Chapter 20 - The Echo on the Lake
By dawn, the media storm had consumed the city.
Every major news outlet in the country was broadcasting Kathryn Reyes's perp walk down the steps of the federal building. The governor had called an emergency press conference to announce his immediate resignation. The corrupt enforcers, Navarro, and the remnants of Sterling's syndicate were rounded up in the largest federal sweep in Chicago's history.
The Vance name was completely cleared.
The morning sun broke through the gray autumn clouds, casting a path of sparkling gold across the calm waters of Lake Michigan.
My father stood on the refurbished pier at Slip Nine, looking out over the water. For the first time in five years, the stoop in his shoulders was gone. He looked ten years younger, holding a single white carnation in his hand.
I walked up beside him, slipping my arm through his.
"Julian would be proud of you, Dad," I whispered.
He swallowed hard, tossing the flower into the lake. It bobbed gently on the clean surface, drifting slowly out toward the open water. "He’d be proud of you, Maya. You broke the silence that was choking us all."
A sleek black car pulled up to the edge of the slip. Gabriel and Beatrice stepped out, walking slowly toward us along the concrete wharf.
Gabriel looked exhausted, the dark circles under his eyes revealing the seventy-two hours of nonstop legal battles he had just navigated, but there was an unmistakable peace in his expression.
Beatrice reached us, wrapping me in a fierce, tight embrace. When she pulled back, she signed with a soft, affectionate smile:
*Now, will you finally let my son pay you an executive salary to run the port's shipping office?*
I laughed, looking up at Gabriel. "Your mother thinks I should be running logistics."
"My mother is rarely wrong," Gabriel replied, a faint smirk touching his lips. "The board met two hours ago. Vance & Sons owns fifty-one percent of the combined northern logistics corridor. You have full veto power over every manifest that enters this harbor."
"And what about Il Canto?" I asked.
"Table Seven is reserved for you and your father every Friday night," Gabriel said, his voice softening with genuine warmth. "For the rest of your lives. On the house."
We turned back toward the warehouse, a sense of closure washing over me like a warm tide. The debt was settled. The killers were imprisoned. The family legacy was restored.
Then a young courier on a bicycle skid to a stop at the gate of Slip Nine.
"Maya Vance?" the courier called out, checking a receipt clipboard.
"Yes?" I said, stepping forward.
"Priority international dispatch from the maritime postal registry," the courier said, handing me a small, heavy envelope wrapped in water-resistant yellow oilcloth. "Signed for at the airport customs terminal this morning."
I took the envelope. It was postmarked from a cargo terminal in Rotterdam, Netherlands.
The date stamp was from three days ago.
My heart began to hammer erratically against my ribs. I looked down at the handwriting on the front.
It wasn't typed. It was written in black fountain pen, in the precise, slanted cursive I had memorized since childhood.
Gabriel noticed the look on my face and stepped closer, his hand instinctively resting near his lapel. "Maya? What is it?"
My hands trembled so violently I could barely peel back the wax seal. Inside was a single brass shipping key stamped with the number *404*, and a short note written on yellow lined paper:
*Maya,*
*If you’re reading this, Sterling and Reyes are finished, and it’s safe for me to surface.*
*The body Navarro pulled from the lake wasn't mine.*
*Meet me at the dry dock in Rotterdam before Gabriel's father finds out I'm still breathing.*
*Julian.*
I stared at the paper as the world spun around me.
May you like
Gabriel’s father had been dead for ten years.
And my brother was still alive.
