Chapter 4 - The Sister with the GunLucia Moretti had always been the person Vincent feared most.
Claire screamed and dropped behind the counter.
Michael grabbed her by the shoulders and pulled her toward the kitchen.
Vincent threw himself sideways from the wheelchair as another shot ripped through the display case.
Glass exploded over trays of cookies.
“Back door!” Vincent shouted.
Michael stared at him.
“Who are these people?”
“Move!”
Another round struck the espresso machine.
Steam hissed into the darkness.
Claire crawled toward Vincent.
He was on the floor.
“What are you doing?”
“Get away from the windows.”
She grabbed his arm.
“I’m not leaving you.”
“Yes, you are.”
“No.”
Vincent looked toward the street.
The gunmen weren’t entering.
That meant they weren’t there to execute him.
Not yet.
They wanted him moving.
They wanted him scared.
Or they wanted confirmation.
Dante knew better than to fire into a public storefront unless something had gone catastrophically wrong.
Vincent reached beneath his pant leg and pulled a small folding knife from inside his boot.
Michael’s expression hardened.
“Who the hell are you?”
Vincent cut a strip from the bottom of his shirt and wrapped it around Claire’s bleeding palm.
She hadn’t even noticed she had been cut.
“Later.”
The gunfire stopped.
Silence became worse.
Vincent glanced at the rear hallway.
“How many exits?”
“Front and alley,” Claire said.
“Basement?”
“Storage cellar. Old coal chute.”
“Where does it open?”
“Side alley behind Turner Pharmacy.”
Vincent nodded.
“We use that.”
Michael grabbed a heavy rolling pin.
Vincent almost smiled.
“You planning to bake them to death?”
“It’s maple.”
“Fair.”
They moved into the basement.
Vincent could stand, but only briefly.
His limp was genuine.
Three years earlier, a car bomb meant for him had killed his driver and shattered part of his hip.
He had spent six months learning to walk again.
The wheelchair had started as a disguise.
Now it was necessity.
Claire descended first.
Michael helped Vincent down the narrow steps.
When they reached the cellar, Claire shoved sacks of flour aside, revealing an iron hatch near the wall.
“Mom used to complain about this thing.”
Michael forced it open.
Cold rain blew inside.
Vincent looked at him.
“You first.”
Michael shook his head.
“My daughter.”
“Your daughter follows you.”
Michael hated that the stranger was giving orders.
But he obeyed.
Claire crouched near Vincent.
“What about you?”
“I’ll follow.”
“You can barely stand.”
“Then I’ll crawl.”
Her face tightened.
“No.”
“Claire.”
“You know my name. I still don’t know yours.”
“Vincent.”
“Your whole name.”
He hesitated.
Outside, footsteps entered the bakery.
Michael whispered urgently, “Claire.”
She refused to move.
Vincent heard boards creaking overhead.
He looked into her eyes.
“Vincent Moretti.”
Nothing happened for one second.
Then Claire’s face emptied.
Michael went completely still.
The name reached them before recognition fully did.
Moretti.
The newspapers.
The trials.
The port unions.
The restaurants that burned.
The vanished witnesses.
Rumors that traveled through every small town between Pittsburgh and Charleston.
Claire whispered, “That Vincent Moretti?”
“Yes.”
Michael’s fist tightened.
“You brought this to my shop?”
“I didn’t know I was followed.”
“You expect me to believe that?”
“No.”
Footsteps reached the basement door.
Vincent grabbed Claire’s arm.
“Be angry later.”
They climbed through the coal chute.
Michael went first.
Claire followed.
Vincent pulled himself through last, every movement sending pain through his hip.
The alley smelled like rain and garbage.
They had barely moved twenty feet when the basement door crashed open behind them.
“Run,” Vincent said.
Claire helped him.
They reached Turner Pharmacy.
Locked.
Michael pounded the glass.
Nothing.
Vincent looked down the street.
Two figures emerged from the alley.
Dante wasn’t among them.
Mercenaries.
Vincent recognized one.
Cal Henson.
Former county deputy.
Discharged for excessive force.
Now private muscle.
Vincent had refused to hire him two years earlier.
Interesting.
“Moretti!” Henson shouted.
Vincent pushed Claire behind him.
Michael stared.
“You don’t even have a gun.”
“No.”
“Then what exactly are you planning?”
Vincent looked at Henson.
“To negotiate.”
Claire gave a disbelieving laugh.
“With bullets?”
“That’s usually when people negotiate.”
Henson raised his weapon.
“Boss says you come with us.”
“Which boss?”
“You know.”
“I’d like to hear you say it.”
Henson stepped closer.
“Dante.”
There it was.
Confirmed.
Vincent felt less pain now.
Betrayal was an excellent anesthetic.
“Dante works for me.”
“Not anymore.”
Henson smiled.
“He says the family needed a man who still had a stomach.”
Vincent’s expression did not change.
“And shooting bakers proves his?”
Henson shrugged.
“Collateral damage.”
Vincent saw Claire flinch.
That was enough.
He tilted his head.
“You know what Dante forgot to tell you?”
Henson frowned.
Vincent continued.
“Why nobody has killed me in twenty years.”
