Chapter 5 - THE CHILD'S DRAWING
Sadi drove like a madwoman, the heavy SUV tearing down the dark suburban roads back toward Chicago.
Roman was slumped in the passenger seat, pressing a makeshift bandage of Sadi’s torn slip against his bleeding side.
"Take the next left," Roman rasped, his eyes closed. "We can't go to my estate. The Morettis will have eyes on it."
"Where are we going?" Sadi asked, her hands gripping the steering wheel so tight her knuckles ached.
"Safe house. South Loop."
Ten minutes later, they pulled into an abandoned underground parking garage beneath a derelict textile factory.
Roman directed her to a heavy steel freight elevator.
They rode it to the top floor. Roman leaned heavily on Sadi, his blood staining the shoulder of her emerald dress.
He unlocked a heavy steel door, pushing it open to reveal a massive, open-concept loft. It was stark, minimalist, and heavily fortified with steel shutters over the windows.
Sadi helped Roman to a leather sofa in the center of the room.
"First aid kit in the bathroom," Roman grunted, peeling off his ruined suit jacket.
Sadi ran to the bathroom, returning with a fully stocked trauma kit.
For the next twenty minutes, Sadi focused entirely on the gruesome task of cleaning and packing Roman's gunshot wound. She was terrified, but her hands were remarkably steady.
Roman watched her the entire time. He didn't flinch.
"You're good in a crisis," Roman noted quietly.
"I clean up messes for a living," Sadi muttered, tying off a bandage around his torso. "Usually, they don't bleed this much."
She sat back on the coffee table, wiping blood from her hands with a towel.
She reached into her pocket and pulled out the tarnished bracelet she had taken from the hitman.
"Why did they steal this from my mother's house?" Sadi asked, holding it up. "It's worthless. My grandmother gave it to me, but I lost it years ago. Mom must have found it."
Answer One: The bracelet wasn't a family heirloom. It was a mechanical key.
"Look at the clasp," Roman said, his voice stronger now that the bleeding had stopped.
Sadi turned the silver bracelet over. The intricate floral clasp had a strange, geometric protrusion on the back.
"It's a skeleton key," Roman explained. "Custom milled. It opens a specific safe deposit box in the city. The box holding the twenty million your father stole."
Open Two: If the bracelet was the key, who knew where the physical box was located?
"Why didn't my dad just give the money back?" Sadi asked, tears prickling her eyes. "Why risk our lives?"
"Because he didn't steal it out of greed, Sadi," Roman said softly.
Reversal: Sadi's father wasn't a thief. He was a whistleblower.
"He found out my father was selling out our own people to the Morettis," Roman confessed, the shame evident in his dark eyes. "Your father drained the accounts to cripple my father's operation. He did it to stop a war. He was a hero, Sadi."
Sadi stared at the mafia boss, her worldview completely shattering.
"But why involve me?" Sadi cried. "Why did you hire me as a maid?"
Roman slowly sat up. He reached over to a small, locked side table next to the sofa. He opened it and pulled out a piece of faded, yellowed construction paper.
He handed it to her.
Sadi looked down.
It was a child's drawing. Done in cheap, waxy crayons. A drawing of a dark, tall building with a clock tower.
Sadi gasped.
"I drew this," she whispered. "I was seven years old. I gave it to my dad to put in his office."
"Your father left that drawing inside a secure file he sent to me before he died," Roman said.
Sadi looked at Roman, confused. "Why?"
"Because, Sadi," Roman said, his voice thick with an emotion that sounded dangerously like love. "Your father didn't hide the location of the money in a coded ledger. He hid it in the one thing he knew the mafia would never care to look at. A child's drawing."
Suddenly, the heavy steel door of the loft rattled violently.
Someone was entering the code on the electronic keypad outside.
"Roman," Sadi panicked, dropping the drawing. "Are your men here?"
May you like
Roman reached for his gun, his face hardening into stone.
"Only three people know the code to this safe house," Roman whispered. "And two of them are dead."
