Chapter 2 - Everyone Knew His Name Except Me
By Monday morning, Gregory Davies’s office was empty.
Not cleaned out.
Empty.
His family photographs were still on the shelf.
His golf trophy still sat beside the window.
His expensive espresso machine still had water in it.
But Gregory was gone.
Human Resources sent a companywide email at 7:14 a.m.
Mr. Davies has been placed on administrative leave pending an internal investigation.
No mention of me.
No mention of security footage.
No mention of Leo.
I appreciated the first two omissions.
The third seemed impossible.
Everybody was talking about him.
I learned more about Leo Marchetti in twenty minutes of whispered office gossip than he had told me during two weeks in the alley.
The Marchettis controlled warehouses, trucking contracts, nightclub properties, private security firms, and a significant amount of dock access along the eastern seaboard.
Depending on which coworker whispered the story, Leo was either a legitimate businessman with dangerous relatives or the most dangerous relative with legitimate businesses.
Neither version comforted me.
At ten thirty, HR called me upstairs.
I expected concern.
Instead, I received paperwork.
Janice Keller, our director of employee relations, sat across from me with a legal pad.
“Norah, we take Friday’s incident extremely seriously.”
That sentence should have reassured me.
It didn’t.
People who truly care usually say your name before the company policy.
“We’ll need a written statement.”
“Okay.”
“And it would help if you could characterize the relationship between yourself and Mr. Davies.”
“There wasn’t a relationship.”
“Professional relationship.”
“He was my supervisor.”
“Any prior personal interaction?”
I almost laughed.
“You mean did I encourage him?”
Janice’s mouth tightened.
“I didn't say that.”
“You didn’t need to.”
Her pen stopped moving.
“I’m trying to establish a timeline.”
So I gave her one.
Every comment.
Every unwanted touch.
The copy room.
The break room.
The hallway.
The offers for drinks.
The performance-review implications.
She wrote until the pages turned.
Then she asked the question I had been waiting for.
“How do you know Mr. Marchetti?”
“I met him behind the building.”
Her eyebrows rose.
“That sounds worse than it was.”
“How many times?”
“A few.”
“For what purpose?”
“Coffee. Cigarettes.”
“You smoke?”
“No.”
Janice stared at me.
I rubbed my forehead.
“This is going badly.”
She closed the legal pad.
“Norah, Apex currently has multiple outside investigations occurring. Mr. Marchetti’s presence here Friday was connected to one of them.”
“The missing money?”
Her face became blank.
“What missing money?”
There it was.
I had said too much.
I stood.
“Apparently nothing.”
“Sit down.”
“No.”
“Norah—”
“You just spent forty minutes investigating whether I somehow invited my boss to put his hands on me, and now you're pretending you don't know about numbers your vice president discussed openly Friday.”
“I am protecting the integrity of several investigations.”
“And I’m protecting mine.”
I left.
My hands shook so badly in the elevator that I nearly dropped my phone.
When the doors opened on the lobby level, Leo was waiting.
Of course he was.
Black overcoat.
Dark suit.
Two men positioned far enough away to pretend they weren’t guarding him.
I walked past.
“Norah.”
I kept walking.
He followed.
“Give me a minute.”
“You’ve had two weeks.”
“For what?”
“To tell me who you were.”
We reached the revolving doors.
He stepped ahead and pushed one panel so I wouldn’t have to struggle with it.
I hated that I noticed.
Outside, wind cut between the buildings.
“Would you have stood in that alley with me if you knew?”
“No.”
“That’s why.”
I stopped.
“That is a terrible defense.”
“I know.”
“You deliberately hid it.”
“Yes.”
“You watched me complain about work while investigating my company.”
“Yes.”
“Were you using me?”
His answer came immediately.
“No.”
I wanted hesitation.
I wanted something I could attack.
Instead, he looked almost offended.
“Then why were you there every afternoon?”
His gaze moved toward the alley.
“I was watching someone.”
“Gregory?”
“No.”
That surprised me.
“Who?”
“Your chief financial officer.”
I blinked.
“Avery Cole?”
Leo nodded.
Avery Cole was fifty-eight, mild, married, and famous for bringing homemade muffins to quarterly meetings.
“What did he do?”
“That’s what I’m trying to establish.”
“And the money?”
Leo’s expression changed.
“You should stop working on those accounts.”
“No.”
“Norah.”
“You don’t get to order me around because Gregory is scared of you.”
“This has nothing to do with Gregory.”
“Everything suddenly has something to do with you.”
He lowered his voice.
“The discrepancy you found is connected to shell vendors moving money through Apex.”
“Illegal money?”
“Yes.”
“For you?”
His eyes hardened.
“No.”
“You expect me to trust that?”
“No.”
That stopped me.
“I expect you to verify it yourself.”
He reached into his coat.
I stiffened.
His hand stopped immediately.
“Phone.”
I nodded.
He removed it slowly.
Then opened a photograph.
A shipping invoice.
Apex letterhead.
Vendor: Ridgeway Therapeutic Services.
My stomach tightened.
“That’s Ben’s rehab center.”
“Yes.”
The invoice showed a medical-equipment shipment worth $216,000.
I knew enough about rehabilitation equipment to recognize the item description.
“Those machines don’t cost that much.”
“No.”
“What is this?”
“We believe Apex has been inflating healthcare shipments, then using the difference to transfer money.”
“Why use Ridgeway?”
“We don't know.”
I enlarged the photograph.
A signature sat at the bottom.
Authorized by Gregory Davies.
The cold had nothing to do with why my hands started shaking.
“He approved this?”
“And thirty-one others.”
I looked at Leo.
“My brother is there.”
“I know.”
“How?”
“Because you told me.”
My anger returned instantly.
“Right. In the alley.”
“Yes.”
“Was that useful information?”
His jaw tightened.
“Norah.”
“Did I accidentally help your investigation?”
“No.”
“How can I know?”
“You can’t.”
It was probably the most honest answer he could have given.
I looked again at the invoice.
Then I saw the date.
My mouth went dry.
The shipment had been authorized four days before Ben’s car accident.
“What does this have to do with him?”
“We don’t know that it does.”
“Don’t lie to protect me.”
“I’m not.”
“Then why are you showing me?”
Leo looked toward the building behind us.
“Because Gregory may not have targeted you only because he wanted you.”
The sentence turned my stomach.
“He may have needed you distracted.”
“From what?”
“Those numbers.”
I stared at the invoice.
For months, I had believed Gregory kept me trapped because he enjoyed power.
Now another possibility opened beneath my feet.
“What exactly was inside those shipments?”
“We're trying to find out.”
My phone rang.
Ridgeway Rehabilitation Center.
I answered immediately.
“This is Norah.”
A nurse spoke fast.
“Ms. Hayes, your brother had an incident during therapy.”
Everything else disappeared.
“What happened?”
“He’s conscious. But he fell.”
“I’m coming.”
I hung up.
Leo had already opened the door of a black sedan.
“No.”
“It’ll take twelve minutes in this car.”
“I’m not getting into your car.”
“Your brother is hurt.”
I hated that he knew which argument would win.
I climbed in.
Leo sat opposite me.
Neither of us spoke for three blocks.
Then my phone buzzed.
Unknown number.
One text.
STOP LOOKING AT THE VENDOR ACCOUNTS.
Below it was a photograph.
Ben.
Taken through the window of his rehabilitation room.
I stopped breathing.
Leo saw my face.
“What?”
I turned the phone toward him.
For the first time since I met him, Leo Marchetti looked genuinely afraid.
May you like
Not for himself.
For my brother.
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