A vehicle roared into the alley.
Henson turned.
A rusted bakery delivery van slammed into a row of garbage cans, scattering both gunmen.
Michael stared.
“Who—”
The driver’s door flew open.
A woman in her sixties leaned across the seat.
“Get in!”
Claire shouted, “Aunt Rosa?”
Vincent didn’t ask questions.
They climbed inside.
Rosa Bennett drove like a woman who considered traffic laws personal insults.
She shot through two alleys, jumped a curb, and nearly sideswiped a police cruiser.
Claire looked back.
“Are they following?”
“No,” Michael said.
Vincent knew better.
“They will.”
Rosa looked at him through the mirror.
“You the reason someone shot my brother’s bakery?”
“Yes.”
She nodded.
Then punched him in the mouth.
Vincent’s head snapped sideways.
Claire gasped.
“Aunt Rosa!”
Rosa kept driving.
“That’s for the window.”
Vincent touched his lip.
Blood.
He almost laughed.
“I respect that.”
“I don’t care.”
They drove six miles outside Cedar Hollow to a farmhouse hidden behind rows of dead corn.
Rosa parked inside an old equipment shed.
Michael immediately turned on Vincent.
“Start talking.”
Vincent sat on a wooden crate.
Claire remained near the door.
She hadn’t looked directly at him since learning his name.
That bothered him more than Henson’s gun.
“I left my organization four days ago.”
Michael scoffed.
“Men like you don’t leave.”
“Apparently not.”
“Why?”
Vincent looked at Claire.
“My father died.”
“So?”
“He left me a letter.”
Michael folded his arms.
“You got shot at because of a letter?”
“No. I got shot at because my absence created opportunity.”
Claire finally spoke.
“Dante.”
“Yes.”
“Your cousin?”
“Yes.”
She knew more than he expected.
“News said he was your second-in-command.”
“News exaggerates.”
“He isn’t?”
“He was first.”
Michael paced.
“You need to get out.”
“I know.”
“Tonight.”
“Yes.”
Claire said, “And then what?”
Michael stared at her.
“What do you mean?”
“If he leaves, those men disappear?”
Vincent said nothing.
Claire looked at him.
“They know where the bakery is. They know who we are.”
“Yes.”
“So we’re already involved.”
Michael’s face darkened.
“No, we are not.”
Vincent stood slowly.
Michael grabbed the rolling pin again.
“I’m not threatening you.”
“Good.”
“I’m telling you the truth.”
He looked at all three Bennetts.
“Dante won’t assume you’re innocent.”
Rosa leaned against the van.
“What will he assume?”
“That I trusted you.”
Claire frowned.
“But you don’t.”
“No.”
That hurt her.
Vincent corrected himself.
“I shouldn’t.”
The distinction mattered.
Michael said, “Police.”
Vincent shook his head.
“Dante owns two officers in Cedar Hollow and at least one sheriff’s deputy.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I used to pay them.”
Silence.
That sentence changed the room.
Until then, Vincent had been dangerous in theory.
Now he was confessing to the machinery of that danger.
Claire’s voice turned cold.
“How many lives have you ruined?”
Vincent looked at her.
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know?”
“No.”
“That’s worse.”
“Yes.”
He did not defend himself.
For some reason, that made Claire angrier.
She walked outside.
Vincent started after her.
Michael blocked him.
“Don’t.”
Vincent stopped.
Michael lowered his voice.
“My daughter believes everyone can be saved.”
“I don’t.”
“No. You look like a man who stopped believing that about himself a long time ago.”
Vincent’s jaw tightened.
Michael continued.
“Don’t use her kindness as permission to drag her into whatever you are.”
“I won’t.”
“Promise?”
Vincent looked toward the farmhouse door.
“I stopped making promises I couldn’t guarantee.”
Michael studied him.
“Then guarantee this.”
He pointed toward Claire.
“She lives.”
Vincent answered immediately.
“She lives.”
The farmhouse lights suddenly died.
Rosa swore.
Michael turned toward the electrical panel.
Vincent froze.
“Don’t move.”
A second later, headlights appeared beyond the cornfield.
Not one vehicle.
Five.
Vincent looked through the narrow window.
Black SUVs.
Claire rushed back inside.
“What is it?”
Vincent stared at the approaching convoy.
For the first time since the bakery shooting, genuine confusion crossed his face.
Those vehicles were not Dante’s.
He knew the pattern.
He knew the drivers.
He knew the security formation.
Claire saw his expression.
“Who are they?”
Vincent whispered one name.
“Family.”
The SUVs surrounded the farmhouse.
Doors opened.
Men in dark suits stepped into the rain.
Then a woman emerged from the center vehicle.
Tall.
Silver hair.
Black coat.
Vincent’s older sister.
Lucia Moretti.
She looked toward the farmhouse and raised a handgun.
Claire whispered, “Is she here to help?”
Vincent watched his sister advance.
“I don’t know.”
Lucia reached the porch.
She kicked open the door.
Then pointed the gun directly at Vincent’s chest.
“You stupid bastard.”
Vincent slowly raised his hands.
May you like
Lucia’s eyes burned.
“Do you have any idea what you started?”
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