Chapter 6 - THE DOCTOR ZACH WAS AFRAID OF
Zach woke to three adults trying not to look worried.
Children noticed that immediately.
“What happened?”
“Nothing you caused,” Michael said.
Good first sentence.
Zach sat up.
Michael crouched.
“I need to ask you about Dr. Caruso.”
The boy’s face changed.
There.
Fear.
Michael saw it.
“So you are scared of him.”
Zach looked down.
“A little.”
“Why?”
“He asks weird questions.”
“What questions?”
“About you.”
Michael frowned.
“What about me?”
“Who comes to our house.”
“When Uncle Arthur visits.”
“Where Uncle Nico takes me.”
Michael’s jaw tightened.
“How long?”
Zach shrugged.
“Since kindergarten?”
Nearly a year.
“Did he tell you why?”
“He said doctor safety.”
“Did he tell you not to tell me?”
Zach hesitated.
Then nodded.
Michael inhaled slowly.
“That was wrong.”
“I thought secret doctor stuff was real.”
“Some medical information is private.”
Michael’s voice stayed gentle.
“But no adult gets to tell you to hide something from me if it makes you uncomfortable.”
Zach’s eyes filled.
“Am I in trouble?”
“No.”
Immediate.
“Never for telling me the truth.”
I sat near him.
“Did Dr. Caruso ever hurt you?”
“No.”
“Touch you in a way you didn’t like?”
“No.”
Relief.
Then Zach said:
“He had Mom’s necklace.”
Michael froze.
“What?”
“The angel one from the pictures.”
Michael’s face drained.
Elena had worn a small silver angel pendant almost every day.
It disappeared after the crash.
The family assumed it had been lost during emergency treatment.
“When did you see it?”
“In his desk.”
“Why were you looking?”
“I wanted a sticker.”
Six-year-old crime scene.
Of course.
“What happened?”
“He shut the drawer.”
“Did he say anything?”
“He said old jewelry looks the same.”
Michael stood.
Walked to the window.
Stopped.
He needed distance from his anger.
That mattered.
Federal investigators dug into Caruso’s finances.
Payments from Arthur.
Years of them.
Caruso had supplied medical information on multiple Moretti relatives.
Zach’s appointments gave Arthur routine access to questions about Michael’s household.
Then Caruso reappeared.
He walked into a state police station in Pennsylvania forty-eight hours after disappearing.
Arthur had not kidnapped him exactly.
He had forced him to leave New York under threat.
When Arthur went out to meet someone, Caruso fled.
His cooperation cracked the case open.
Five years earlier, after Elena’s crash, Arthur called Caruso before Michael reached the hospital.
Caruso removed Elena’s angel pendant from her belongings.
Why?
Because the pendant contained a tiny removable memory card.
Elena had hidden photographs of ledgers inside it.
Michael stared at the recovered necklace when investigators returned it.
“Where’s the card?”
“Arthur took it.”
But the necklace survived.
Zach had been right.
The family had been wrong.
Again.
Caruso also identified the mechanic who altered Elena’s brake line.
Tony paid him.
Arthur authorized the payment through a shell company.
The mechanic was found alive in Florida.
He cooperated.
The case no longer depended only on Elena’s letter.
There was money.
Witnesses.
Records.
Arthur was arrested outside Scranton four days later.
No shootout.
No private revenge.
His attorney negotiated surrender.
Michael stayed in Brooklyn.
With Zach.
When I asked why, he looked surprised.
“Because my son has spent a week thinking every adult he trusted might be lying.”
He glanced toward Zach drawing at my kitchen table.
“He needs me here more than Arthur needs to see my face.”
That may have been the moment I truly started falling for him.
Not when he walked through Bellarosa in a black suit.
Not when Tony’s men backed down.
This.
Choosing where his presence mattered.
Regina’s case moved too.
She accepted responsibility for misusing trust funds and helping Tony locate me.
She denied knowing about Elena.
Evidence supported that.
She had been greedy.
Desperate.
Cruel.
But she had not been part of the murder.
Truth needed precision.
Her lawyer negotiated a plea involving restitution, probationary supervision, and mandatory gambling treatment, with additional consequences for the trust fraud.
I recovered control of my property.
The number shocked me.
Enough income to live comfortably.
Enough equity to build something.
Michael asked:
“What do you want?”
Not:
What will you do?
“What do you want?”
“A bakery.”
He blinked.
“Seriously?”
“My father taught me.”
“Where?”
I pointed downstairs.
The empty storefront beside Bellarosa.
His mouth slowly curved.
“Do it.”
“That sounded like an order.”
He corrected.
“Please do it.”
“Better.”
Aurora’s Bakery opened four months after the night I met Zach.
Four months.
That timeline mattered.
The investigation was still ongoing.
Michael and I had not kissed.
Not yet.
He visited because Zach loved the bakery.
At least that was his excuse.
Zach became unofficial quality control.
Everything with chocolate passed.
Everything with raisins failed.
His methodology lacked sophistication.
Then one evening, after closing, Michael stood by the counter.
“No Zach tonight?”
“Teresa has him.”
“So you came alone.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
He looked almost uncomfortable.
“Dinner.”
I stared.
“What about it?”
“Would you have it with me?”
No threats.
No investigation.
No child arranging our marriage.
A date.
“Just dinner?”
“Yes.”
“No bodyguards at the table.”
“Nico will sit elsewhere.”
I raised an eyebrow.
“That’s not the same.”
“It is the best you’re getting while Arthur’s case is active.”
Fair.
“One dinner.”
His expression softened.
“One.”
From the kitchen doorway, Mrs. Bellarosa shouted:
“Finally!”
May you like
I covered my face.
Michael laughed.
