Chapter 8 - The Story Boston Wanted
The second message included a photograph of Chloe leaving school two weeks earlier.
My hands went numb.
I showed it to James.
His face changed instantly.
“Elias.”
Elias crossed the room.
“What?”
James handed him my phone.
“Find out where this came from.”
I took the phone back.
“No.”
Both men looked at me.
“You don’t get to ‘find’ people because I got a disgusting text.”
James’s voice was controlled.
“Someone sent you a photograph of your child.”
“I understand that.”
“Then you understand why I’m concerned.”
“I also understand what people think you mean when you say find them.”
A muscle moved in his jaw.
Around us, employees pretended not to listen.
That was impossible now.
James lowered his voice.
“I mean identify the number through legal channels, preserve the message, and contact the police if there is a threat.”
I held his gaze.
“Say that first next time.”
Elias looked like he wanted to disappear into the floor.
James nodded once.
“Fair.”
The article was worse than the headline.
It quoted an unnamed “former manager” who claimed James had arrived Christmas Eve, discovered “accounting irregularities,” and detained staff overnight while demanding loyalty.
Nobody had been detained.
The meeting had happened voluntarily the next day.
But the article had one thing facts rarely beat: a story people already wanted.
James Moretti, feared businessman, intimidating workers behind closed doors.
The comment section turned me into his secret girlfriend before lunch.
By two o’clock, someone had found my old social media profile.
By three, my mother’s obituary had been reposted.
By four, a stranger had left a voicemail saying Chloe should be taken away from me if I was “bringing her around gangsters.”
I vomited in the employee restroom.
Maya found me sitting on the closed toilet lid afterward.
“You need to go home.”
“I don’t have one.”
She winced.
“Sorry.”
“Don’t be. It’s funny in a terrible way.”
“It’s not funny.”
“I know.”
She leaned against the sink.
“You can stay with me after the apartment over the bakery. I have a couch.”
“You have a studio.”
“It’s a generous couch.”
I looked at her.
“After what I did to you?”
“You apologized.”
“That does not erase it.”
“No. But I’m allowed to decide what I do with the apology.”
I looked away.
There were days when accepting forgiveness felt harder than accepting blame.
My phone rang.
Victor.
Maya saw the name.
“Don’t answer.”
I did.
“Grace.”
His voice was calm.
He sounded like my manager again.
“I’m surprised you called.”
“I’m surprised you answered.”
“What do you want?”
“To help you.”
Maya rolled her eyes so hard it was almost athletic.
Victor continued.
“This has gotten out of hand.”
“You gave a reporter my name.”
“I didn’t give anyone your address.”
“That is not a denial.”
“The story was going to come out. James Moretti calls police on his own manager Christmas morning? You think nobody was going to ask why?”
“What do you want?”
A pause.
Then his voice softened.
“I can make this easier.”
“For who?”
“For you and Chloe.”
My stomach tightened.
“I know the apartment situation was harsh.”
“You had my belongings removed.”
“I told Keating you had discussed leaving.”
“I never did.”
“You said you couldn’t keep up with the new rent.”
“That is not surrendering a lease.”
Victor exhaled.
“I was trying to solve a problem before you became a problem for the owner.”
There it was.
His whole worldview in one sentence.
People became problems.
Then they could be managed.
“What are you offering?” I asked.
Maya stared at me.
Victor answered immediately.
“A written reference. Three months’ rent at another apartment. Enough cash to cover food and childcare while you find a new job.”
My fingers tightened around the phone.
“In exchange for what?”
“Tell the truth publicly.”
“I already am.”
“Tell the reporter James pressured you to accuse me.”
I laughed.
“You want me to lie.”
“I want you to correct an impression.”
“What impression?”
“That I was exploiting employees. I was helping people who had nowhere else to go.”
“You charged me more after I refused a two a.m. shift.”
“You were unreliable.”
“I had a child.”
“And I accommodated that child dozens of times.”
His voice sharpened.
“You keep pretending I did nothing for you.”
That hurt because it was not completely false.
Victor had covered a shift when Chloe was in the emergency room.
He had brought me soup once when I had the flu.
He had found the apartment.
He had given me eight hundred dollars without asking for a credit score.
Abusive control would be easier to recognize if it never came carrying groceries.
“I know you helped me,” I said.
Victor went quiet.
“And I know you used that help to make me feel like I wasn’t allowed to say no to you.”
“Grace-”
“That’s the part you still don’t understand.”
I hung up.
My hand shook.
Maya took the phone from me and put it on the sink.
“You okay?”
“No.”
“Good answer.”
For the next forty-eight hours, James stayed away from me.
Not disappeared.
Stayed away.
He sent messages about payroll through Elias. He had an attorney send every employee a written notice that any private loan deductions were suspended and that the restaurant would reimburse disputed tip money after individual review.
But he did not call me.
At first I was relieved.
Then annoyed.
Then embarrassed that I was annoyed.
On December twenty-eighth, I went back to the apartment with Mr. Keating to collect the last of our things.
Chloe came with me because she refused to let Mr. Buttons out of her sight after the move.
The apartment looked smaller empty.
The radiator clanged uselessly beneath the window.
Chloe wandered into the kitchen.
“Mommy?”
“What?”
“Was Mr. Victor fixing the sink that day?”
I looked up.
“What day?”
“When he came here.”
My skin prickled.
“What are you talking about?”
She pointed beneath the kitchen sink.
“The day you were working. Mrs. Alvarez was in the bathroom. Mr. Victor came in with the key. He put something down there.”
I crossed the room.
“Chloe, when was this?”
She thought.
“Before Christmas. The day we made the paper snowman.”
That had been December nineteenth.
I knelt and opened the cabinet.
Cleaning spray.
Trash bags.
A dented pot.
Then I saw the corner of a brown paper bag wedged behind the pipe.
I pulled it out.
May you like
Inside were three unopened bottles of rare Italian wine.
Each one had a Moretti’s inventory sticker on the neck.
