Chapter 2 - THE NAME MY MOTHER MADE ME FORGET
“The kind a man named Castellano paid people to destroy.”
For a second, the hospital room seemed to tilt harder than my injured ankle ever had.
Dominic Reyes watched my face.
“You know the name.”
It was not a question.
I looked down at the silver cross around my wrist.
C.V.
Carmen Vega.
My mother.
“I heard it once.”
“When?”
“I was nine.”
Dominic’s expression sharpened.
The memory had always lived in fragments.
Our apartment kitchen.
Rain against the window.
My mother locking the deadbolt twice even though it was only six in the evening.
She had crouched in front of me and held both my shoulders.
“If anyone ever asks about Castellano, you don’t know the name.”
I had laughed because children laugh when adults become serious enough to frighten them.
She had not.
“Promise me, Elena.”
That was me.
Elena Vega.
Twenty-seven years old now.
And suddenly nine again.
“I promised her.”
Dominic sat back.
“What else did she say?”
“Nothing.”
“Elena.”
“I’m not protecting anyone.”
My voice came sharper than I intended.
“I genuinely don’t know.”
He studied me for several seconds.
Then nodded.
“I believe you.”
That surprised me.
“Why?”
“Because if you were lying, you wouldn’t look angry.”
“What would I look like?”
“Afraid.”
I gave him a tired stare.
“I’m also afraid.”
“I know.”
The honesty again.
I was beginning to dislike how much more unsettling it was than arrogance.
I touched the cross.
“What records did she go back for?”
Dominic looked toward the hospital window.
“My father controlled a freight company near the South Branch. Warehouses, trucking routes, union storage agreements.”
“Legitimate?”
His eyes returned to me.
“Some of it.”
“Helpful distinction.”
The corner of his mouth moved.
Then disappeared.
“Castellano was one of my father’s partners.”
“What first name?”
“Victor.”
Something cold moved through me.
Victor Castellano.
My mother had never said the first name.
Dominic continued.
“Twenty years ago, Victor handled several warehouse contracts and night-shift crews. My father believed he was skimming money.”
“That sounds surprisingly ordinary.”
“It became less ordinary.”
Victor had not simply been stealing.
He was moving freight through Reyes warehouses without recording it.
Cash.
Imported goods.
High-value cargo.
Sometimes containers belonging to other crews.
“Your father found out?”
“He suspected.”
“And my mother?”
Dominic looked at the cross.
“She knew.”
“How?”
“She worked payroll and night inventory.”
I laughed once.
“My mother told me she did office work.”
“She did.”
“She failed to mention it was office work for people who apparently owned half the docks.”
“That was probably intentional.”
“Thank you, Dominic.”
He accepted the sarcasm.
Three weeks before the fire, Carmen discovered duplicate shipment numbers.
The same truck listed in two places at once.
One legitimate load.
One hidden.
Victor was using the Reyes freight network to move private cargo while leaving the risk attached to Dominic’s father, Rafael Reyes.
“Why not fire him?” I asked.
“Because Victor had allies.”
“Of course he did.”
“He had three warehouse captains, a union steward, and two trucking companies dependent on him.”
“So your father needed proof.”
“Yes.”
“And my mother found it.”
Dominic’s eyes hardened.
“She found enough.”
The night of the warehouse fire, Carmen had copied ledgers.
Not official accounting.
Handwritten records.
Truck numbers.
Dates.
Payments.
Names.
Dominic had been at the warehouse because his father refused to leave him home during an internal family meeting.
“You were twelve.”
“My father thought boys became men by watching men lie to each other.”
I stared.
“That explains several things.”
Dominic almost smiled again.
Then his face changed.
“The fire started near the records office.”
“My mother pulled you out.”
“Yes.”
“And went back.”
“Yes.”
“For the ledgers.”
“Yes.”
My fingers tightened around the cross.
“She died for paperwork.”
“No.”
Dominic’s voice changed.
“She went back because someone else was still inside.”
I looked up.
“Who?”
He hesitated.
That hesitation frightened me.
“Dominic.”
“My younger brother.”
I stared.
“You have a brother?”
“Had.”
The word settled heavily.
“Mateo was eight.”
My anger disappeared.
“What happened?”
“Carmen thought he was still inside.”
“Was he?”
“No.”
Dominic looked at the floor.
“My father had already gotten him out through the loading bay.”
“So she went back for a child who wasn’t there.”
“Yes.”
For years, I had imagined my mother running back into the warehouse for records.
That hurt.
But this was worse.
Better.
Both.
She had gone back because she believed an eight-year-old boy was trapped.
“What happened to Mateo?”
Dominic’s expression closed.
“He died four years later.”
“How?”
“Car accident.”
The answer came too quickly.
I noticed.
He noticed me noticing.
“That isn’t the whole story.”
“No.”
“Are you going to tell me?”
“Not tonight.”
“That sounds convenient.”
“It is also true.”
Before I could argue, the hospital door opened.
Marco Bianchi walked in.
My manager.
He looked very different without nightclub lighting helping him.
Smaller.
Nervous.
The red marks his fingers had left on my wrist were still visible.
Dominic became cold instantly.
“Why is he here?”
Marco swallowed.
“I came to apologize.”
I stared at him.
“You tracked me to a hospital?”
“Mr. Reyes’s people told me.”
Dominic looked toward the security man outside.
Apparently somebody was about to lose access privileges.
Marco continued quickly.
“Elena, I shouldn’t have grabbed you.”
“No.”
“I was stressed.”
“Still no.”
“I thought you were making a scene in front of investors.”
“My shoe broke.”
“I know.”
He looked genuinely ashamed now.
That mattered.
Not enough.
But something.
“I’m sorry.”
I nodded once.
“Thank you.”
Marco seemed relieved.
Then Dominic asked, “Why did you really come?”
Marco went pale.
There it was.
He had not driven to a private hospital at midnight solely to become emotionally mature.
“I found something in her locker.”
My stomach tightened.
“What?”
He took an old photograph from his jacket.
Dominic stood immediately.
The photograph showed my mother.
Younger.
Standing outside a warehouse beside Rafael Reyes.
And Victor Castellano.
But there was another man.
Marco Bianchi’s father.
Giuseppe Bianchi.
I knew him from the photographs Marco kept in the manager’s office.
On the back, someone had written:
CARMEN HAS THE COPIES.
G.B. KNOWS WHERE.
Marco looked at me.
“My father worked that warehouse.”
Dominic’s expression became unreadable.
“You never told me.”
“I didn’t know.”
“Where did you find this?”
“In Elena’s employee locker.”
I stared.
“That isn’t mine.”
“I know.”
Marco swallowed.
“Someone put it there tonight.”
Dominic took the photograph.
“Who has staff-area access?”
“Employees. Security. Management.”
“And Castellano?”
Marco went still.
I looked between them.
“What?”
Dominic’s voice became quiet.
“Victor Castellano owns the other sixty percent of Obsidian.”
My pulse slowed.
I thought of the nightclub.
My shifts.
Marco’s complaints.
The weeks Dominic had been watching.
And the name my mother had made me promise never to repeat.
I whispered, “I’ve been working for him.”
Dominic looked at the photograph.
“No.”
May you like
His eyes hardened.
“You’ve been working where he could watch you.”
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