Chapter 6

Late that night, Vincent came into my study.

No knock. No lead-in. He just sat down in the chair across from me.

"There's a pile of old accounts at the dock warehouse," he said. "Tied to a money laundering run from three years ago. The FBI's been sniffing around that line. Someone needs to be on-site to clean it up."

"Fine. I'll handle it." I looked up at him when I said it, and I meant it. No grudge, no testing him. I was genuinely solving his problem.

Vincent saw no shift in my expression. "I want you to go personally."

"Fine. I'll go personally." I didn't refuse. Same serious expression.

A few seconds of silence.

Sofia's voice from the doorway. "Vincent, are you done? I want you to take a walk with me."

"Almost. Coming."

He paused. His voice stayed level, as if he were assigning a routine task.

"Sofia is moving into the main house as of today. You'll stay at the safe house by the docks. Until the books are clean, stay out there."

"Understood."

He waited.

I think he was waiting for me to say something else. To ask why. Or refuse. Or at least show some kind of displeasure.

He got none of it.

His brow furrowed. He didn't understand why I was this calm. From the moment he'd found my clinic records, I'd never once pushed back.

Announcing Sofia as the lady of the house at the dinner, moving her in — all of it had been aimed at making me admit I was wrong.

But I'd said nothing. Fine, then. The punishment could continue.

Vincent kept his anger under control. "This needs to move fast. Go now."

When he finished, I stood, walked out of the study, and went to the dressing room to pack.

I didn't take much. Changes of clothes. The laptop for work. The small bag with the encrypted drives in it. And the family crest from the bottom drawer of the nightstand. Vincent had pinned that crest on me himself, seven years ago. He'd said, This is the Maro family's acknowledgment of you.

I put the crest in my bag and closed the drawer.

There was a set of jewelry on the nightstand he'd given me. A row of gowns hung at the back of the closet, things he'd had me wear to various events.

I didn't touch any of it.

None of it had ever been mine. That was the kit for the lady of the Maro family. It had nothing to do with me personally.

Twenty minutes later I came out with my bag and changed shoes in the foyer.

Vincent was leaning against the banister. He looked at the bag in my hand and frowned slightly.

"That's all you're taking?"

"It's enough."

I pushed the door open and walked out.

The night air was cool, salt-sharp. A ship's horn sounded from the direction of the docks.

I didn't look back.

I knew Vincent understood what this meant — in seven years I had never once left the main house with anything less than a full suitcase. I kept my things with me. I kept myself ready to leave, ready to come back, at any moment.

Tonight I walked out with almost nothing. He should have known this was different.

He didn't call me back.

The safe house at the docks was a place the Maros had bought twenty years ago, wedged between a shipping yard and a cold storage warehouse, surrounded by machinery that never stopped. I'd been here a few times. Always for something ugly. Never to stay the night.

A layer of dust had settled inside.

I found a mop, ran it over the floor, set things in some kind of order, sat down, and opened the accounts.

They were a mess. A three-year-old disaster, every line tangled with at least two hidden threads, multiple people through the chain, at least three different bookkeeping conventions jammed together. Thrown together fast at the time. No one had ever meant to actually reconcile it.

I worked through it line by line, reconstructing the flow of every transaction. When I looked up again, two hours had passed.

The floor I'd mopped was dry now. The smell — salt water and mildew — hadn't lifted.

I stood up, stretched my stiff shoulders, and went to the window.

The horns at the docks had gone quiet. Only the deep hum of the cold storage compressors was left.

The row of cold storage warehouses across the way looked like a line of silent tombstones.

I hated this place, and I had to stay here anyway.

By three in the morning fog had come in off the water, muffling the sound of the machines.

I didn't text Vincent. I didn't call.

Not out of spite.

There was just nothing to say.

I poured a glass of water, stood at the window to drink it, watched the dock lights haloing in the fog.

Seven years ago, the first time I'd walked into the Maro house, I'd also stood by a window overlooking the harbor.

That window had been much bigger. A whole wall of glass. You could take in the lights of the entire harbor.

Vincent had stood next to me and reached for my hand. Gentle voice. "Elena. Everything here is mine. And it's yours. From now on, we'll protect it together."

I'd taken him at his word. I'd protected it for seven years.

I set the glass back on the table and went back to the accounts.

My phone buzzed.

An encrypted message from the partner at the firm. Very short.

"Documents verified. Final authorization code generated. Awaiting your instruction."

I looked at it for a long time, then set the phone facedown on the desk and went back to the books.

I'd do the cleanup right.

I wasn't going to be in the Maro family much longer.