Chapter 4 - The Rabbit With One Missing Eye
Adrian’s convoy was already halfway to Manhattan when Mateo called.
“Turn around.”
Adrian sat in the rear of an armored SUV.
“Why?”
“It’s a decoy.”
“Leo?”
“Maybe. But the estate was breached. Evan Pike and Celeste Arno entered Hannah’s room. They were trying to move Ellie.”
Adrian’s voice dropped.
“Is she hurt?”
“No.”
“Hannah?”
“Safe.”
“Then why would Falcone send people inside my house while I’m leaving?”
Mateo hesitated.
“Because Ellie may be the real target.”
Adrian looked out at the highway.
Cars blurred past.
“Explain.”
“Noah Carter may have worked for Falcone.”
Hannah’s dead husband.
Adrian’s mind moved quickly.
“What role?”
“Financial.”
“Evidence?”
“Celeste says he copied something before he died.”
“Where is it?”
“No idea.”
“And they think Ellie has it.”
“She said Falcone believes Noah hid a key with his daughter.”
Adrian closed his eyes.
The little girl who saved him had become a target because of sins committed before she could read.
“Bring Hannah and Ellie to the secure wing.”
“Already moving.”
“Vincent?”
“Still below.”
Adrian glanced at the road sign.
Twenty-two minutes to Fourteenth Street.
“What about Leo?”
Mateo said nothing.
That was the cruelty of the trap.
Turn back and abandon an eight-year-old.
Continue and risk a four-year-old.
Adrian had spent his life making decisions men called ruthless because hesitation got people killed.
This one was different.
Both choices had children on the other side.
He looked at his captain.
“Split the convoy.”
“Boss?”
“Two vehicles continue. No visible change. I return in the third.”
“And the rescue team?”
“Continue surveillance only. Nobody enters until we verify Leo.”
The driver exited.
Adrian’s phone buzzed.
Unknown number.
He answered.
Dominic Falcone’s voice was smooth.
“You disappoint me.”
Adrian looked at the captain.
“Trace.”
Falcone laughed.
“You think I’m stupid enough?”
“No. I think you enjoy hearing yourself speak.”
“Still arrogant after almost dying.”
“Still hiding behind children.”
A pause.
Then Falcone’s tone cooled.
“You don’t know what Noah took.”
“No.”
“You don’t know what that little girl is carrying.”
“No.”
“Then give her to me.”
Adrian’s jaw tightened.
“You know the answer.”
“You buried one daughter already, Adrian.”
Every man in the SUV went still.
Falcone continued.
“Do you want to watch another small coffin go into the ground?”
Adrian’s voice became almost calm.
“Say her name again.”
“What?”
“Lily. Say my daughter’s name.”
Falcone laughed softly.
“Why?”
“So when I find you, I remember exactly which sentence brought me there.”
Falcone hung up.
Adrian stared at the phone.
Three years of suspicion.
No proof.
Now Falcone had admitted knowledge of the bombing in the way powerful men often confessed—through confidence.
When Adrian returned to the estate, Hannah was waiting in the secure wing.
Ellie slept on a sofa.
The stuffed rabbit lay beside her.
Mateo stood over a table containing everything removed from Hannah’s room.
Clothes.
Medication.
Toys.
A small backpack.
Adrian looked at Hannah.
“Did Noah ever tell you he worked for Falcone?”
“No.”
“Did he leave anything with Ellie?”
“No.”
“Think.”
“I am thinking.”
Hannah’s voice broke.
“My husband died and I had to identify him at a morgue. Then debt collectors called before the funeral flowers were dead. I spent two years trying to keep my child alive and fed. If Noah left me some secret mafia treasure, he forgot to mention it.”
Adrian let her anger pass.
“Did he give Ellie anything unusual?”
Hannah looked toward the sleeping child.
“The rabbit.”
Mateo picked it up.
Hannah stepped forward.
“Careful.”
“What’s special about it?”
“Noah bought it the week Ellie was born. He fixed the button eye himself after she tore it.”
Adrian examined the rabbit.
One eye missing.
The other was black plastic.
The stitching along the back looked uneven.
“Was that always there?”
Hannah frowned.
“No.”
Mateo cut one thread with a small evidence knife.
Hannah winced.
Inside the stuffing was a waterproof capsule.
Everyone froze.
Mateo removed it.
A microSD card.
Hannah sat down hard.
“Noah.”
Adrian looked at the sleeping child.
Falcone had been right.
The key had been with Ellie all along.
Mateo inserted the card into an isolated laptop.
Encrypted files appeared.
One folder opened without a password.
It contained a single video.
Noah Carter appeared on screen.
He was thinner than in Hannah’s wedding photograph.
Afraid.
He looked into the camera.
“Hannah, if you’re seeing this, I failed.”
She covered her mouth.
Noah continued.
“Do not trust the police. Do not trust Falcone. And whatever happens, do not let them learn what Ellie’s blood can prove.”
Adrian leaned closer.
Hannah whispered, “What does that mean?”
The video continued.
“Ellie is not only my daughter.”
The screen flickered.
Then Noah said the sentence that changed every face in the room.
“She is a Moretti.”
Hannah sat beside Ellie while Mateo copied the memory card without opening any files. Her fingers moved through her daughter’s curls automatically.
“Did Noah sew?” Adrian asked.
Hannah gave him a strange look.
“Badly.”
“The stitching is bad.”
Despite herself, she smiled.
“He once repaired a kitchen towel and somehow made it shorter.”
Adrian looked at the rabbit.
“Then this could be his.”
“It could.”
The possibility hurt more than certainty.
Hannah remembered Noah sitting on the apartment floor the night before his supposed accident, turning Ellie’s rabbit over in his hands while the child slept against him. She had thought he was fixing a loose seam. He had kissed Hannah afterward and said, “Whatever happens, you are the bravest person I know.”
She had been irritated because he sounded dramatic.
Now she understood it as goodbye.
“Open it,” she whispered.
Mateo hesitated.
Hannah looked directly at him.
“That rabbit belonged to my husband and my daughter. Whatever is inside has already cost us two years. Open it.”
When the tiny capsule emerged from the stuffing, Hannah did not feel surprised.
May you like
She felt betrayed by the dead.
Then Noah’s face appeared on the screen, and even betrayal had to make room for shock.
