Chapter 9 - The Broken Watch
Later that evening, Dante sat alone in his private study with Lily. A warm fire crackled in the limestone fireplace, casting flickering shadows across the leather-bound books and oil paintings. On the low coffee table between them sat a jeweler's velvet mat, upon which rested the old brass pocket watch.
Dante held a tiny precision screwdriver, carefully tightening the hinge of the brass casing while Lily watched with wide, fascinated eyes. Marcus had delivered a brand-new, diamond-encrusted timepiece earlier that afternoon as a gift, but Lily hadn't even looked at it. She only cared about the scratched brass heirloom her father had wound for her every evening before bed.
"Is it fixed, Mr. Dante?" she asked, resting her chin on her hands.
"The gears are cleaned, Lily," Dante replied, carefully wiping the brass with a polishing cloth. "And Marcus replaced the broken crystal with sapphire glass. It won't crack again, no matter how hard you drop it."
He wound the crown gently until the mechanism caught with a crisp, rhythmic tick-tick-tick. He handed the watch back to her. Lily took it reverently, holding it up to her ear. A brilliant, radiant smile illuminated her small face.
"It sounds like Daddy’s heartbeat," she whispered.
Dante swallowed hard, feeling an unfamiliar warmth expanding in his chest. "Your father was the smartest man I ever knew, Lily. He outsmarted a whole room full of bad men, and he did it because he loved you more than anything in this world."
"Did you catch the bad men, Mr. Dante?"
"Yes," Dante answered, looking straight into her innocent blue eyes. "Every single one of them. They will never lie to anyone ever again."
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Lily nodded thoughtfully, tucking the watch securely into the breast pocket of her sweater, right over her heart. "Daddy said good bosses don't get mad when people tell them the truth. He said good bosses listen."
Dante let out a soft laugh, shaking his head. "Your daddy was right about that too, Lily. From now on, whenever I look at those screens, I’m going to make sure the seconds don't jump."
