Chapter 5 - The Enemy Inside the Reed Name
Gabriel had spent seven years imagining what he would say if Marcus Reed ever returned.
None of those imagined conversations began with his uncle holding Jennifer Kelly hostage.
“Let her go.”
Marcus laughed softly.
“You sound exactly like Daniel.”
Gabriel’s hand tightened around the phone.
“Where are you?”
“You have something I need.”
“The ledger.”
“The original.”
Gabriel glanced at Ava.
Marcus continued.
“Bring the notebook and the drive. Midnight. Pier Nineteen.”
“No.”
Jennifer screamed in the background.
Gabriel’s jaw tightened.
Marcus chuckled.
“There. Now you understand the negotiation.”
The call ended.
Ava was the first to speak.
“We’re not giving him anything.”
Gabriel looked at her.
“He’ll kill Jennifer.”
“He’ll kill her anyway.”
Gabriel said nothing.
Ava stepped closer.
“People like Marcus don’t leave witnesses.”
Dylan pointed toward the laptop.
“What if we copy everything?”
“We already have,” Gabriel said.
“Then give him the originals.”
Gabriel looked toward his security chief, Elias Kane.
“Prepare the cars.”
Ava caught Gabriel’s arm.
“I’m coming.”
“No.”
“It’s my mother’s evidence.”
“No.”
“My family is already in this.”
“That doesn’t mean I’m putting you on a pier with armed men.”
Ava stared at him.
“You don’t get to decide everything.”
“I do when bullets are involved.”
“That might be the most mafia sentence anyone has ever spoken.”
Despite the danger, Dylan coughed to hide a laugh.
Gabriel glared at him.
“Sorry,” Dylan said.
At eleven thirty, Gabriel left.
Ava waited exactly four minutes.
Then followed.
She had learned something about powerful men during years of serving them.
They rarely looked behind them.
Pier Nineteen sat beneath an abandoned shipping terminal.
Rain swept across the river.
Gabriel arrived carrying a metal case.
Marcus waited beneath a rusted loading crane.
He was older than Daniel had been in the video but unmistakably Reed: tall, dark-eyed, composed.
Jennifer sat tied to a chair.
Robert Kelly stood beside her.
Gabriel stopped.
Jennifer stared at her father.
“You?”
Robert smiled.
“Did you truly believe I was a hostage in my own city?”
Jennifer’s face crumpled.
Marcus spread his hands.
“Families are disappointing things.”
Gabriel placed the case down.
“Release Jennifer.”
“First the evidence.”
Gabriel opened the case.
Marcus nodded to Robert.
Kelly untied Jennifer.
She ran.
Halfway toward Gabriel, Robert drew a gun.
Ava saw it from behind a stack of shipping containers.
“Gabriel!”
Gabriel moved.
The shot cracked.
Jennifer fell.
Chaos erupted.
Elias and Gabriel’s men opened fire toward the overhead lights, plunging half the pier into darkness.
Ava ran to Jennifer.
Blood stained Jennifer’s shoulder.
“You followed him?” Jennifer gasped.
“Apparently I make terrible decisions around your fiancé.”
“Ex-fiancé.”
“Right.”
Ava dragged her behind cover.
Gabriel appeared seconds later.
His fury was terrifying.
“AVA.”
“Complain later.”
Elias covered them while Gabriel lifted Jennifer.
Marcus and Robert escaped through the loading yard.
But the metal case remained.
So did the evidence.
At the hospital, Jennifer survived.
The bullet had passed cleanly through her shoulder.
Robert Kelly disappeared before sunrise.
Marcus vanished with him.
By morning, the city was exploding with rumors.
Gabriel sat beside Ava in an empty hospital corridor.
“You disobeyed me.”
“You’re not my employer.”
“I could be.”
“No.”
“I could buy the Gilded Rose.”
“You probably already own it.”
“Thirty-two percent.”
Ava stared at him.
“You’re unbearable.”
“And you followed me into a gunfight.”
“Jennifer needed help.”
Gabriel looked toward the hospital room.
“You hated her.”
“I didn’t hate her. I hated how she treated me.”
“She used you as bait.”
“She also warned us.”
Gabriel studied Ava.
“You always look for the part of someone worth saving?”
“No.”
“Then why her?”
Ava looked at him.
“Because someone has to stop deciding people are only the worst thing they’ve ever done.”
That struck deeper than she intended.
Gabriel looked away.
“My father did terrible things before he tried to stop Kelly.”
“And?”
“I spent my entire life defending his empire.”
“You didn’t know.”
“I benefited from it.”
“That’s different from choosing it.”
Gabriel’s eyes returned to hers.
“And now?”
“Now you know.”
Ava stood.
“So now you choose.”
She walked toward Jennifer’s room.
Gabriel caught her hand.
Not forcefully.
Barely.
A question rather than a command.
Ava looked down at their joined hands.
Then at him.
“What?”
“You make everything sound simple.”
“It isn’t simple.”
“Then why do you say it like it is?”
“Because complicated is what powerful people call things when the right answer costs them something.”
For several seconds, neither moved.
Gabriel released her hand.
But something between them had changed.
Jennifer was awake when Ava entered.
“You saved me.”
“Don’t make it sentimental.”
Jennifer smiled weakly.
“I deserved that slap.”
“You absolutely did.”
“I hated you when you did it.”
“Understandable.”
Jennifer’s smile disappeared.
“My father has been watching your family for years.”
Ava pulled a chair closer.
“Why?”
“Because your mother hid one thing that isn’t in the ledger.”
“What?”
Jennifer looked toward the doorway.
Then whispered:
“Proof that Robert Kelly didn’t order Daniel Reed’s murder.”
Ava frowned.
“Then who did?”
Jennifer swallowed.
“Marcus.”
Gabriel stood outside the partially open door.
He heard every word.
But Jennifer was not finished.
“And Gabriel?”
He entered.
Jennifer’s eyes filled with fear.
“Marcus didn’t kill your father alone.”
She reached beneath the blanket and removed a folded photograph she had hidden inside her torn evening dress.
She handed it to him.
Gabriel unfolded it.
Daniel Reed stood beside Marcus on the marina the night he died.
A third man stood behind them.
Gabriel stared at the face.
His breathing stopped.
“No.”
Ava came beside him.
“Who is he?”
Gabriel’s voice broke for the first time.
“My godfather.”
May you like
He looked at the man who had raised him after Daniel’s death.
“Elias Kane.”
