Chapter 4 - The Locker My Mother Paid for After Her Funeral
I did not go alone.
I wanted to.
That bothered Matteo more than the threat itself.
“You're not walking into an anonymous location alone.”
“You don't decide where I walk.”
“I can when somebody is baiting you.”
“No, you can advise.”
He stared at me.
“You're exhausting.”
“You've known me twenty-four hours.”
“An extremely long twenty-four hours.”
We compromised again.
I entered alone.
Matteo and Grant watched from two blocks away.
The storage facility sat outside Boston in a neighborhood of repair shops and warehouses.
Locker 214.
The manager confirmed it had been paid in cash for years.
The listed renter:
Anna Blake.
My mother.
My throat closed.
“When was the last payment?”
“Three months ago.”
I stared at him.
“Three months?”
“Yes.”
“By whom?”
“No idea. Envelope under the door.”
If my mother was alive, she would be sixty-one.
I unlocked the unit.
Inside:
One table.
Three metal boxes.
An old electrician’s tool case.
And a reel-to-reel recorder.
My mother's initials were burned into the leather handle of the tool case.
A.B.
I touched it.
For a second, I was fourteen again.
She used to come home smelling like dust, copper and peppermint gum.
I had forgotten that.
Memory is cruel that way.
Huge things disappear.
Tiny things wait forever.
The first metal box held electrical drawings.
Old Rinaldi buildings.
Municipal properties.
Private clubs.
Every drawing contained the same red marks.
Unauthorized circuits.
Surveillance routes.
My mother had discovered a network much larger than one building.
The second box held names.
Judges.
Detectives.
Developers.
Two mayors.
And Vincent Caruso.
The third box contained photographs.
One stopped me.
Vincent meeting Celeste Warren.
Twelve years ago.
Celeste looked barely twenty-five.
“How long have they known each other?”
I whispered.
A voice behind me answered.
“Longer than you should worry about.”
I spun.
A man stood in the doorway.
Gun lowered but visible.
Not Matteo.
Not Grant.
Vincent.
Of course.
“You followed me.”
“Yes.”
“Matteo?”
“Busy.”
My hand moved toward my phone.
“Don't.”
I stopped.
Vincent entered.
“Your mother was difficult too.”
My heartbeat thundered.
“You knew her.”
“Yes.”
“You killed her?”
He looked almost offended.
“No.”
“Then where is she?”
“I don't know.”
“Liar.”
“Possibly.”
He smiled faintly.
“You've become inconvenient very quickly.”
“What are you doing?”
“Preventing history from repeating itself.”
“That sounds threatening.”
“It is advice.”
I looked at the old recorder.
“Why preserve all this?”
“Anna liked insurance.”
“So do I.”
Vincent's eyes narrowed.
He realized too late.
I had activated my phone recorder before entering.
He reached for it.
A gunshot cracked outside.
Vincent turned.
I dropped behind the table.
Grant stormed through the doorway.
Vincent fired.
Grant fired back.
Metal screamed as a bullet struck shelving.
Then Matteo appeared.
“Enough!”
His voice was colder than the guns.
Vincent froze.
Matteo aimed directly at him.
“Drop it.”
For the first time, Vincent looked afraid.
He set down the weapon.
Matteo stared at the man who had apparently served his family most of his life.
“Why?”
Vincent smiled sadly.
“You think this is about you?”
“Answer.”
“You inherited an empire built by men stronger than you.”
“And?”
“You've spent seven years trying to make it legitimate.”
Matteo's jaw tightened.
“You call that weakness.”
“I call it suicide.”
There it was.
Ideology.
Not money.
Not merely power.
Vincent believed Matteo was destroying the old order.
“Did you build the surveillance network?”
Vincent said nothing.
“Did you kill Anna Blake?”
“No.”
“Who did?”
Vincent looked toward me.
“She isn't dead.”
My entire body went cold.
“What?”
Vincent laughed once.
“You people really know nothing.”
Matteo stepped closer.
“Where is she?”
“Ask your father.”
Silence.
Matteo stared.
“My father is dead.”
Vincent's expression changed.
Not enough to hide it.
Matteo saw.
So did I.
“Oh my God,” I whispered.
Vincent said nothing.
Matteo's father, Salvatore Rinaldi, had officially died seven years ago from pancreatic cancer.
Private funeral.
Closed family chapel.
Few photographs.
Matteo stepped closer until the gun nearly touched Vincent's chest.
“Tell me.”
Vincent smiled.
“Your father understood what happens when powerful men pretend they can retire.”
“Where is he?”
“Alive.”
Matteo's hand tightened.
“Where?”
Vincent looked at me.
“Maybe with her mother.”
Then the storage facility lights went out.
Not the building.
Only our row.
I heard movement.
Glass shattered.
Grant shouted.
By the time emergency lighting returned, Vincent was gone through a rear service window.
On the table, the reel-to-reel recorder had started spinning.
A woman's voice emerged through static.
My mother.
“Erin, if you're hearing this, then they found you too.”
I couldn't breathe.
The recording continued.
“Do not trust the man who says he wants to protect Matteo.”
Matteo looked at Grant.
Grant looked at Matteo.
Then my mother's voice added:
May you like
“Because the person who built the surveillance system has been beside him since childhood.”
And suddenly Grant's hand moved toward his gun.
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