Chapter 7 - THE WOLF'S DEBT
I pulled Leo tighter against me, hiding his face in the folds of Adrian’s coat. My heart hammered wildly against my ribs, but I refused to take a step back.
"He's not yours," I said, my voice cutting through the settling dust. "His name is Leo, and he is my son."
Marcus Bellini smiled, a thin, humorless expression. He leaned on his silver-headed cane. "You raise a child with the blood of my enemy, and you think love changes his pedigree? The boy’s father, Tommy Rossi, stole millions from my syndicate. Adrian killed Tommy, took the boy, and thought he could use him as a bargaining chip. I’ve come to collect."
"Father, wait," Vanessa interrupted, stepping between Bellini and me. She pointed up at the catwalk. "Adrian is the one you want! He didn't bring the ledgers. He destroyed the money. Kill him!"
Bellini barely glanced at his daughter. He raised his hand, and two of his armed men stepped out of the SUV, raising their weapons toward the catwalk where Adrian was trapped.
Adrian panicked. He dropped the rifle, raising his hands in surrender. "Marcus! We can make a deal! The ledgers—I have the real ones! They're in a locker at the bus terminal, not the train station. I'll give you the key!"
Bellini shook his head slowly. "You always were a loud, pathetic creature, Adrian. I don't care about the ledgers anymore. I have a judge in my pocket who will throw out the federal case tomorrow. You have nothing I want. Except the boy."
"Why?" I demanded, shielding Leo. "He's just a child. His father is dead. The money is gone. What could you possibly want with an eight-year-old?"
Bellini’s cold eyes fixed on me. "Tommy Rossi didn't just steal money, Claire. He stole a list. The names and bank accounts of every corrupt politician on my payroll. And Tommy hid that list before Adrian killed him. For years, I’ve torn this city apart looking for it. Then, yesterday, my men found Tommy's old safehouse. We found an empty floorboard... and a child’s sketchbook."
Bellini pointed a gloved finger at the crumpled piece of paper Leo was still clutching in his small hand.
"The boy," Bellini said softly, "drew a picture of where his father hid the list. Give me the paper, Claire."
I looked down at the drawing. I had seen it a hundred times over the last three years. A crayon sketch of a woman with red hair and a man with a star-shaped scar. But looking closer now, in the harsh glare of the SUV's headlights, I saw what I had always missed.
They weren't just standing in a field. They were standing in front of a building with a very specific, stained-glass window. A church. St. Jude’s on 4th Avenue.
And drawn beneath the church steps was a small, black box with an 'X' on it.
Leo hadn't drawn his parents. He had drawn a map.
"If I give you the drawing," I said, my mind racing, "you'll kill us anyway to leave no witnesses."
"You are out of options, Mrs. Moretti," Bellini said, stepping forward.
"She has one," Rosa’s voice rasped.
I turned. Rosa had crawled over to the crushed remnants of the briefcase Vanessa had dropped. From the shattered debris, she held up the bloody silver Rolex—Tommy Rossi's watch.
But she wasn't just holding it up. She had unscrewed the back casing of the watch with her pocket knife.
"Tommy Rossi was a paranoid man," Rosa said, her voice echoing in the warehouse. She pulled a tiny, folded piece of waterproof paper from inside the watch's casing. "He didn't hide the list under a church. The drawing was a decoy for his kid. He hid the list inside the only thing he took to his grave... the watch Adrian took off his corpse."
Bellini froze. Even Vanessa gasped.
Adrian, watching from the catwalk, screamed, "Mother, don't you dare!"
Rosa looked at Bellini. "I know how this world works, Marcus. A trade. The list for the girl, the boy, and my own life. Let us walk out of here, and you can have the names."
Bellini stared at the tiny piece of paper in Rosa's hand. It was the master key to his empire. "And what about your son?" he asked, gesturing up at Adrian.
Rosa looked up at the catwalk. She looked at the man who had ordered her to send an innocent child to an orphanage. The man who had betrayed his wife and pointed a gun at his own mother.
"My son," Rosa said coldly, "died to me tonight."
She tossed the tiny piece of paper onto the concrete floor between them.
Bellini smiled. He gestured to his men. "Let the women and the child pass. Take Adrian Moretti."
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I didn't wait. I grabbed Leo's hand, took Rosa by the arm, and we walked past Bellini, past Vanessa, and out into the storm. Behind us, Adrian began to scream, begging his mother, begging me, as Bellini's men dragged him off the catwalk.
We didn't look back.
