Chapter 3 - THE ENVELOPE UNDER THE FLOOR
Mara returned from Sadie's apartment at 11:42 p.m.
She did not bring the envelope.
She brought a photograph.
Sadie was sitting inside a penthouse guest room overlooking Manhattan when Mara placed it on the coffee table.
Ronan stood near the windows.
“What is that?” Sadie asked.
“Your bedroom.”
Sadie recognized the loose floorboard immediately.
It had been ripped away.
Her closet had been emptied.
Clothes covered the floor.
The mattress had been slashed open.
“No.”
She picked up the photograph.
“My money.”
“Gone,” Mara said.
Eighteen hundred dollars.
Two years of skipped lunches.
Double shifts.
Walking instead of taking taxis.
Coins hidden in tampon boxes because Carl never looked there.
Gone.
Sadie lowered her head.
She didn't cry.
That worried Ronan more than tears would have.
“I'll pay it back,” she whispered.
Ronan frowned.
“Pay what back?”
“The room. Security. Whatever this costs.”
“Nothing.”
“I don't take charity.”
“Neither do I.”
She looked up.
“What do you call this?”
“An inconvenience.”
Mara almost smiled.
Sadie did not.
Ronan walked toward the table.
“Mara found something else.”
Mara produced a small black object inside a plastic evidence bag.
A listening device.
Sadie stared.
“It was beneath your dresser.”
“I don't understand.”
“Carl was recording your apartment.”
“Why?”
“That,” Ronan said, “is what we're going to find out.”
Sadie's stomach tightened.
“You think this is about you.”
“I think Carl made a phone call and somebody immediately knew you were with me.”
Ronan crouched beside the table, careful to keep distance between them.
“Has Carl ever asked about your work?”
“All the time.”
“Customers?”
“Yes.”
“Private rooms?”
Sadie remembered questions she'd considered jealousy.
Who tipped you?
Who was there?
What did they talk about?
Did Hayes come in tonight?
Her face changed.
Ronan saw it.
“What?”
“He asked about you.”
“When?”
“Last week.”
The penthouse went silent.
“He asked whether you still used the Obsidian Room on Thursdays.”
Ronan exchanged a look with Mara.
“Thursday,” Mara said.
Ronan's jaw tightened.
Sadie looked between them.
“What happens Thursday?”
“A meeting that only six people know about.”
Sadie's heart began pounding.
“I didn't tell him anything.”
“I know.”
“How?”
“Because if you had, you wouldn't look terrified right now.”
She hated how easily he read her.
Mara's phone rang.
She stepped into the hallway.
Sadie looked toward the windows.
“I should leave.”
“No.”
“Carl wants information about you. I'm putting you in danger.”
Ronan almost smiled.
“You think Carl Jenkins is putting me in danger?”
“I think arrogance gets people killed.”
That actually made him smile.
It transformed his face.
For one second he looked younger.
Human.
Then Mara returned.
“We have another problem.”
She handed Ronan her phone.
Security footage showed Carl entering Sadie's apartment building at 9:18.
Seven minutes later another man entered.
Thomas.
Sadie's manager.
Her mouth opened.
“No.”
Thomas emerged twelve minutes later carrying Sadie's envelope.
Ronan watched the footage twice.
Sadie's betrayal settled slowly.
Thomas knew.
He had seen her work exhausted.
Seen the makeup.
Seen the flinching.
And he had still been helping Carl.
“Why would Thomas do that?”
“Money,” Ronan said.
Mara shook her head.
“Maybe not.”
She enlarged another frame.
Thomas was leaving the building.
Behind him, partially reflected in the glass entrance, stood a man in a camel overcoat.
Ronan became still.
“Who is he?” Sadie asked.
Neither answered.
“Ronan?”
His gaze remained fixed on the screen.
“My brother.”
Sadie stared.
Ronan Hayes had a younger half brother named Declan, a polished real-estate developer whose photograph appeared in charity magazines instead of crime reports.
The respectable Hayes.
The clean Hayes.
And apparently the man standing outside Sadie's apartment.
“Why is your brother involved?”
Ronan didn't answer immediately.
Because suddenly several unrelated problems had become one.
The waterfront union dispute.
Carl's questions.
Thomas.
The bug.
