Chapter 2 - A Dead Man's Handwriting
Grace locked herself in the staff bathroom and read the note until the letters blurred. Her father, Daniel Bennett, always made the tail of his y curl backward. This note had the same ridiculous curl. She remembered teasing him about it when she was nine, sitting on an overturned trunk behind the big top.
There was no way to fake the brass token, either. He had given it to her on her tenth birthday and told her it opened a door only brave people could find. She'd lost it the week the circus burned.
Someone knocked. “Grace? It's Vincent.”
“I'm fine.”
“That's not what I asked.”
“Then ask something easier.”
The handle didn't move. At least he knew better than to force the door. “Security caught a man leaving the west gate. Gray suit. He gave a fake name.”
Grace opened the door. “Where is he?”
“Gone. Somebody switched off three cameras and let him walk out.” Vincent noticed the token in her fist. “What is that?”
“Something that doesn't belong to you.”
“Most things don't.” His gaze dropped to her scraped ankle. “The anchor above you was tampered with. My people are checking every inch of that rig.”
Grace thought of Vanessa's pleased expression when she'd looked toward the ceiling. “You think your fiancée tried to kill me?”
“Ex-fiancée.” His jaw worked. “And I think somebody wanted you up there for a reason.”
Grace had heard plenty about Moretti: stolen shipments, dirty cops, men who vanished after crossing him. She also knew he'd paid the kitchen staff when a storm shut the mansion down for a week. Both things could be true, which made him dangerous in a different way.
“I want my last paycheck,” she said. “Then I'm leaving.”
“You can leave tonight. But somebody knew about your circus past.”
“Vanessa had a background check done. Rich people love knowing other people's worst days.”
Vincent held out his phone. A still image showed the stranger in gray standing near a catering truck. A silver pin gleamed on his lapel: a tiny wing inside a circle.
Grace gripped the sink. The same emblem had been stamped on the harness she wore the night her partner, Leo Mercer, died.
“I know that symbol,” she whispered.
Vincent's phone buzzed. His security chief was calling. Vincent answered on speaker.
“Boss,” Marco Ruiz said, sounding shaken. “We found a cut cable above the ballroom. And there's something else. Somebody left a photograph in your office. It's the maid at the circus.”
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“Who else is in it?” Vincent asked.
Marco paused. “Your father.”
