Chapter 2 - Sadie stared at him.“That isn't funny.”
“I didn't make a joke.”
“You're telling me a giant man carrying a crowbar and a pistol broke into a restaurant full of armed guards because he wanted to kill me?”
“Yes.”
“That sounds insane.”
“It is.”
She backed against the wall.
“I don't know you.”
“I know.”
“I've never seen him.”
“I know.”
“Then why me?”
Dominic didn't answer immediately.
Behind the steel door, footsteps moved across the kitchen.
Slow.
Heavy.
Someone had entered.
Then another.
Dominic raised his revolver.
Sadie whispered, “How many bullets?”
“One.”
“You're joking.”
“I rarely joke when people are shooting at me.”
They heard a metallic scrape.
The lock began turning.
Dominic pointed toward a second door at the bottom of the stairwell.
“Run.”
They sprinted.
The second door opened into a narrow tunnel.
Sadie nearly fell.
“Where does this go?”
“Under the street.”
“You have a tunnel under your restaurant?”
“I own the building.”
“That wasn't my question.”
Dominic kept moving.
“It's complicated.”
“That is the worst answer I've ever heard.”
They reached an iron ladder.
Dominic climbed first.
Sadie followed.
The hatch opened behind an alley three blocks away.
Rain poured down.
A black SUV waited.
One of Dominic's guards jumped out.
“Boss!”
Dominic shoved Sadie inside.
They sped away.
Sadie sat frozen against the window.
Philadelphia blurred past in streaks of wet yellow light.
“Where are you taking me?”
“Somewhere safe.”
“Your definition of safe is terrible.”
Dominic almost smiled.
Then his phone rang.
He answered.
“Russo.”
A voice came through.
Sadie couldn't hear the words.
Dominic's face changed.
“Say that again.”
A pause.
Then:
“Bring her to me?”
Another pause.
Dominic looked at Sadie.
“No.”
He ended the call.
“Who was that?”
“Someone I don't trust.”
“Someone who knows me?”
“He knows your name.”
Sadie's fingers tightened.
“How?”
Dominic reached into his jacket and pulled out the photograph from the restaurant.
He handed it to her.
“Because your name was written on the back.”
Sadie stared.
There were words beneath the first sentence.
She hadn't seen them before.
Written in tiny black ink:
S. BENNETT. ROOM 214. ST. MARY'S. 1999.
Her face went pale.
“That's my birthday.”
Dominic's eyes sharpened.
“What?”
“The year.”
“You were born in 1999?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
“St. Mary's Hospital.”
Dominic looked at the driver.
“Take us there.”
Sadie frowned.
“Why?”
“I want to know what happened in 1999.”
“You think a hospital record has something to do with tonight?”
“I think someone spent twenty-seven years hiding something.”
The SUV turned.
Twenty minutes later, they stopped outside an abandoned church-owned medical building.
Sadie stared at the address.
“St. Mary's?”
Dominic opened the door.
“Stay behind me.”
Inside, dust covered the hallways.
The building had been closed for years.
Dominic found an old records room.
He pulled out a flashlight.
“Your file should be here.”
“My file?”
“If someone erased your history, they might have missed the original.”
They searched shelves.
Nothing.
Then Sadie noticed a box behind a broken cabinet.
Inside was an old ledger.
Dominic opened it.
Names.
Birth dates.
Room numbers.
Then he stopped.
His finger froze on one line.
Sadie stepped closer.
“What?”
Dominic looked at her.
“You weren't the only child born here that night.”
He turned the ledger toward her.
Two names.
Same date.
Same hour.
Same doctor.
The first name was hers.
The second had been blacked out.
Sadie touched the ink.
“Who was the other baby?”
Dominic shook his head.
“I don't know.”
Then he noticed something written in the margin.
A handwritten note.
Four words.
TRANSFERRED TO RUSSO FAMILY.
Sadie stared.
“Russo?”
Dominic's face drained of color.
Before either could speak, footsteps echoed in the hallway.
Someone was walking toward them.
Dominic grabbed the ledger.
“Hide.”
They ducked behind the shelves.
The door opened.
A woman stepped inside.
Sadie recognized her immediately.
It was Carl's wife.
The restaurant manager's wife.
And she was holding a photograph of Sadie.
The woman whispered into the darkness.
“She found the ledger.”
May you like
Then she smiled.
“Good.”
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