Chapter 2 - THE PHONE THAT RANG BEFORE SHE TOUCHED IT
Mave stared at the black box Leo had pushed across the desk.
“I already told you I can’t take this.”
“And I already told you it belongs to the company.”
“You are the company.”
“Exactly. Very efficient.”
Mave gave him a flat look.
“You practiced that answer.”
“No.”
“You absolutely did.”
Leo leaned back in his chair.
“I don’t practice conversations with employees.”
“Then maybe start. Most employers don’t greet people at two in the morning like a jealous undertaker.”
Carmine, who had apparently not fled as far as Leo hoped, made a choking sound from somewhere beyond the half-open study door.
Leo looked toward it.
The hallway became silent.
Mave smiled.
“See? Healthy workplace.”
Leo rubbed his temple.
“Take the phone.”
She reluctantly removed it from the box.
The device was sleek, expensive, and undoubtedly worth more than every appliance in her apartment combined.
“What’s the catch?”
“There is no catch.”
“Tracking?”
Leo said nothing.
Mave slowly looked up.
“Leo.”
“It is a security phone.”
“You put tracking software on it.”
“Of course.”
“Then I don’t want it.”
“Mave.”
“No.”
She placed it back inside the box.
Leo stared at her.
There were men in three countries who would have accepted surveillance implants if Leo Castiglion had asked in that voice.
Mave Bennett apparently found it mildly irritating.
“I am not wearing an ankle monitor because you had one bad night.”
“You disappeared for four hours.”
“My friend’s radiator exploded.”
“Cars do not explode in this city accidentally as often as people believe.”
“That might be the most mafia sentence you’ve ever said.”
Before Leo could respond, the phone inside the box rang.
They both froze.
Mave had never turned it on.
Leo’s expression changed first.
He picked it up.
No caller identification.
One incoming video call.
Mave frowned.
“Who has the number?”
“Nobody.”
“That seems less than ideal.”
Leo answered without turning on the camera.
The screen remained black.
For three seconds, nobody spoke.
Then a distorted male voice said:
“You bought her the phone too late.”
Mave’s face drained.
Leo stood.
“Who is this?”
The caller laughed softly.
“You should ask your housekeeper what she was doing at Pier Fourteen last night.”
The connection died.
Silence filled the study.
Leo slowly looked at Mave.
She had gone perfectly still.
That was worse than surprise.
“You were at Pier Fourteen.”
It was not a question.
Mave looked away.
Leo’s voice dropped.
“You told me you were at a diner.”
“I was.”
“Mave.”
“And after the diner, we drove past the waterfront.”
“You said the radiator failed in the industrial district.”
“It did.”
“Pier Fourteen is three miles in the opposite direction.”
She said nothing.
Leo walked around the desk.
“Who were you with?”
“My friend.”
“Name.”
“You don’t need her name.”
His eyes hardened.
“I apparently do.”
Mave folded her arms.
“Don’t do this.”
“Do what?”
“Turn fear into an interrogation.”
Leo moved closer.
“Someone just called a phone that became active less than five minutes ago.”
“Yes.”
“They knew I gave it to you.”
“Yes.”
“They knew where you were last night.”
Her expression finally cracked.
“I understand.”
“No, you don’t.”
The study door opened.
Giani entered without knocking.
That alone told Leo something was wrong.
His security chief was fifty-two, compact, gray-haired, and normally possessed the emotional range of a bank vault.
Now his face looked grim.
“Boss.”
“What?”
“We traced the call for seven seconds.”
“And?”
“It originated inside the estate.”
Mave stopped breathing.
Leo turned slowly.
“Inside?”
“The signal bounced through one of the internal network relays.”
“How many people are in the house?”
“Staff? Twelve. Security? Eight.”
“Lock the gates.”
Mave stepped forward.
“Leo—”
“Now.”
Giani disappeared.
Within seconds, the mansion changed.
Metal locks engaged.
Security doors sealed.
Men moved through corridors.
Mave stared at Leo.
“You just locked twenty people inside because of one phone call.”
“One of them may have made it.”
“Or someone hacked the system.”
“Yes.”
“You considered that?”
“I consider everything.”
“No. You consider everything dangerous.”
He looked at her.
“In my life, that’s usually accurate.”
A knock sounded.
Carmine entered.
His eyes briefly landed on Mave and then immediately relocated to the ceiling with such exaggerated discipline that she almost laughed.
“What?”
Leo asked.
Carmine cleared his throat.
“About the tow truck.”
Mave’s humor vanished.
“What about it?”
“We found it.”
Leo waited.
Carmine looked uncomfortable.
“Driver’s dead.”
Mave’s face went white.
“What?”
“Found behind an auto shop in East Narrows about an hour ago.”
“How?”
“Gunshot.”
Mave grabbed the edge of Leo’s desk.
Leo instinctively reached for her.
She pulled back.
“Who killed him?”
“We don’t know.”
“My friend?”
Carmine looked at Leo.
That was enough.
Mave stepped toward him.
“Where is Tessa?”
So now Leo had a name.
Carmine slowly answered.
“We went to her apartment.”
“And?”
“She’s not there.”
“Work?”
“Hasn’t arrived.”
Mave pulled out her broken phone as if she had forgotten it was dead.
“I need a charger.”
Leo took the device.
“Giani can recover the data.”
“I need to call her.”
“From what number?”
“Mine.”
“Your number may be compromised.”
“Leo!”
Her voice cracked.
Everything stopped.
