Chapter 2 - Shadows In The Mirror
The sound of tires humming along the Kennedy Expressway was the only noise breaking the suffocating quiet inside the vehicle. In the backseat, Lily was happily humming a cartoon theme song while coloring in a picture book, blissfully unaware that she had just collided with the king of the Chicago underworld. My hands shook so intensely that I had to tuck them under my thighs to hide the trembling from Emma.
Emma glanced at me through the rearview mirror, her knuckles pale against the steering wheel. ""Claire, tell me that wasn't who I think it was. Tell me my eyes are playing tricks on me.""
""It was him, Emma,"" I whispered, the words tasting like ash on my tongue. ""He saw her. He looked right into her eyes.""
Emma cursed softly under her breath, checking her side mirrors every three seconds. For five years, Emma had been my rock. She wasn't just my former talent manager; she was the sister I never had, the only person who stood in that desolate hospital room in rural Vermont when Lily took her very first breath. She had helped me stage the quiet retirement of Claire Bennett, former Academy darling, ensuring that no paparazzi or syndicate hound caught wind of the child growing up on a quiet apple orchard.
""Why did we have to come back to Chicago?"" Emma muttered, genuine terror edging her voice. ""We should have done the real estate signing remotely. We shouldn't have set foot in his territory.""
""My grandfather’s theater estate required an in-person probate hearing,"" I replied, staring out at the towering Chicago skyline looming in the distance. The Sears Tower, the lakefront, the cold steel bridges—every corner of this city was stamped with Vincent Moretti’s blood and empire. ""The lawyers said it would take forty-eight hours. We sign the deed over to the historical society, take the inheritance trust for Lily, and leave. We were supposed to slip in and slip out.""
""Well, the devil saw his reflection today, Claire,"" Emma warned. ""Vincent isn't going to let this go. You saw how he was looking at you. That wasn't just shock. That was obsession.""
My mind flashed back to the day my marriage died. I remembered sitting outside that small, rain-streaked diner on the South Side, watching Vincent through the steamy window. He had been laughing with Elena, a pretty, innocent waitress with wide eyes and flour on her apron. He had looked at her with an easy, gentle tenderness he had stopped giving me the moment his father was assassinated and the syndicate crown fell onto his head. I remembered the exact coldness in his eyes when he told me, I love someone else.
I had walked away without taking a single dime of his dirty syndicate money, taking only the earnings from my own film contracts. I had thought I was setting him free to live his simple, tender romance with the woman who didn't remind him of war.
""Mommy?"" Lily’s small voice pulled me back from the dark abyss of memories. She leaned forward against her harness, holding up a sheet of paper. ""I drew the superhero man from the airport. He had sad eyes like the prince in the snow story.""
My breath hitched as I looked at the drawing. A stick figure wrapped in black crayon, with two giant, dark circles for eyes. Children had an uncanny intuition; she had picked up on the hollow despair Vincent carried behind his lethal gaze.
Suddenly, Emma’s voice tightened. ""Claire. Don't look back casually, but check the blind spot.""
I glanced subtly at the passenger mirror. Two black Cadillac Escalades with deeply tinted windows had seamlessly merged behind us two exits back. They weren't riding our bumper aggressively; they were flanking us with disciplined, military precision, boxing us in from passing lanes.
""Is it him?"" I asked, my pulse pounding in my ears.
""It’s Moretti security,"" Emma said, her voice dropping an octave. ""They’re escorting us. Or herding us. Where do we go?""
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""Head straight for the Drake Hotel,"" I instructed firmly, hardening my voice. ""It’s high-profile, crawling with out-of-town diplomats and high-society events. Vincent may run this city’s underbelly, but even he won't kick down the doors of a historic lobby packed with public witnesses.""
Emma nodded grimly, flicking her turn signal. But as the towering gray facades of downtown closed around us, I realized with sickening clarity that five years of peaceful exile were over. Vincent Moretti had picked up our scent, and a predator never surrendered his claim.
