Chapter 1 - THE SIX DOLLARS THAT STARTED A WAR
By the time I reached the bus stop, the three wealthy women had already decided I was going to regret buying that loaf of bread.
I didn't know it yet.
All I knew was that I had three dollars and seventeen cents left in my purse, my feet hurt, and the stranger outside Rossi's had looked at me as though nobody had treated him kindly in years.
My name is Hannah Ellis.
I was twenty-six years old, worked two jobs, and lived with my mother in a second-floor apartment on Chicago's South Side.
Mom had been sick for almost eighteen months.
Her medication was expensive, and the insurance company seemed to invent a new reason to deny coverage every time we submitted a claim.
That morning, I should have saved my money.
Instead, I'd bought bread for a stranger.
And strangely, I didn't regret it.
My bus arrived twenty minutes late.
I climbed aboard, counted my remaining change, and found a seat near the back.
Then my phone rang.
ROSSI'S RESTAURANT.
My stomach tightened.
I answered.
"Hannah, where are you?"
It was my manager, Patrick Doyle.
"I'm on the bus. My shift ended at ten."
"Get back here."
"Why?"
"There's been a complaint."
I closed my eyes.
Of course.
"About what?"
"Three customers claim you threatened them."
I almost laughed.
"I told them to stop humiliating someone."
"That isn't how they described it."
"Then they lied."
Patrick lowered his voice.
"One of those women is Coraline Vane."
"And?"
"Her family owns half the commercial property on this street."
I stared through the bus window.
"That doesn't make her honest."
"Hannah, I can't afford trouble with people like that."
My heart sank.
"Are you firing me?"
A pause.
Then he sighed.
"Come collect your final paycheck tomorrow."
The call ended.
I sat motionless.
My first thought wasn't about the humiliation.
It was about Mom's prescriptions.
The electricity bill.
The brakes on my Honda.
The twelve dollars I owed our neighbor for groceries.
I pressed my palms against my eyes.
"Wonderful," I whispered.
Then my phone vibrated again.
An unknown number.
A message appeared.
You should have kept walking, little waitress.
Beneath it was a photograph.
Me, standing outside Rossi's.
Handing the homeless man his bread.
My blood ran cold.
Someone had been watching us.
Across town, the man I'd helped was sitting inside an abandoned-looking sedan with tinted windows.
The torn coat lay on the passenger seat.
His dirty boots had been replaced by polished black shoes.
And the expression on his face had become something entirely different.
"Who was the girl?" Adrian Cain asked.
Samuel Bishop, his oldest adviser, opened a tablet.
"Hannah Ellis. Twenty-six. Waitress at Rossi's. Lives with her mother."
Adrian stared at the photograph.
"Any connection to our people?"
"None that I've found."
"Then why was Coraline there?"
Samuel hesitated.
"She recognized you."
Adrian's jaw tightened.
"How?"
"Apparently, she's been following rumors about your disappearance."
Adrian looked toward the street.
"That woman never does anything without a reason."
Samuel's phone rang.
He answered.
Then went completely still.
"What?"
Adrian turned.
Samuel slowly lowered the phone.
"Boss, Coraline just made contact with the Vane family."
Adrian's expression darkened.
"What did she tell them?"
Samuel swallowed.
"She says you've found the girl."
Adrian frowned.
"What girl?"
Samuel looked at Hannah's photograph again.
May you like
Then whispered the words that changed everything.
"The daughter of the woman your father ordered killed nineteen years ago."
