He walked toward the window.
The lake beyond the glass was black, with the lights along Lakeshore Drive reflecting like broken gold.
When he turned back, his face was different.
Controlled.
Dangerously controlled.
“Why is Fletcher interested in Ben now?”
“I don’t know.”
“He’s Ben’s father?”
“Yes.”
“Does Ben know?”
“No.”
“Does Fletcher want custody?”
“Raymond doesn’t want children.”
“Then leverage.”
Amelia nodded.
“He wants me frightened.”
“Are you?”
She looked toward the bedroom where Ben slept.
“Terrified.”
Dante sat opposite her.
“Good.”
She stared at him.
“What?”
“Fear keeps people cautious. Panic gets them killed. You’re afraid, but you’re still thinking.”
“I’m barely thinking.”
“You protected your son for three years.”
“By hiding.”
“Sometimes hiding is strategy.”
She studied him.
“You sound like you have experience.”
Dante’s expression shuttered.
“I do.”
Amelia knew rumors about him.
Everybody did.
His father, Salvatore Castellano, had allegedly run illegal gambling operations throughout Chicago during the 1990s.
His uncle had been murdered outside a steakhouse.
Dante himself had never been convicted of anything more serious than a traffic violation.
But people stepped aside when he entered a room.
That kind of influence usually came from somewhere.
“Why are you helping me?”
The question made Dante lean back.
“You work for me.”
“That isn’t enough.”
“It should be.”
“It isn’t.”
Dante looked toward the hall.
“When I was twelve, my mother worked nights.”
Amelia waited.
“A man followed her home from work.”
His voice was flat.
“My father found him before police did.”
“What happened?”
“He never bothered her again.”
Amelia understood what he wasn’t saying.
Dante continued.
“My father believed fear solved everything. Sometimes he was right. Usually he created another problem.”
“And you?”
“I prefer leverage.”
“Is that supposed to reassure me?”
“No.”
Her phone buzzed.
Amelia jumped.
Unknown number.
Dante held out a hand.
“Don’t answer.”
Another message appeared.
You should have stayed gone.
Then a photograph downloaded.
Amelia’s face drained of color.
It showed Ben sleeping.
Not in her old apartment.
In Dante’s penthouse.
Taken minutes ago.
She sprang from the chair.
“Ben!”
Dante was faster.
He reached the hallway as two security men emerged from the elevator.
“What happened?”
“Lock everything down.”
Amelia ran into the bedroom.
Ben was still asleep.
Window closed.
Closet empty.
Bathroom empty.
No one inside.
Dante examined the photograph.
The angle was wrong for someone inside the apartment.
He moved toward the bedroom window.
Across the street stood another high-rise.
“Telephoto lens.”
One of his men swore.
Dante’s phone rang.
A security officer downstairs.
They had found an abandoned camera mounted inside an empty apartment opposite the building.
Whoever installed it was already gone.
Amelia sank onto the bed beside Ben.
“They found us in two hours.”
Dante said nothing.
She looked up.
“If they can find us here, where can we go?”
Dante’s gaze hardened.
“We stop running.”
“No.”
“You said Raymond wants something.”
“He wants the encryption key.”
“Then we give him something to chase.”
“You want to use me as bait?”
“No.”
“What then?”
Dante held up the phone displaying the photograph.
“We make him believe you still have the files.”
“He’ll come after me.”
“He already is.”
Amelia stood.
“You don’t understand Raymond. He enjoys hurting people.”
Dante’s expression became cold.
“Then he made a serious mistake tonight.”
“What?”
“He hurt someone in public.”
Amelia stared at him.
Dante continued.
“Men like Fletcher survive because their victims are isolated. Because everybody is afraid separately.”
He placed the phone on the bedside table.
“Tonight forty-three people watched him knock you unconscious.”
“So?”
“So tomorrow every one of them gets asked what they saw.”
“You think witnesses will save me?”
“No.”
Dante looked toward Ben.
“But witnesses change the battlefield.”
By dawn, the story had already reached local media.
WOMAN ASSAULTED INSIDE PRESTIGIOUS CHICAGO RESTAURANT.
Videos filmed by customers spread online.
Raymond’s face appeared everywhere.
The footage showed him striking Amelia.
It showed her falling.
It showed Dante entering seconds later.
And by eight in the morning, Raymond Fletcher’s attorney had obtained emergency bail.
Amelia discovered this from the television.
She stood frozen.
“No.”
Dante looked at his phone.
His security chief confirmed it.
Raymond was out.
“How?”
“Good lawyer.”
“He’ll come here.”
“No.”
“You don’t know that.”
Dante’s phone rang again.
This time his expression changed.
“What?”
He listened.
Then looked directly at Amelia.
“What happened?” she asked.
Dante ended the call.
“Fletcher didn’t go after you.”
Her stomach tightened.
“Where did he go?”
“To a private airfield.”
“Why?”
“He boarded a charter jet twenty minutes ago.”
“Going where?”
Dante hesitated.
“Las Vegas.”
Amelia’s heart stopped.
Ethan’s photograph had been taken outside a motel in Nevada.
Raymond wasn’t running away.
He was running toward her brother.
