Chapter 2 - THE LETTER BENNY HID
Gabriel reached for the envelope.
Benny pulled it back.
Every man in the diner reacted.
Coats opened.
Hands moved.
Metal flashed.
“Don’t,” Leo warned.
Benny looked like he might faint, but he held on to the letter.
“I promised her.”
Gabriel’s voice became terrifyingly calm.
“You have something addressed to me, and you’re worried about breaking a promise?”
“She said I could give it to you only under one condition.”
“What condition?”
Benny looked at me.
“That Norah was here.”
I forgot how to breathe.
“Me?”
Gabriel stared between us.
Benny nodded.
“Rosa came here seventeen years ago. Norah was still a kid. Rosa knew I let her sit in the back booth after school while her mom worked.”
I stepped closer.
“You knew Rosa?”
“Everybody around here knew Rosa.”
“Then why didn’t you ever tell me?”
“Because she made me swear.”
Gabriel slammed one palm onto the counter.
“Enough.”
Benny flinched.
Gabriel pointed at the envelope.
“Open it.”
Benny finally surrendered it.
Gabriel broke the brittle seal.
Inside was a single sheet of paper and an old brass key.
He unfolded the letter.
I watched his eyes move across the first line.
Then stop.
Leo stepped closer.
“Boss?”
Gabriel read aloud.
“Gabriel, if you are reading this, then they tried again.”
The room changed.
Gabriel continued.
“The first time they used a car. The second time they used fire. If they ever use food, you will know Paulie was right.”
Leo cursed under his breath.
Gabriel’s face went pale.
Paulie.
The man who had collapsed over poisoned risotto two weeks earlier.
Gabriel kept reading.
“Do not trust the house. Do not trust the family name. And do not trust the man who tells you I died.”
He stopped.
No one spoke.
I looked at Benny.
“Who told Gabriel she died?”
Benny answered before Gabriel could.
“His father.”
Gabriel folded the letter so tightly the paper nearly tore.
“My father died fifteen years ago.”
Benny shook his head.
“I’m not talking about the man who raised you.”
That sentence landed harder than any gunshot.
Gabriel stared at him.
“What did you say?”
Benny closed his eyes.
“Rosa told me Charles Hayes wasn’t your biological father.”
Gabriel crossed the diner in two steps and grabbed Benny by the shirt.
Leo moved forward, but Gabriel shouted, “Nobody touches him.”
Benny’s back hit the counter.
“Who was my father?”
“I don’t know.”
“Liar.”
“I swear!”
I saw Gabriel’s hand tighten.
“Gabriel.”
He looked at me.
I didn’t know why he listened.
Maybe because I had just fed him.
Maybe because I knew Rosa.
Maybe because the entire room had been lying to him for years and I was the only person with nothing to gain.
“Let him breathe.”
Slowly, Gabriel released Benny.
Benny coughed.
Then pointed at the brass key.
“Rosa rented a storage locker under another name. She said that key opened it.”
Gabriel looked down.
“Where?”
“Union Terminal.”
Leo immediately reached for his phone.
Gabriel stopped him.
“No calls.”
“Boss, we need a team.”
“That letter says not to trust the house.”
“That doesn’t mean us.”
Gabriel looked directly at Leo.
For the first time, I saw something painful pass between them.
“It means I don’t know who ‘us’ is anymore.”
Then a violent crash came from the alley behind the diner.
One of Gabriel’s men drew his weapon.
Another ran toward the kitchen.
Leo reached the back door first.
He opened it.
A black sedan was disappearing into the rain.
On the pavement lay a brick wrapped in paper.
Leo picked it up.
May you like
The message contained only one sentence:
THE WAITRESS SHOULD HAVE LET HIM STARVE.
