Claire whispered:
“Who are you?”
“Adrian Bellini.”
Claire looked toward the shattered restaurant.
Bellini.
Of course.
She had worked in Bellini’s Cafe for a year and a half.
She knew the company owned restaurants, hotels, warehouses, and real estate.
She also knew people lowered their voices when they discussed the family.
Claire had deliberately avoided asking why.
Adrian looked toward the pendant again.
“My younger sister wore the matching half of that necklace when she disappeared twenty-four years ago.”
Claire forgot her pain for one second.
“What?”
“My sister’s name was Rachel Bellini.”
The paramedics began wheeling Claire toward the ambulance.
She grabbed Adrian’s sleeve.
“My mother was nineteen when she had me.”
Adrian’s face changed again.
“How old are you?”
“Twenty-four.”
He looked as if someone had struck him.
Claire shook her head.
“That doesn’t prove anything.”
“No.”
Adrian glanced toward one of his men.
“Find out everything.”
The man immediately took out his phone.
Claire noticed.
“Stop.”
Adrian looked at her.
“You don’t investigate my life without asking me.”
“This concerns my family.”
“It concerns mine first.”
Adrian stared at her.
For a man with his reputation, he accepted the boundary surprisingly quickly.
“Fair.”
The ambulance doors opened.
Sofia struggled in her father’s arms.
“Mummy!”
Claire closed her eyes.
Adrian leaned toward the stretcher.
“There is one thing you should know.”
Claire looked at him.
“The other half of that pendant is still in my family.”
The doors began closing.
Claire whispered:
“My mother told me family gets lost.”
Adrian went still.
“What?”
“She used to say that.”
“Say what?”
Claire’s voice weakened.
“Sometimes family gets lost.”
The ambulance doors shut.
Adrian stood in the alley holding Sofia.
His daughter cried against his chest.
Around him, police moved through the wreckage.
His men spoke into phones.
Paramedics carried the wounded.
But Adrian heard only one sentence.
Sometimes family gets lost.
Rachel used to say that too.
Claire woke in St. Catherine’s Medical Center several hours later.
The bullet had passed through muscle near the left shoulder.
No major artery.
No shattered bone.
No permanent nerve injury.
The surgeon called her lucky.
Claire did not feel lucky.
She felt as though someone had driven a hot nail through her upper body and then charged her for the privilege.
Two detectives questioned her that evening.
Claire told them about the attack.
The gunman.
Sofia.
The kitchen.
The alley.
She did not mention the necklace.
She was not sure why.
Perhaps because she did not understand it.
Perhaps because Adrian Bellini’s reaction had frightened her more than the information itself.
Before leaving, one detective asked:
“Did you recognize anyone?”
“No.”
“Have you received threats?”
“No.”
“Anyone following you?”
Claire almost said no.
Then she remembered something.
Three nights earlier, she had closed the cafe.
A black SUV had been parked across the street.
She had noticed it only because the driver kept the engine running for nearly twenty minutes.
At the time, Claire assumed somebody was waiting for a passenger.
Now she wondered.
She told the detectives.
They wrote it down.
At nearly midnight, Claire opened her eyes and found Adrian sitting beside the window.
Alone.
No suit jacket.
Tie gone.
Sleeves rolled.