Chapter 4 - THE PAWNBROKER WHO REMEMBERED MY FACE
She survived the poison.
I stood in the freezing storage unit, my thumb tracing the black ink on the back of the child’s drawing.
My knees finally gave out.
I collapsed onto the concrete floor, the smell of ash and burnt lies filling my lungs.
For twenty-three years, I had believed my baby’s lungs simply weren't strong enough. The doctor had looked me in the eye, holding my hand, and told me it was a tragic, natural complication.
Poison.
If this note was true, my daughter hadn't just died. She was murdered.
And Dominic’s explanation about the hospital lockdown was a desperate, fabricated lie to cover up something much darker.
But whose child drew this picture?
Why was it hidden inside an incinerator bin meant to destroy my baby’s nursery furniture?
I carefully folded the drawing and slipped it into my coat pocket.
I couldn't go back to the mansion. I couldn't look at Dominic. The man I had loved for three decades was suddenly a terrifying stranger.
I needed help.
I needed Silas.
Silas Vance was a retired Chicago detective. He was sixty-eight years old, lived in a rundown apartment in the South Side, and was the only man in the city who didn't fear Dominic Moretti.
Twenty years ago, I had secretly paid for Silas’s wife’s cancer treatments when his insurance failed. He had sworn a blood debt to me.
I drove to his apartment and knocked on the peeling door at 2:00 AM.
Silas opened it, holding a baseball bat. When he saw my face, pale and streaked with rain, he lowered the weapon and pulled me inside.
I sat at his cramped kitchen table and told him everything.
Vanessa. The empty nursery. The deposit slip in the pocket watch. The ashes in the storage unit. And the drawing.
I placed the crayon drawing on the table.
Silas put on his reading glasses and studied it under the harsh kitchen light.
“Maggie,” Silas said, his voice gravelly. “If someone poisoned an infant in a hospital, it wasn't a random hit. That requires access. It requires a doctor or a nurse.”
“Dominic said Carlo Bellini paid him three million dollars the next morning,” I whispered.
Silas rubbed his eyes. “Carlo Bellini was a monster. But he didn't target babies. He targeted men. If he paid Dominic, he was covering the tracks of someone in his inner circle.”
“Vanessa’s mother?” I asked.
“Maybe,” Silas muttered. He turned the drawing over, looking closely at the paper. “Look at the bottom edge of this paper, Maggie. See the perforations? This was torn from a very specific type of ledger. The kind pawnbrokers use to keep off-the-books records.”
My heart skipped a beat.
“I know a guy who runs a pawn shop near the old waterfront,” Silas continued, standing up and grabbing his coat. “He does business with Dominic’s crew. Let’s go pay him a visit.”
The rain had stopped by the time we reached 'Gold & Goods' on 5th Avenue. It was 3:30 AM, but Silas pounded on the metal security grate until a grumpy, older man unlocked it.
His name was Arty.
When Arty saw Silas, he cursed. When he saw me, his face went completely white.
“Mrs. Moretti,” Arty stammered, backing away from the counter. “I don't want any trouble with your husband.”
I pulled the child’s drawing from my pocket and slammed it onto the glass counter.
“Where did you get this paper, Arty?” I demanded.
Arty looked at the drawing, and sweat broke out on his forehead.
“I didn't write that,” Arty swore, holding his hands up. “I swear on my mother’s grave.”
“Who did?” Silas asked, stepping closer to the man.
Arty swallowed hard. “A woman. She came in here about ten years ago. She was desperate for cash. She sold me a piece of jewelry, tore a page out of my ledger, wrote that note, and told me to give it to Dominic Moretti.”
“Did you give it to him?” I asked.
“No!” Arty said frantically. “I’m not getting in the middle of mafia secrets! I threw it in the trash. Dominic’s man, Paulie, must have dug it out.”
“What did the woman look like?” I asked, my voice shaking.
Arty looked me dead in the eye.
“She looked exactly like you, Mrs. Moretti. Just younger. Blonde hair. Green eyes.”
Vanessa.
Ten years ago, Vanessa would have been twenty-one.
But why would Vanessa write a note saying she survived the poison?
“What did she sell you?” Silas demanded.
Arty hesitated, looking terrified. “I still have it in the back safe. I never melted it down because I knew who it belonged to.”
Arty disappeared into the back room.
A minute later, he returned holding a small, velvet jewelry box.
He placed it on the counter and opened it.
I stopped breathing.
Laying on the black velvet was a heavy, silver rosary.
The beads were made of polished onyx. The silver cross was slightly bent at the bottom.
It was my rosary.
The one I had placed into my dead daughter’s tiny hands inside her casket before they closed the lid twenty-three years ago.
I reached out and touched the cold silver, my vision swimming.
“Arty,” I gasped, clutching my chest. “How did this woman get the rosary from my daughter’s grave?”
Arty shook his head, his eyes filled with pity.
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“Mrs. Moretti,” Arty whispered. “She didn't get it from the grave. The woman who sold me this rosary... she told me she was the baby in the casket.”
TITLE: THE GRAVE THAT HELD NOTHING BUT STONES
