Chapter 11 - THE LETTER SOPHIA NEVER SENT
Vincent wanted to go into the diner with ten armed men.
I wanted Rosa alive.
Those goals were not automatically the same.
“No shooting unless there’s no other choice,” I said.
Vincent stared at me.
“You’re giving me orders now?”
“Yes.”
“Good.”
We entered through the front.
The diner lights were on.
Caleb sat in booth six.
Rosa was behind the counter, frightened but alive.
Derek stood near the kitchen.
Carlo was nowhere visible.
“Three years,” Caleb said.
I looked at him.
Really looked.
He seemed smaller than I remembered.
That surprised me.
For years, he had occupied enormous space inside my head.
In reality, he was simply a man sitting in a diner.
“Where’s Carlo?” Vincent asked.
Caleb smiled.
“Still thinking this is about Carlo?”
Derek moved toward Rosa.
Vincent’s men appeared outside the windows.
I held up the envelope we had found in the safe-deposit box.
“Sophia’s original letter.”
Caleb’s eyes fixed on it.
“Give it to me.”
“Release Rosa.”
He laughed.
“You learned to negotiate.”
“I learned to leave.”
That hit him.
His face changed exactly the way it used to before he hurt me.
My body reacted.
But I didn’t move backward.
Caleb stood.
“You took everything from me.”
“No.”
I met his eyes.
“I stopped letting you take things from me.”
Police sirens sounded in the distance.
Derek panicked.
Caleb grabbed for me.
Vincent moved.
Then stopped.
Because I had already stepped away.
Caleb’s hand closed on empty air.
For the first time, he looked confused.
Rosa slammed a coffee pot into Derek’s arm.
Chaos erupted.
Vincent’s men entered.
Within seconds, Derek was on the floor.
Caleb was restrained.
Rosa was free.
No one had fired a shot.
Then Caleb started laughing.
“You still don’t understand.”
He looked at Vincent.
“Open the letter.”
Vincent did.
Sophia’s handwriting filled three pages.
She described Carlo’s scheme.
Marcus’s abuse.
Caleb’s cowardice.
And one final meeting.
The last person Sophia had arranged to meet before her death was not Carlo.
Not Marcus.
Not Caleb.
It was Douglas Lawson.
Derek’s father.
Sophia believed Douglas wanted to help her expose everything.
But on the last page, she had added one hurried line.
I was wrong about Lawson. He isn't Carlo's partner.
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He's Carlo's boss.
The wealthy developer everyone believed was laundering money for the mafia had actually been controlling the entire operation from outside it.
