Chapter 4 - THE CHILD'S DRAWING
The breath was knocked completely out of Hannah’s lungs.
I STARTED IT.
She stared at the thick black ink scrawled across her childhood drawing.
Twenty years ago. She was six years old. The foster home in Chicago had burned to the ground. The fire investigator had blamed Hannah, claiming she had been playing with matches near the stove. The guilt had haunted her entire life. It was why she never got adopted. It was why she believed she was fundamentally broken.
But the drawing in her hand meant she hadn’t started that fire.
Dominic Salerno had.
He had tracked her down when she was six. He had tried to finish the job he started when she was a baby.
“Hannah,” Vincent said, his voice pulling her back from the edge of a panic attack.
She looked up. Tears streamed down her cheeks, hot and angry.
“He tried to burn me alive when I was a child,” Hannah choked out, handing the drawing to Vincent. “He knew where I was. He’s always known.”
Vincent took the paper. His dark eyes scanned the words, a lethal fury hardening his features into stone.
“He was tying up loose ends,” Vincent deduced quietly. “But you survived. Again.”
Vincent looked down at his seven-year-old daughter. Sophia was clutching his pant leg, completely unaware of the terrifying violence closing in on them.
“Marcus,” Vincent ordered, picking Sophia up and settling her on his hip. “Get the car. The armored SUV. Meet us at the south service exit.”
“Boss, the perimeter is compromised. Dominic’s men—”
“Drive through them,” Vincent snapped. “We are not dying in this house tonight.”
Marcus nodded once, drawing his weapon, and sprinted down the hallway.
Vincent looked at Hannah. He didn’t see a clumsy waitress in a soaked uniform anymore. He saw a survivor.
“Stay exactly one step behind me,” Vincent said. “If anyone shoots, you hit the floor. Understand?”
Hannah nodded, pulling the oversized wool coat tightly around her body.
They moved quickly through the shadows of the estate. The ballroom was completely silent now. The power had been cut to the entire west wing, plunging the grand hallways into an eerie, moonlit darkness.
Sophia buried her face in Vincent’s neck. “Daddy, it’s dark.”
“Just close your eyes, sweetie,” Vincent murmured, holding a suppressed pistol steady in his free hand. “We’re playing a game. You have to stay perfectly quiet.”
They reached the south service stairs.
Vincent paused at the top of the landing, listening.
The faint, unmistakable sound of glass shattering echoed from the kitchen below. Boots crunched on the tile. Dominic’s men were inside.
Vincent swore under his breath. He turned to Hannah.
“We have to take the dumbwaiter down to the cellar,” he whispered. “It’s the only way to avoid the main floors.”
He led her to a small wooden door built into the wall of the corridor. He pulled it open, revealing a heavy metal box used for transporting laundry and food between floors. It was small. Too small for Vincent.
“Get in,” Vincent told Hannah.
She looked at the cramped, dark box. Panic flared in her chest. “I can’t fit in there with the coat.”
“Take it off.”
She stripped the coat off, tossing it aside. She climbed into the cold metal box, contorting her plus-size frame until her knees were pressed tight against her chest.
Vincent handed Sophia to her.
“Hold her,” Vincent instructed. “When you hit the bottom, push the metal grate open. Marcus will be waiting in the garage. Go with him. I will hold them off here.”
“No!” Hannah protested, grabbing his sleeve with her bandaged hand. “You can’t stay up here alone. They’ll kill you!”
Vincent looked at her hand, at his bloody handkerchief wrapped around her palm.
“Twenty-four years ago, I failed your mother,” Vincent said, his eyes filled with a terrifying, absolute resolve. “I will not fail you. Protect my daughter.”
He didn’t give her a chance to argue.
He hit the release lever.
The heavy wooden door slammed shut, plunging Hannah and Sophia into pitch blackness.
The dumbwaiter dropped rapidly, the pulleys screeching against the sudden weight. Hannah clamped a hand over Sophia’s mouth to keep the child from screaming, wrapping her other arm tightly around the girl’s trembling body.
They hit the bottom with a jarring thud.
Dust cascaded from the ceiling.
Hannah pushed against the metal grate in the darkness. It groaned, giving way, and she spilled out onto the cold concrete floor of the sub-basement.
She scrambled to her feet, pulling Sophia with her.
The sub-basement was a labyrinth of old brick arches and wine racks.
“Marcus?” Hannah whispered into the dark.
No answer.
Just the dripping of a leaky pipe in the distance.
Hannah’s heart pounded. She grabbed Sophia’s hand and moved slowly through the aisles of dusty wine bottles, heading toward the faint red glow of an exit sign at the far end of the cellar.
As they rounded the final row of shelves, a figure stepped out from the shadows.
Hannah froze, pulling Sophia behind her.
It wasn’t Marcus.
It was Dominic Salerno.
He was holding a suppressed pistol, but he wasn’t aiming it at her. He was leaning casually against a massive oak wine barrel, twirling a heavy ring of keys around his finger.
“Hello, Hannah,” Dominic said. His voice was smooth, cultured, and absolutely chilling.
Hannah took a step back, her mind racing. She had no weapon. No training. Just a terrified child hiding behind her.
“Where is Marcus?” Hannah demanded, trying to keep her voice steady.
Dominic chuckled. “Marcus is currently taking a nap in the garage. He really shouldn’t have trusted the estate manager’s intel. Eleanor worked for me long before she worked for Vincent.”
“You killed Eleanor,” Hannah stated.
“I terminated her employment,” Dominic corrected, stepping closer. “She became a liability. Just like your mother.”
Hannah felt a surge of pure, blinding anger cut through her fear.
“My mother was an accountant. She wasn’t a threat to you.”
“Clara was a thief,” Dominic snarled, his polite facade cracking for a second. “She stole thirty million dollars from my brother’s accounts right before she died. She hid it. And she took the key to the vault with her.”
Dominic raised his gun, pointing it directly at Hannah’s chest.
“I’ve waited twenty-four years to find you,” Dominic said. “Because if Clara hid the money, she would have left the key with her only heir.”
“I don’t have a key!” Hannah cried out. “I was in foster care! I had nothing!”
“Check your pockets, Hannah.”
Hannah froze. She remembered the heavy silver pocket watch Marcus had pulled from her apron earlier. Vincent had taken it. She didn't have it anymore.
“Vincent has the watch,” she said defiantly.
Dominic smiled a cruel, terrifying smile.
“I’m not talking about the watch, you stupid girl.”
Dominic pointed his gun toward her chest. Not at her heart. At her neck.
“I’m talking about the necklace,” Dominic said.
Hannah’s hand flew to her throat.
Tucked beneath the high collar of her cheap black waitress uniform, resting against her collarbone, was a thin, tarnished silver chain. She had worn it every day of her life. The orphanage director told her she was wearing it when she was found.
Hannah pulled the chain out.
Dangling from the end was a heavy, ornate silver pendant shaped like a teardrop.
“Open it,” Dominic commanded, cocking the hammer of his gun.
With trembling fingers, Hannah pressed the edge of the teardrop pendant. It wasn't solid silver. It was a locket.
The locket snapped open.
May you like
Inside, there was no picture.
Tucked perfectly into the silver casing was a tiny, gold micro-SD card.
