Chapter 7 - THE EMERALD NECKLACE
The drive upstate was a quiet nightmare.
Clara’s heater in the rusted Honda Civic blasted warm, stale air. Leo was asleep in the backseat, wrapped in Rico’s ruined suit jacket. Rico sat in the passenger seat, his face pale and tight with pain. Clara’s makeshift apron tourniquet was holding, but he needed a doctor.
“Why are we doing this?” Rico asked quietly, staring out at the dark, winding highway. “If we go to the clinic, Dante will follow us. We’re leading the wolf to his own den.”
“Exactly,” Clara said, keeping her eyes on the road. Her hands gripped the steering wheel so tight her knuckles were white. “Dante burned your house down to bury his secrets. If he thinks we’re going after his son, he’ll drop everything and chase us. He’ll call off the men looking for the key. He’ll come alone.”
Rico looked at her profile in the dashboard light. “You’re ruthless for a waitress.”
“I grew up in the system, Mr. Moretti. You learn how to bait a bully,” Clara replied softly.
It was 4:00 AM when they pulled up to the St. Jude Pediatric Clinic. It wasn't a hospital; it was a sprawling, private manor hidden in the dense pine forests of the Catskills. High-end, discreet, and very expensive.
Clara parked the Civic in the shadows near the delivery entrance.
“Stay here with Leo,” Rico said, pulling his gun with his good hand.
“If you go in there looking like a bleeding mob boss, they’ll call the cops,” Clara argued. “I’ll go. I look like a tired mother. I can talk my way to the records room.”
Before Rico could protest, Clara slipped out of the car.
She walked up to the locked glass double doors and pressed the buzzer. A sleepy night nurse in a crisp white uniform appeared, looking annoyed. She cracked the door.
“We’re closed to visitors until 8:00 AM,” the nurse said.
Clara immediately burst into tears. It wasn't entirely fake; the exhaustion of the night hit her all at once. “Please, my car broke down. My son is in the back, and it’s freezing. Can I just use your lobby phone to call a tow truck?”
The nurse hesitated, then sighed, unlocking the door. “Five minutes.”
Clara stepped into the warm, sterile lobby. While the nurse walked behind the reception desk to point out the phone, Clara’s eyes locked onto the woman’s neck.
Resting against the nurse’s collarbone was a heavy, intricate emerald necklace.
Clara had seen that necklace before. It was on the front page of the New York Post fourteen months ago. It was the custom piece Elena Moretti had been wearing the night she died.
“Where did you get that?” Clara blurted out, all pretense dropping.
The nurse froze, her hand flying to the emeralds. “Excuse me?”
The glass doors behind Clara slid open. Rico stepped through, his gun raised, his face a mask of lethal calm despite his injuries.
“Take it off,” Rico commanded the nurse.
The woman gasped, backing into the wall, her hands trembling as she unclasped the necklace and dropped it onto the counter.
“Who gave this to you?” Rico demanded, stepping closer.
“The man who pays for the burn ward!” the nurse cried, tears spilling down her cheeks. “Mr. Vale! He brought the little boy here three years ago. He gave me the jewelry to keep his name off the official ledger!”
Clara frowned. “Mr. Vale? You mean Dante?”
Suddenly, a cold, metallic click echoed through the empty lobby.
“No,” Dante’s voice said from the hallway behind the reception desk.
May you like
He stepped out of the shadows, a suppressed pistol aimed directly at Clara’s head. He looked exhausted, his suit ruined from the explosion he had set.
“She means Agent Vale,” Dante said softly. “Federal Bureau of Investigation. And it’s time to tell Rico the truth about who you really are, Clara.”
