Chapter 3 - APARTMENT 4B
Apartment 4B smelled like plaster and dust.
The renovation had stopped halfway.
Walls stripped.
Cabinets removed.
Floorboards exposed.
Nothing about it looked like Rosa’s kitchen anymore.
Norah hated that.
She could still remember flour on the counter.
A cracked yellow kettle.
Rosa singing old Italian songs badly.
Now only shadows remained.
Gabriel walked toward the back wall.
“What was here?”
“Cupboard.”
“Anything else?”
“Radiator.”
He crouched despite Leo’s objection.
The brass key did not fit the door.
Or windows.
Or old mailbox.
Then Norah remembered Rosa’s sewing cabinet.
Small.
Blue.
Always locked.
Gone now.
She pointed.
“There was a cabinet here.”
The superintendent said:
“Storage basement.”
They went downstairs.
Boxes.
Broken furniture.
Moldy books.
Then Norah found it beneath a plastic tarp.
Blue sewing cabinet.
Same chipped corner.
Same faded flower sticker she placed on it at age ten.
The brass key turned.
Inside:
Thread.
Buttons.
Needles.
And a false bottom.
Gabriel lifted it.
Underneath sat three envelopes.
One cassette tape.
A photograph.
And a newspaper clipping.
Headline:
LOCAL WOMAN AND DRIVER DIE IN LAKEFRONT HOUSE FIRE.
Photo:
Elena Hayes.
Gabriel’s mother.
Norah looked at him.
He did not move.
Another photograph showed Elena alive three days after the reported fire.
Standing beside Rosa.
Bandage around her head.
Date written on back.
Gabriel whispered:
“No.”
Leo stared.
“Boss…”
Gabriel picked it up with shaking fingers.
“My mother survived.”
Apparently.
Then the cassette.
They found an old player in the superintendent’s office.
Rosa’s voice filled the basement.
“If you are hearing this, either I failed to keep Elena hidden or Gabriel finally found the truth.”
Gabriel closed his eyes.
Norah’s heart pounded.
Rosa continued.
“The fire was not an accident.”
No surprise now.
Only confirmation.
“Elena discovered someone inside Michael Hayes’s organization was moving family money through food suppliers and private clubs. She planned to leave.”
Michael Hayes.
Gabriel’s father.
Dead fifteen years.
“He would not let her take Gabriel.”
The tape crackled.
“So he arranged the fire.”
Gabriel’s hands clenched.
Leo whispered a curse.
Norah watched Gabriel.
Not the feared boss.
A son hearing his father tried to kill his mother.
Then Rosa said:
“Elena escaped.”
Gabriel leaned closer.
“We hid her.”
Norah stopped breathing.
“Where?”
The tape could not answer him.
Instead:
“She wanted to return for Gabriel.”
A pause.
“She tried once.”
Gabriel’s eyes filled.
“When?”
No answer.
Then Rosa continued:
“Michael threatened the boy.”
That explained everything.
Elena stayed away to keep her son alive.
Gabriel looked almost sick.
The tape continued.
“Years later, Elena learned Michael was dying.”
Gabriel’s father died when Gabriel was twenty-three.
“She came back.”
Gabriel whispered:
“No.”
Leo looked at him.
“What?”
Gabriel’s voice broke.
“I was twenty-two when a woman came to the restaurant.”
“What woman?”
“Gray hair. Scarf.”
His eyes closed.
“She stared at me.”
Norah understood.
“You didn’t recognize her.”
“No.”
Michael had told Gabriel his mother burned beyond recognition.
He had mourned her since childhood.
Why would he recognize an older living woman?
Gabriel whispered:
“She asked if I remembered cinnamon.”
Norah felt chills.
“What did you say?”
“I told security to remove her.”
Silence.
Gabriel looked destroyed.
Then Rosa’s tape continued.
“Elena forgave him immediately.”
That nearly broke him.
“She said he was still Michael’s prisoner even after Michael died.”
Gabriel covered his mouth.
Then:
“Elena died six months later.”
Cancer.
Not violence.
Not conspiracy.
Rosa buried her under another name.
Gabriel never knew.
The tape clicked.
Then one final message:
“If Gabriel hears this, tell him Elena left something behind.”
The tape ended.
Norah opened the first envelope.
Inside:
Bank records.
Second:
Letters addressed to Gabriel.
Never delivered.
Third:
A small recipe card.
Stracotto.
Elena’s handwriting.
At the bottom:
For Gabriel, if he ever learns to trust hunger more than fear.
Gabriel sat on the basement floor.
The most feared man in Chicago.
Too weak to stand.
Holding his mother’s recipe.
Then Leo opened the bank records.
His expression changed.
“Boss.”
Gabriel looked up.
“What?”
Leo held out one page.
A payment ledger.
Twenty-three years old.
One recipient:
MICHAEL HAYES.
Another:
VINCENT HAYES SR.
Gabriel’s uncle.
Then a third name.
ROSA DELUCA.
Paid fifty thousand dollars.
Gabriel stared.
“Why was Rosa paid?”
Norah’s stomach turned.
May you like
Maybe Rosa had not merely hidden Elena.
Maybe she had been part of the original plan.
