Chapter 2 - The Warning
For half a second, I forgot how to breathe.
Cassandra’s fingers had already left my wrist, but I could still feel the pressure. She stood beside me beneath the gold light of the foyer, smiling for anyone watching through the ballroom doors.
“What did you say?” I asked.
Her smile never changed. “You heard me.”
I stared at her. “Is that a threat?”
“No. It’s advice.”
The doors opened behind us.
Dominic stepped into the foyer.
Cassandra instantly moved away from me. “She’s upset,” she said softly. “I was trying to calm her down.”
I almost laughed.
Dominic looked from her to me. “Ava, come upstairs. Five minutes. Let me explain.”
“No.”
His expression tightened. “You’re pregnant.”
“And you remembered that now?”
That landed. His face went still.
I walked toward the elevators. Dominic followed.
“Don’t leave alone,” he said. “Marco will drive you.”
“I don’t want one of your men.”
“Tonight you do.”
I turned. “Why?”
His eyes shifted past me, toward the street entrance.
It was only a glance, but I caught it.
Fear.
Dominic Moretti was afraid of almost nothing. Seeing that in his face scared me more than Cassandra’s words.
“What happened?” I asked.
He lowered his voice. “The transfer you found wasn’t what you think.”
“Then what was it?”
“I can’t explain it here.”
“Of course you can’t.”
The elevator opened. I stepped inside.
He put one hand against the door before it could close. “Ava, listen to me. Go to the lake house. Not home. Do not use your usual driver. Do not answer unknown calls.”
I stared at him. “You expect me to follow orders after tonight?”
“I expect you to stay alive.”
The elevator went silent.
Cassandra stood twenty feet away, watching us.
Then Dominic did something he had never done in public.
He leaned close, his voice almost breaking.
“Someone inside my organization has been feeding our locations to the Vescari crew,” he said. “The two million dollars was bait.”
My anger stalled.
“Bait for who?”
His eyes moved to Cassandra.
The elevator doors started closing.
Before they met, Dominic said, “I don’t know yet.”
Then my phone buzzed.
A message from an unknown number appeared on the screen.
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DON’T GO TO THE LAKE HOUSE.
THEY’RE ALREADY THERE.