Leo had heard Mave annoyed.
Sarcastic.
Exhausted.
He had heard her threaten a plumber with bodily harm for scratching imported tile.
He had never heard fear like that.
He lowered his voice.
“We’ll find her.”
“You don’t know that.”
“No.”
The admission surprised them both.
Leo looked toward Carmine.
“Bring every camera feed between the diner and Pier Fourteen.”
Carmine nodded.
“And find out who knew Mave’s schedule yesterday.”
“That’s most of the household.”
“Then question most of the household.”
Mave looked furious.
“Without breaking anybody’s legs.”
Carmine glanced at Leo.
Leo sighed.
“Without breaking anybody’s legs.”
“Very progressive,” Mave muttered.
Carmine almost smiled.
Leo did not.
Two hours later, they gathered in the security room.
Camera footage covered twelve monitors.
Mave sat beside Giani, still wearing her housekeeping uniform.
Leo stood behind her.
They watched Tessa’s old sedan leave Murray’s Diner at 10:18 p.m.
Tessa was thirty, red-haired, and laughed through the windshield while Mave apparently argued with the radio.
At 10:44, the car passed Pier Fourteen.
Leo leaned closer.
“Why?”
Mave hesitated.
“Tessa wanted to show me something.”
“What?”
“She got an envelope.”
Leo’s expression changed.
“From who?”
“She didn’t know.”
“Mave.”
“It had my mother’s name on it.”
Silence.
Leo stared.
Mave’s mother had been dead almost four years.
“What was inside?”
“She wouldn’t tell me at the diner.”
“So you went to the pier.”
“She said that was where whoever sent it wanted us to go.”
Leo nearly exploded.
“You received instructions from an anonymous person using your dead mother’s name and went to an abandoned pier at eleven at night?”
Mave looked defensive.
“When you say it like that—”
“How else is there to say it?”
“Without the judgmental eyebrows.”
“My eyebrows are the least of your problems.”
Even Giani looked like he wanted to laugh.
Leo pointed toward the screen.
“What happened at Pier Fourteen?”
Mave exhaled.
“We waited.”
“For?”
“I don’t know.”
“No one came?”
“No.”
“Then?”
“Tessa’s radiator light came on. Steam started pouring out. We left.”
Leo looked toward Giani.
“Sabotage?”
“Possible.”
The footage continued.
At 11:07, Tessa’s car pulled away.
Then Giani froze the image.
“Wait.”
He zoomed in.
A man stood beneath a warehouse awning across the road.
Long coat.
Dark hat.
Face obscured.
Watching.
Mave leaned toward the monitor.
“I don’t know him.”
Leo did.
His blood went cold.
“Zoom on his hand.”
Giani enlarged the image.
A silver ring gleamed beneath the streetlamp.
Oval black stone.
A small crest carved into its surface.
Carmine cursed.
Mave looked between them.
“What?”
Nobody answered.
“Leo?”
He stared at the ring.
He had seen one exactly like it throughout his childhood.
Every Castiglion captain once wore one.
The tradition had ended sixteen years earlier after Leo’s father was murdered.
Only a handful still existed.
And only one man Leo knew continued wearing his every day.
Mave followed his gaze.
“Whose ring is that?”
Leo answered quietly.
“My uncle Renato’s.”
Mave frowned.
“I thought your uncle lived in Sicily.”
“He does.”
“Then why is he standing at Pier Fourteen?”
Leo did not answer.
Because Renato Castiglion had supposedly suffered a stroke six months earlier and had not been able to walk without assistance since.
Before anyone could speak, another camera feed appeared.
Giani had found footage from a toll booth.
Tessa’s sedan.
11:42 p.m.
But Tessa was no longer driving.
A man was behind the wheel.
Mave gripped the desk.
“Where is she?”
Giani enlarged the passenger seat.
Empty.
Then the rear seat.
Something pale was visible behind the glass.
A hand.
Tessa’s hand.
Mave stood so quickly the chair rolled backward.
“Oh, God.”
Leo caught her shoulders.
“She may be alive.”
“You don’t know that.”
“No.”
Again, the truth.
Mave looked up at him.
“Find her.”
The words were barely a whisper.
Leo had commanded murders with less certainty than the answer he gave her.
“I will.”
Then the new phone buzzed again.
This time it was a photograph.
Tessa sat tied to a metal chair.
Alive.
Terrified.
A newspaper with that morning’s date rested against her chest.
Beside her stood a handwritten sign.
BRING THE MAID TO PIER FOURTEEN. ALONE.
Mave stared.
Carmine whispered, “That seems bad.”
Everyone turned toward him.
He lifted both hands.
“I’m working on tact.”
For one absurd second, Mave laughed.
A frightened, broken laugh.
Then Leo took the phone from her.
His gray eyes became cold enough to freeze the room.
“No one is bringing you anywhere.”
Mave looked at him.
“Tessa is there because of me.”
“No.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I know anyone who thinks I’m going to hand you over has made the last stupid decision of his life.”
Mave’s expression shifted.
“Leo.”
He turned toward Giani.
“Find Renato.”
Giani hesitated.
“Boss…”
“What?”
“Your uncle’s private plane landed in the city yesterday afternoon.”
The room fell silent.
Leo’s jaw clenched.
“And nobody told me?”
Giani looked pale.
“No.”
That was the moment Leo understood the call had not merely come from inside his house.
May you like
Someone inside his organization had hidden Renato’s arrival from him.
And whoever it was had known exactly when Mave would come home.
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