Chapter 3 - THE DEED IN THE SAFE
~1,100 words
"I know, Nora."
The words echoed in her mind as the dining room erupted into sheer, unadulterated chaos.
Chairs overturned. Men shouted in Italian and English. Two massive guards lunged for Nora, tackling her to the thick Persian rug. Her cheek slammed into the floorboards hard enough to make her see stars, but she couldn't tear her eyes away from the head of the table.
Russo lay motionless, his dark hair resting in the mascarpone cream she had so carefully whipped that afternoon.
"Lock the doors!" someone screamed. "Nobody leaves this house!"
Rough hands dragged Nora to her feet. She was shoved against the silk-papered wall, a cold gun barrel pressed sharply under her jaw.
"I didn't do it!" Nora choked out, tears finally spilling over her lashes. "It was Elliot! My assistant!"
She pointed frantically toward the swinging kitchen doors. But the doors were still. Elliot was gone.
"Search the grounds!" a man in a gray suit barked.
The guard holding Nora shoved her forward, marching her out of the dining room, down a long, dimly lit hallway, and threw her into a private study. The door slammed shut behind her, the lock clicking heavily into place.
Nora scrambled backward until she hit a heavy leather sofa. She pulled her knees to her chest, trembling violently.
She had failed. Russo was dead. Elliot was working for Ricci. And somewhere in the city, Danny was tied to a chair, bleeding, waiting for a sister who was never coming home.
Ten minutes passed. The screaming in the house faded to a tense, vibrating silence.
Then, the heavy oak door to the study unlocked.
Nora braced herself, expecting the guards to come in and finish what Elliot had started.
Instead, the door opened, and Donatello Russo walked in.
He wiped a smear of mascarpone cream from his cheek with a linen napkin. He didn't look dead. He didn't even look sick. He looked furiously, violently alive.
Nora stopped breathing. "You... you ate it. I saw you."
"I ate a piece of crust that wasn't soaked in whatever amateur venom Ricci’s boy poured on the sponge," Russo said smoothly, walking over to a mahogany wet bar. He poured two fingers of amber liquid into a crystal glass and downed it in one swallow. "I have a very good eye for wet cake, Miss Callahan. And an even better ear for when a baker screams a warning across a crowded room."
"You faked it," she breathed.
"I needed Ricci's spies in the room to think they succeeded, so they would report back to him," Russo said, turning to face her. His dark eyes were intense, analyzing her every flinch. "You saved my life by screaming. Why? I was told you had every incentive to see me choke."
Nora’s hands shook. "Because my father respected you. And because I won't be a murderer for Matteo Ricci. Not even to save Danny."
At the mention of her brother, a shadow passed over Russo’s face. He set his glass down with a heavy thud.
"Your brother," Russo said softly. He walked over to a large, imposing wall safe hidden behind a framed oil painting. He spun the dial with practiced ease. "Tell me exactly what the scarred man told you about Danny."
"He said Danny owed Ricci a hundred thousand dollars in gambling debts," Nora said, her voice cracking. "He said if I didn't poison you, Danny would die. They let me hear him over the phone. They were hurting him."
The safe clicked open.
"Danny doesn't owe Ricci a hundred thousand dollars, Nora," Russo said. He reached into the steel box and pulled out a thick, legal-looking folder. "Ricci doesn't care about street-level gambling debts. Ricci cares about real estate. Specifically, prime real estate in the North End."
He walked over to the sofa and tossed the folder onto the coffee table in front of her.
"Open it."
Nora reached out with trembling fingers. She flipped the heavy cardstock cover. Inside was a property deed. The official seal of the city of Boston sat heavily in the bottom corner. It was the deed to The Gilded Crumb, her bakery. The building her father had owned for thirty years.
She looked at the owner's name. It wasn't her father's. It wasn't hers.
It was Donatello Russo's.
"I don't understand," Nora whispered, staring at his name printed in cold, black ink. "My father left the bakery to me. I've paid the property taxes. I hold the mortgage."
"You hold a fake mortgage your brother drew up to keep you quiet," Russo said gently, though the words cut like glass. "Your father didn't leave you the bakery, Nora. He left it to me. He signed it over to my family five years ago."
"No," Nora shook her head, tears blurring her vision. "He would never do that. He loved that shop. He loved our independence."
"He loved your brother more," Russo corrected.
He reached into the folder and pulled out an old, faded paper. It was a betting ticket. A high-stakes marker from an underground casino that hadn't operated in years.
"Five years ago, Danny didn't just rack up debt. He stole money from my uncle's collection routes to pay it off," Russo explained. "My uncle wanted Danny dead. Your father came to me. He begged for Danny's life. So, we made a deal. Your father transferred ownership of the building to me, secretly, to cover the debt. I let you keep running it, rent-free, because your father was a good man who made incredible almond cake."
Nora stared at the betting ticket. The numbers blurred. Everything she had worked for since her father died—the early mornings, the burns on her arms, the crushing exhaustion—it was all for a building she didn't even own.
The study door burst open.
Two of Russo’s guards dragged a bloody, bruised figure into the room, tossing him roughly onto the Persian rug.
It was Elliot.
He was breathing hard, one eye swollen shut, but when he looked up at Nora and Russo, he started to laugh. A wet, ugly sound.
"You think you're so smart, Russo," Elliot spat, coughing up blood onto the rug. "You think you've got it all figured out."
"I know Ricci sent you," Russo said coldly. "And I know where Ricci's slaughterhouse is. We're going to get her brother."
Elliot laughed harder. He looked directly at Nora, his one good eye glittering with malicious joy.
"You're not going to find him at the slaughterhouse, Nora," Elliot wheezed. "Danny isn't bleeding in a chair. Danny isn't a hostage."
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Nora stood up, her fists clenching. "What are you talking about?"
"Danny isn't the victim here," Elliot grinned, showing red-stained teeth. "Danny is the one who gave Ricci the security blueprints to this estate. Danny sold you out to buy back the bakery."
