Chapter 3: What My Mother Never Said
Joseph made one phone call.
He didn't raise his voice.
He didn't explain.
He said four words — "Secure the Bennett address" — and ended the call before whoever was on the other end could respond.
I stared at him.
"You just sent people to my mother's house."
"I sent people to watch the street.
There's a difference."
"Not to me there isn't."
"Audrey." He set the phone on the table.
"If Carbone's men identified you tonight, they already know where Rose lives.
My people arriving first is not a threat to her.
It's the only thing standing between her and one."
I wanted to argue.
I couldn't find the angle.
"Who is Carbone?"
Joseph was quiet for a moment.
He picked up the Polaroid and looked at it, not at me.
"Marco Carbone runs the north side.
Has for fifteen years." He set the photo down.
"He and I have an arrangement.
We stay in our lanes.
We don't touch each other's people."
"Then why would his men be here?"
"Because the arrangement has limits." His eyes came up.
"And because there's something Carbone has wanted from me for a long time that I've refused to give him."
"What?"
"That's not your concern tonight."
"It became my concern the second someone pointed a camera at my face."
He looked at me for a long moment.
Something shifted in his expression — not quite respect, but close to it.
"Your mother," he said carefully, "was not just someone I was with.
She knew things.
About my business.
About certain arrangements I had with people who are now very powerful and very dangerous." He paused.
"When she disappeared, I assumed she had run because she was frightened.
I never looked for her.
I thought that was the kindest thing I could do."
"And now?"
"Now I think someone else has been looking for her.
And tonight, they found something better."
"Me."
He didn't answer.
He didn't need to.
My phone buzzed in my apron pocket.
I pulled it out.
Mom.
I answered immediately.
"Audrey." Her voice was wrong.
Too controlled.
The voice she used when she didn't want me to know she was scared.
"Are you still at work?"
"Yes.
Mom, what's wrong?"
"Nothing.
I just — there's a car parked outside.
It's been there for an hour.
I don't recognize it."
I looked at Joseph.
"Is it a black sedan?
Two men in front?"
Silence on her end.
"How did you know that?"
"Mom, listen to me.
Don't go outside.
Don't open the door for anyone.
I'm coming home."
"Audrey, you're frightening me."
"I know.
I'm sorry.
Just stay inside."
I ended the call.
Joseph was already on his feet.
"She saw the car."
"Your car," I said.
"Yes."
"She's scared."
"I know."
"This is your fault."
He didn't flinch.
"Yes."
That stopped me more than an argument would have.
"I need to get to her."
"My driver will take you.
I'll follow separately." He held up one hand before I could object.
"I won't come inside unless you ask me to.
But I need to be close enough to know you both arrived safely."
I grabbed my bag from behind the bar.
Mr.
Collins watched from the far side of the room, pale and absolutely still, the way a man looks when he has decided that whatever is happening is entirely above his pay grade.
I stopped at the door.
"Joseph."
He looked at me.
"If anything happens to her because of tonight—"
"Nothing will happen to her."
"That's not a promise you can make."
He held my gaze.
"No," he said quietly.
"It isn't."
The car was waiting at the curb.
I got in.
The driver pulled into traffic without a word, and I watched the lights of the Golden Crown disappear behind us.
My hands were shaking.
I pressed them flat against my thighs and stared out the window and tried to think clearly.
My mother had left Chicago twenty-one years ago.
She had told me it was for a fresh start.
She had never mentioned Joseph Salvini.
She had never mentioned Carbone.
She had never mentioned any of it — not once, not in twenty years of dinners and birthdays and quiet Sunday mornings when I had asked, more than once, about my father.
*He wasn't someone who could stay,* she had said.
*That's all that matters.*
The car turned onto my street.
There were two vehicles I didn't recognize parked near the corner.
Joseph's men.
And across from them, half a block down, a dark blue car with its engine running and its lights off.
The driver's eyes went to the rearview mirror.
"Miss Bennett.
Don't get out yet."
His hand moved to his jacket.
My phone rang.
Unknown number.
I answered.
A man's voice.
Calm.
Almost pleasant.
"Tell Salvini that Carbone says hello.
May you like
And tell Rose that her twenty years of hiding just ended."
The line went d*ad.