Thursday's confidential meeting.
Declan.
Someone had been using Sadie without her knowledge as an open window into Ronan's organization.
Mara spoke quietly.
“Thursday is a setup.”
Ronan nodded.
Sadie stood.
Pain tore through her ribs.
She caught the couch.
Ronan moved instinctively toward her, then stopped before touching her.
That small hesitation registered.
“Hospital,” he said.
“No.”
“That's no longer negotiable.”
“It absolutely is.”
“You might have a fractured rib.”
“I can't use insurance. Carl sees the statement.”
“We'll use a private physician.”
Sadie narrowed her eyes.
“You always solve everything with money?”
“No.”
Ronan's voice became quieter.
“Sometimes I use stubbornness.”
Despite everything, she laughed.
Then winced.
“Don't make me laugh.”
“I wasn't aware I had.”
“You didn't.”
“Good.”
For the first time that night, Sadie felt something unfamiliar.
Safe enough to argue.
The realization almost frightened her.
Mara interrupted.
“Doctor's downstairs.”
Sadie looked at Ronan suspiciously.
“You called one before asking me?”
“I predicted your stubbornness.”
“You're irritating.”
“So I've been told.”
“By women?”
“Mostly armed men.”
Another unwilling smile touched her mouth.
Then she remembered where she was.
What she was running from.
The smile disappeared.
The doctor confirmed two cracked ribs, severe bruising and a mild concussion.
When the examination ended, Sadie emerged wearing borrowed sweatpants and a sweatshirt.
Ronan was alone in the living room.
He had removed his jacket.
His sleeves were rolled to his forearms.
For the first time, Sadie noticed an old scar crossing his wrist.
“Your mother,” she said.
Ronan looked up.
“What happened to her?”
He was silent for a long time.
“My father killed her.”
Sadie's breath stopped.
“He wasn't convicted?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“People were afraid of him.”
Something bitter crossed Ronan's face.
“Including me.”
“You were a child.”
“I was sixteen.”
“That is a child.”
Ronan looked at her.
Perhaps nobody had ever said it to him.
Sadie sat carefully across from him.
“What happened to your father?”
“He died six years later.”
“How?”
Ronan's expression warned her not to ask.
She understood.
“I'm sorry.”
“So am I.”
A clock quietly marked the seconds.
Then Ronan placed something on the table.
Two hundred dollars.
Sadie stared at it.
“No.”
“That's what you were missing.”
“I told you—”
“It's not charity.”
“What is it?”
“An advance.”
“For what?”
Ronan leaned back.
“You know the Continental. You know Thomas. And apparently you've been hearing pieces of conversations Carl desperately wants.”
“You want me to spy for you?”
“No.”
“Good.”
“I want you to remember.”
Sadie looked at the money.
Then at him.
“What do I get?”
“Besides two hundred dollars?”
“Yes.”
Ronan's mouth almost curved.
“Your life back.”
She pushed the money toward him.
“That's worth more than two hundred.”
Something in his eyes shifted.
“Name your price.”
Sadie thought about Carl.
About Thomas stealing from beneath her floor.
About two years spent becoming smaller.
Then she met Ronan Hayes's eyes.
“I want Carl's badge.”
Ronan's expression sharpened.
“I want him exposed,” she continued. “Legally. Publicly. I don't want him disappearing into some alley because you got angry.”
Ronan studied her.
“You're giving orders in my house.”
“Yes.”
“And if I refuse?”
“I walk.”
He stared at her.
Then, slowly, he extended his hand.
“Deal.”
Sadie looked at it.
She did not take it.
Not yet.
“There's another condition.”
“Of course there is.”
“You never touch Carl.”
Ronan's jaw tightened.
“That's going to be inconvenient.”
“Promise.”
Long silence.
Then:
“I promise.”
Sadie finally shook his hand.
At that exact moment, Mara entered carrying an open laptop.
“You both need to see this.”
On the screen was security footage from the Continental.
Thomas stood inside the empty Obsidian Room.
He opened Ronan's chair.
Not beneath it.
Inside it.
And removed a tiny transmitter.
Mara froze the image.
“That's not the interesting part.”
She advanced the footage.
May you like
Thirty seconds later, Thomas looked directly toward the hidden security camera.
And smiled.
