Chapter 2 - The Offer She Refused
At 8:14 Friday morning, Maxim Rosetti came back.
This time he brought no gunmen into the diner.
That frightened Bee more.
She was pouring coffee for a construction worker when the bell rang and Maxim walked through the door alone, dressed in a charcoal overcoat over a black suit.
Gina disappeared into the kitchen.
The construction worker suddenly became fascinated by his phone.
Bee put down the coffeepot.
“No.”
Maxim stopped.
“I haven't said anything.”
“I'm getting ahead of you.”
Something almost resembling amusement touched his mouth.
“I need you.”
“See? Still no.”
“I'll pay you five thousand dollars for one day.”
Bee froze.
Five thousand dollars was almost three months of her mother's assisted-living fees.
She hated that he could see her calculating.
“For what?”
“Lunch.”
“You need a five-thousand-dollar waitress?”
“I need someone who knows when she's being lied to.”
That was not the answer she expected.
Maxim slid a folder onto the counter.
Inside were catering menus, seating charts and photographs of men Bee recognized from newspapers. Developers. Attorneys. Shipping executives. Politicians.
And one photograph of a private dining room in Midtown.
“I have six men coming to lunch,” Maxim said. “One is stealing from me.”
“Call an accountant.”
“I did.”
“And?”
“He's missing.”
Bee slowly closed the folder.
“That's a pretty important detail.”
Maxim leaned closer.
“Three nights ago, you looked at an armed man and knew exactly how far you could push before he fired. You noticed Russo bumped you even though everyone else blamed you. And while I was insulting you, you looked twice at the diner window because you noticed the same sedan pass outside.”
Bee's stomach tightened.
She had noticed.
“You watch people,” Maxim continued. “People don't notice that you watch them.”
Bee folded her arms.
“Because I'm fat.”
His expression shifted.
“Yes.”
The answer was so immediate that she nearly slapped him.
But he continued.
“Men underestimate women. Rich men underestimate workers. Almost everyone underestimates someone they don't find threatening. You understand what that feels like.”
“That doesn't make it useful.”
“It can.”
Bee stared at him.
“Five thousand?”
“Cash. Legal. Catering consultation.”
“And nobody points a gun at me.”
“Agreed.”
“Nobody calls me a cow.”
A flicker of shame crossed his face.
“Agreed.”
“And if you shout at me—”
“I remember.”
Twenty minutes later, Bee was sitting in the back of a black sedan wondering whether financial desperation had finally destroyed her survival instincts.
The meeting took place inside the Belmonte Hotel, in a private room beneath chandeliers bright enough to make everyone look guilty.
Bee wore a borrowed white server's blouse and black pants. Maxim's men believed she was catering staff.
So did his guests.
That was the point.
For ninety minutes, Bee poured water and listened.
She heard shipping contracts.
Union negotiations.
A warehouse acquisition.
A proposed hotel development.
Numbers large enough to make her mother's nursing-home bill look like pocket change.
She understood almost none of the business.
But she understood people.
Mr. Kessler touched his wedding ring whenever he lied.
Anthony Russo—the broken-nosed bodyguard from the diner—never ate anything.
Victor Dane, Maxim's attorney, kept glancing toward a black telephone on a side table.
And one man, Luca Ferraro, became strangely tense whenever anyone mentioned Pier 19.
Then Bee noticed something else.
Every time Maxim referred to a shipment arriving Friday, Ferraro scratched beneath his watch.
Once.
Twice.
Three times.
When Maxim excused himself, Bee followed him into the service corridor.
“Watch Guy.”
Maxim frowned.
“Ferraro?”
“He's scared of Pier 19.”
“Why?”
“No idea.”
“That isn't enough.”
“Then here's something else. Your lawyer keeps looking at the phone.”
Maxim's face hardened.
“Dane?”
Bee nodded.
“And Broken Nose hasn't eaten.”
“Russo never eats during meetings.”
“He hasn't drunk either.”
“So?”
“So everybody else thinks they're at lunch. He thinks he's on duty.”
Maxim stared at her.
“You really do watch everything.”
“Occupational hazard. Try carrying six coffees through a room full of men who think your hips are public property.”
Before Maxim could answer, shouting came from the dining room.
They rushed back.
Ferraro was standing.
Dane was pale.
And Anthony Russo had a hand inside his jacket.
Maxim's voice became ice.
“Sit down.”
Everyone obeyed.
Except Bee.
She saw the movement beneath the table first.
A phone.
Ferraro was sending something.
Bee crossed the room and snatched it from his hand.
“What the hell—”
The screen showed only three words.
HE KNOWS. MOVE NOW.
Maxim read them.
His expression emptied.
“Move what?”
Ferraro said nothing.
Then every phone belonging to Maxim's security team began ringing.
His bald bodyguard answered first.
His face changed.
“Boss. Pier 19.”
Maxim turned.
“What?”
“Police raid.”
Silence.
“Warehouse is empty,” the bodyguard continued. “Someone moved everything twenty minutes ago.”
Maxim looked at Ferraro.
Then Dane.
Then Russo.
For the first time, Bee understood that she had not been invited to discover a thief.
She had walked into a war.
Ferraro suddenly lunged toward her.
Maxim caught him by the throat before he crossed two feet.
The room erupted.
Chairs overturned.
Men reached inside jackets.
Bee backed against the table.
Maxim slammed Ferraro against the wall.
“Who are you working for?”
Ferraro laughed through clenched teeth.
“You still don't understand.”
“Understand what?”
Ferraro looked past Maxim.
Directly at Bee.
“They weren't waiting for him to come here.”
Bee's blood chilled.
May you like
Ferraro smiled.
“They were waiting for her.”
