after church.”
“Why didn't you tell me?”
“Because I still don't know who you are.”
Nick considered lying.
Then he realized there was no point.
“Nicholas Santoro.”
The color drained from her face.
This time, she could not hide it.
“Oh.”
“You know the name.”
“Everybody in Bensonhurst knows the name.”
She backed away.
“You’re Nick Santoro.”
“Yes.”
“The Santoro family.”
“Yes.”
“And I just brought you out the back door of my diner.”
“You didn't bring me anywhere.”
“That's your defense?”
Nick ignored the question.
“Your father investigated Sal. Eight years later, Sal’s men come after me while you happen to be working ten feet away.”
Rachel shook her head.
“No.”
“What?”
“You think I set you up.”
“I think coincidences get people buried.”
Her expression hardened.
“Then let me leave.”
Nick looked at her for several seconds.
He walked to the door and unlocked it.
Rachel seemed surprised.
“I won't keep you prisoner.”
She put her hand on the knob.
The burner phone rang.
Both of them froze.
Nick looked at the screen.
Unknown number.
He answered without speaking.
A distorted male voice came through.
“You should have left the waitress out of it, Santoro.”
Nick’s eyes shifted to Rachel.
“What do you want?”
“Something she has.”
Rachel went completely still.
The voice continued.
“Ask Rachel what her father left behind.”
The call disconnected.
Nick slowly lowered the phone.
Rachel was already reaching for the door.
He stepped between her and it.
“What did your father leave you?”
“Nothing.”
“Rachel.”
“Nothing.”
Her voice cracked.
The first crack Nick had heard all night.
Then her tote bag slipped from her shoulder.
It hit the floor.
The zipper opened.
A lipstick rolled out.
Then a wallet.
Then a small silver key attached to a faded plastic tag.
Nick bent and picked it up.
Stamped into the tag were three numbers.
Rachel stared at it.
Nick looked at her.
“What does this open?”
She swallowed.
“My father’s train-station locker.”
Nick’s eyes narrowed.
“He died eight years ago.”
“I know.”
“And you've kept the key?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Rachel's face went pale.
“Because three days before he died, he told me that if anyone ever asked about locker 317, I was supposed to run.”
A heavy silence filled the apartment.
Nick closed his fist around the key.
“Someone just asked.”
Rachel looked at him.
“Yes.”
May you like
Outside, somewhere on the street below, tires screeched.
And for the first time that night, Rachel Adams understood that the warning she had written for a stranger might have reopened the secret that killed her father.
