Chapter 32 - Ash on Lake Shore Drive
The unmarked black SUV cut through the pre-dawn fog hanging over the Indiana border. Rain had started to fall, washing the sulfur stench of Gary into the muddy soil beside the highway.
Julian was at the wheel, his knuckles pale against the grip. I sat in the passenger seat, my eyes fixed on the Chicago skyline looming in the distance. Even from twenty miles away, the smoke from the Port of Chicago rose like an oily smudge against the violet bruises of dawn.
"Police radio is going crazy," Julian muttered, adjusting the earpiece hooked behind his ear. "slip Nine is completely cordoned off. Fire department is treating it as an industrial chemical failure. The media hasn't tied it to the Rossi estate yet."
"Matteo owns three captains in the First District," Gabriel said from the back seat. He was stripping down an automatic pistol, cleaning the firing pin with methodical, chilling precision. "He’ll keep the police narrative contained until he has control of the board. What about Highland Park?"
Julian swallowed hard. "Fire's out. Two bodies recovered from the gatehouse. Security guards. But the main house..." He hesitated. "The interior was gutted. The basement vault was breached from the outside with thermite."
"And Signora Rossi?" I asked, turning around to face Gabriel.
"No body," Julian said quietly. "Or at least, none the fire marshals could identify."
"She’s alive," Gabriel said instantly. The metallic slide of the gun racked back with a sharp, lethal snap. "If Matteo had her body, he would have texted me a photograph to break my resolve. The fact that he only mentioned Maya's father means my mother slipped through his fingers."
"Where would she go?" I asked. "She’s seventy years old, deaf, and her entire security detail was executed."
"She went to the only place Matteo wouldn't look," Gabriel said. "A place that has no value to a man who only cares about money and power."
"The old church on 24th Street," I realized, the memory clicking into place. Signora Rossi had spent decades funding the Saint Jude mission for deaf children in the old Italian district. It was off the grid, unnoticed by the modern syndicate.
"Julian, take the Ryan expressway toward Chinatown," Gabriel commanded. "We don't go to Table Seven until we know what my mother knows."
Thirty minutes later, the SUV slid into the gravel alley behind the red-brick facade of Saint Jude’s. The parish looked abandoned, its stained-glass windows dark behind wire mesh. The rain beat down in relentless sheets, drumming against the roof of the vehicle.
Gabriel stepped out first, coat collar turned up against the deluge. I followed immediately, stepping through puddles of blackened water. Julian stayed with the car, keeping the engine idling and his weapon drawn low beside his thigh.
Gabriel pushed open the heavy wooden door of the church rectory. The scent of damp stone, frankincense, and old beeswax met us.
Sitting in the third pew from the altar, draped in a plain wool coat that did not belong to her, was Signora Rossi.
She looked smaller than she had at the dinner table in Highland Park. Her silver hair, usually pinned in an elegant coil, hung loose around her shoulders, damp with rain and streaked with gray soot. But when she turned her head and saw Gabriel, her posture instantly straightened.
She did not cry. She did not rush forward.
Gabriel knelt beside her pew, placing his calloused hands over hers. For a long moment, neither moved. Then, Signora Rossi raised her hands into the dim candlelight of the chapel.
Her fingers moved with frantic, sharp precision.
I watched her hands, translating the rapid signs under my breath: *Matteo did not work alone. The explosion at Slip Nine was a diversion. They did not just take the ledger.*
"What else did they take, Mother?" Gabriel spoke aloud, keeping his mouth clear so she could read his lips.
Signora Rossi looked past Gabriel, her dark eyes locking onto mine. A look of profound, devastating pity crossed the old woman’s face.
Her hands moved again, slower this time, each motion deliberate and heavy.
*Maya,* I translated silently in my throat, the words choking me before I could speak them aloud. *They did not take your father. Your father was dead before the match was struck.*
The cold stone of the church floor seemed to tilt beneath my boots.
"What?" I gasped, stepping forward until I gripped the back of the pew. "The text message... they said he went back in for the ledger. They said he was alive at Table Seven!"
Signora Rossi shook her head slowly, her eyes brimming with unshed tears. She raised her hands once more, directing the message entirely to me.
May you like
*Matteo shot Thomas Vance at midnight in the port office because your father refused to unlock the digital backup. The man waiting for you at Table Seven is not holding a hostage. He is holding an execution order.*
***
