Chapter 1 - Anything Warm
“We don’t have food at home anyway.”
My six-year-old daughter whispered those words on Christmas Eve, and James Moretti - the man half of Boston feared - stopped walking.
I stood beside the last uncleared table at Moretti’s on Hanover Street, a cleaning rag clenched so tightly in my hand that my fingers hurt.
“Chloe,” I whispered. “Please.”
But it was too late.
Twenty minutes earlier, I had been scrubbing dried wine from the hardwood floor and pretending not to think about the $18.43 left in my checking account.
Or the red rent notice folded inside my purse.
Or the refrigerator in our apartment in East Boston, which contained half a carton of milk, two eggs, ketchup, and a heel of bread I had already decided would become Chloe’s breakfast.
My name is Grace Bennett. I was twenty-nine, and for three years I had been raising Chloe alone, stretching every dollar until it felt thin enough to tear.
That evening, our usual babysitter had gone to Worcester to spend Christmas with her sister. I could not afford another sitter. Missing my shift might have cost me my job.
So I brought Chloe with me.
I tucked her into a corner booth after dinner service slowed down, placed her stuffed rabbit, Mr. Buttons, under her arm, and covered her with my winter coat.
“Wake me when Santa comes,” she had mumbled.
“Santa knows where we live.”
Her eyes had opened halfway.
“Does he know the new address if we have to move?”
I had pretended not to hear that part.
By eleven, the last customers were gone. Christmas music drifted through the empty dining room while snow thickened against the windows.
Then the front door opened.
Three men in dark suits entered first.
James Moretti followed.
Everyone in Boston knew his name. Officially, he owned restaurants, construction companies, and half a dozen pieces of waterfront property. Unofficially, people lowered their voices when they said Moretti.
My manager, Victor Hale, had warned every new employee the same way.
Don’t stare at Mr. Moretti. Don’t gossip. Don’t ask who the men with him are. And if he gives an instruction, do it once.
I lowered my eyes.
James crossed the dining room, then stopped near Chloe’s booth.
“Who is she?”
His voice was calm. That somehow made it worse.
“My daughter,” I said.
One of the men beside him, a broad-shouldered man named Elias Russo, frowned toward me.
“Children aren’t supposed to be here after closing.”
My stomach dropped.
“I’m sorry. I couldn’t find a sitter. She stayed out of the way. I’ll finish everything before I leave.”
James looked at the coat-covered shape in the booth.
I heard myself add, “Please. I need this job.”
He remained silent.
Then Chloe stirred.
“Mommy?”
I hurried over.
She pushed herself upright, curls stuck to one cheek.
“Are we going home?”
“Soon, sweetheart.”
She looked toward the snowy windows.
“Can we stay here tonight?”
“No, baby.”
“But it’s warm here.”
“We have a home.”
“I know.” She rubbed her face. “But we don’t have food at home anyway.”
Silence settled over the restaurant.
My cheeks burned.
“Chloe, please.”
“But you said we have to wait until Friday to buy groceries.”
I wanted the floor to open under me.
James spoke.
“When did she last eat?”
“She ate today.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
My throat tightened.
“This afternoon. A sandwich.”
“How much?”
I stared at him.
He did not look cruel. He looked angry, but not at me.
“Half,” I said.
Chloe leaned against my side.
“Mommy gave me her half.”
I closed my eyes.
“We’re fine,” I said.
James’s gaze moved from my face to my shoes, to the coat on Chloe, to the restaurant apron tied around my waist.
“No,” he said quietly. “You’re surviving.”
The words landed harder than they should have.
People had called me strong so many times I had begun to hate the word. Strong meant nobody asked if you needed help. Strong meant they watched you carry six bags and handed you a seventh.
James took off his black wool coat.
Elias straightened.
“Boss?”
James ignored him.
He draped the coat around Chloe’s shoulders, then crouched beside the booth.
“What’s your favorite Christmas dinner?”
Chloe considered the question with the seriousness only a six-year-old could bring to food.
“Anything warm.”
James went completely still.
His jaw tightened once.
Then he stood and looked toward the dark kitchen.
“Open it.”
Elias blinked.
“The chefs went home two hours ago.”
James began rolling up his sleeves.
“I didn’t ask where the chefs were.”
Nobody moved.
He looked at me.
“Grace. Sit with your daughter.”
“Mr. Moretti, I can’t let you-”
“Tonight,” he said, and his voice softened by half a degree, “you can.”
Then the most feared man I had ever met disappeared through the swinging kitchen doors.
A moment later, the lights snapped on.
Cupboards opened. Metal pans clattered. A refrigerator door thumped shut.
Chloe pulled his coat tighter around herself.
Elias stood beside me, staring through the service window.
“I’ve worked for him fourteen years,” he murmured.
I looked at him.
His expression was almost offended by what he was witnessing.
“I have never seen him cook for an employee.”
“Maybe he’s poisoning us,” I whispered before I could stop myself.
Elias looked at me.
Then, unexpectedly, he laughed.
It was the first time I had ever heard anyone around James Moretti sound normal.
Ten minutes later, James came back carrying three bowls of tomato soup, grilled cheese sandwiches cut diagonally, and a plate of roasted potatoes he claimed had been “sitting there asking to be useful.”
Chloe’s eyes went wide.
“For me?”
“For the table.”
She immediately pushed the biggest sandwich toward me.
“Mommy gets the big one.”
I almost cried right there.
Instead, I sat.
James sat across from us, his sleeves still rolled to his forearms. Elias and the other two men moved to a nearby table and pretended not to watch.
The soup was hot enough to sting my tongue.
I had not realized how hungry I was until the first swallow hit my stomach.
Chloe ate in small, careful bites, the way she always did when she wanted food to last.
James noticed.
I noticed him noticing.
That irritated me.
“You don’t have to study us,” I said.
His eyes lifted to mine.
“I’m not.”
“You are.”
“Fair.”
I set down my spoon.
“We had a bad month. That’s all.”
“How many bad months?”
“That’s none of your business.”
One of the men behind him shifted in his chair.
James did not.
“You work in my restaurant,” he said. “If you are working full shifts and your child is hungry, it becomes my business at least far enough to ask why.”
I wanted to tell him I had medical bills from Chloe’s ear infection, that our rent had gone up, that the transit pass cost more, that every time I caught up something else broke.
I wanted to tell him none of that was his fault.
Instead, I said, “I get paid Friday.”
Chloe dipped a corner of sandwich into her soup.
“Unless Mr. Victor takes the envelope again.”
My spoon stopped halfway to my mouth.
James looked at her.
“What envelope?”
“Chloe.”
She glanced at me, confused.
“The one Mommy puts the money in after work.”
James’s expression changed.
Not much.
A small stillness entered his face.
“What does Victor do with it?” he asked.
I pushed back my chair.
“We should go.”
James did not raise his voice.
“Grace.”
“I said we should go.”
Chloe clutched Mr. Buttons to her chest.
“Mommy, did I do something bad?”
My anger collapsed instantly.
“No. Never.”
I bent and kissed the top of her head.
Behind me, the front door opened.
Cold air rolled across the dining room.
A man stamped snow from his polished shoes.
Victor Hale looked up, saw James at our table, saw the food, saw Chloe wrapped in James’s coat - and stopped smiling.
Then his eyes dropped to my purse.
“Grace,” he said carefully. “You didn’t tell Mr. Moretti about our little arrangement, did you?”
James leaned back in his chair.
“What arrangement?”
May you like
Victor’s gaze met mine.
Suddenly, I was not hungry anymore.
