Chapter 4 - THE CAMERA ABOVE THE BAKERY
The photograph came from above.
That was Marco’s conclusion.
Angle downward.
Partial fire escape in frame.
Meaning whoever took it had been inside the bakery building.
The bakery had been closed for six months.
Roman owned that building too.
Of course he did.
By morning, we were inside.
Dust.
Empty display cases.
Old flour bags.
A smell like damp cardboard.
Marco’s team found the camera in an upstairs apartment.
Not hidden well.
Whoever installed it expected to remove it quickly.
The footage contained weeks.
Me walking to work.
David taking smoke breaks.
Delivery trucks.
Roman’s men visiting the restaurant.
Then Ethan.
My knees almost failed.
“There.”
I pointed at the screen.
A man in a baseball cap crossed the alley three nights earlier.
Only profile.
Older.
Thinner.
But I knew the way he moved.
One shoulder slightly lower from an old hockey injury.
“Ethan.”
My voice broke.
Roman paused the footage.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
Five years disappeared.
I remembered our tiny apartment.
Cheap takeout.
Ethan kneeling beside my swollen feet when I was pregnant.
The last morning.
He kissed my forehead before leaving.
Said:
I’ll be late tonight. Don’t wait up.
Then police came two days later.
Car fire.
Wallet recovered.
Presumed dead.
I sat down hard.
“He’s alive.”
Marco enlarged the image.
“Looks like it.”
Anger arrived before relief.
Five years.
Five birthdays.
Leo’s first steps.
First word.
First day of preschool.
Ear infections.
Nightmares.
Everything.
“He left us.”
Roman spoke carefully.
“We don’t know that.”
“He was alive.”
“Yes.”
“And didn’t come home.”
“Yes.”
“That qualifies.”
No one argued.
Then Marco found another clip.
David Kesler entering the bakery after closing.
My manager.
He met someone upstairs.
Face hidden.
They exchanged an envelope.
David left.
The next morning, fifty thousand dollars appeared in his account.
I stared.
“He’s involved.”
“Likely.”
Roman’s eyes hardened.
“Bring him in.”
David was found at O’Hare.
One-way ticket to Toronto.
He had thirty thousand in cash.
When confronted, he panicked.
“I didn’t stab anyone.”
“What did you do?” Roman asked.
“I deleted cameras.”
“Why?”
“They paid me.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
Roman stepped closer.
David shrank.
“I swear.”
“Then why run?”
“Because after last night I realized what this was.”
“What is it?”
David looked toward me.
“Ask Megan.”
I froze.
“What?”
“You got a package three months ago.”
“I get packages.”
“At the restaurant.”
“What package?”
He swallowed.
“A children’s book.”
My stomach tightened.
I remembered.
No return address.
A beautifully illustrated book about stars.
Leo loved it.
I assumed a customer sent it after hearing me talk about him.
“What about it?”
David’s face went white.
“They told me to make sure you took it home.”
Roman looked at me.
“Where is the book?”
“At my apartment.”
We retrieved it under security.
Leo was furious nobody let him come.
The book looked ordinary.
Until Roman’s man removed the binding.
Inside the spine was a memory card.
My hands shook.
We opened it.
One video.
Ethan.
Recorded six months earlier.
He looked older.
Scar along his jaw.
Eyes exhausted.
“Megan.”
I covered my mouth.
“If you are seeing this, then I failed to keep this away from you.”
Tears blurred the screen.
Ethan continued.
“I’m alive.”
I wanted to scream at him.
“I stayed gone because the people hunting me believed you and Leo were safer if I was dead.”
My anger did not disappear.
But it cracked.
Then Ethan looked directly into the camera.
“There’s something I never told you about Leo.”
My heart stopped.
“What?”
The recording continued.
“The missing money was moved into an account under his name before he was born.”
I stared.
Twenty-three million dollars.
My unborn son had been used as the destination for stolen mafia money.
May you like
And whoever was hunting Ethan was not only looking for him.
They needed Leo.
