Chapter 5 - Someone Had Been Watching Sadie
Dominic did not tell Sadie immediately.
That was his mistake.
He increased security.
Changed vehicles.
Moved Rosa to another location.
Ordered background checks on people he had known for years.
Sadie noticed all of it.
“You’re doing it again.”
They were standing in Dominic’s kitchen when she confronted him.
“Doing what?”
“Deciding what I’m allowed to know.”
“There’s nothing you need to know.”
“That sentence proves there is.”
Dominic remained silent.
Sadie put down her coffee.
“Tell me.”
“We believe someone close to me helped whoever targeted my mother.”
Sadie’s face changed.
“Someone you trust?”
“Yes.”
“And that person knows about me?”
“Probably.”
“Then why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because you’ve already lost enough because of this.”
“That doesn’t answer the question.”
Dominic looked at her.
“I wanted you to have one normal day.”
Sadie’s anger softened slightly.
“That’s not your decision.”
“I know.”
“You keep saying that after you make the decision.”
“I’m working on it.”
Despite herself, Sadie almost smiled.
Then the elevator chimed.
Carmine entered.
“We found something.”
They went to Dominic’s office.
Carmine placed security photographs across the desk.
A man appeared in several.
Sadie leaned closer.
Her stomach dropped.
“I know him.”
Dominic turned.
“From where?”
“The diner.”
Carmine stiffened.
“When?”
“He came in twice.”
“What did he do?”
“Nothing. Coffee. Eggs.”
“Did he talk to you?”
Sadie thought.
“He asked about my hands.”
Dominic’s face hardened.
“What exactly did he ask?”
“He said they looked burned. Asked if I’d been in an accident.”
“And what did you tell him?”
“That I burned them cooking.”
Carmine looked at Dominic.
The man had been testing her.
Trying to determine what she knew.
Sadie sat down.
“So he was watching me before the photograph?”
“Looks that way,” Carmine said.
Dominic picked up his phone.
Sadie touched his wrist.
“Wait.”
He looked at her hand.
Then at her.
“What?”
“I remember something else.”
They waited.
“He left a twenty-dollar bill.”
Carmine frowned.
“So?”
“He paid with a card.”
Dominic understood immediately.
“Receipt.”
Sadie nodded.
“The diner keeps signed receipts.”
They were at the restaurant fifteen minutes later.
Sadie’s manager was confused but cooperative.
They found the transaction.
The name on the card was probably false.
But there was something handwritten on the back.
A phone number.
Sadie stared at it.
“He gave this to one of the other waitresses.”
Carmine photographed it.
Within an hour, they had another connection.
The number had contacted the same insider Dominic was investigating.
The circle tightened.
Dominic wanted Sadie somewhere secure.
This time she agreed.
Not because he ordered her.
Because she understood.
That distinction mattered.
That evening, Sadie stood at the penthouse windows.
Chicago stretched below.
Dominic joined her.
“Beautiful,” she said.
“You get used to it.”
“That sounds tragic.”
He looked at her.
“What?”
“Imagine getting used to something beautiful.”
Dominic studied the city again.
Perhaps she was right.
He had spent years accumulating things until nothing impressed him.
Sadie still stopped to watch snow fall.
Still brought Rosa cheap flowers because she liked their color.
Still knew the names of homeless men who came into the diner.
“You’re strange,” Dominic said.
Sadie laughed.
“That might be the nicest thing you’ve said to me.”
He became serious.
“You should hate me.”
Sadie looked over.
“Why?”
“Because none of this would have happened to you if you hadn’t crossed paths with my family.”
“That’s not how responsibility works.”
“You nearly died.”
“So did Rosa.”
“Because of me.”
Sadie faced him.
“Did you start that fire?”
“No.”
“Then stop taking responsibility for choices other people made.”
Dominic stared at her.
Nobody had ever said that to him.
In his world, responsibility traveled through bloodlines.
A brother’s mistake became a family’s debt.
A father’s enemy became a son’s enemy.
Sadie rejected the entire premise with one sentence.
“Why did you go inside?” he asked.
She looked away.
“I heard her.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“It’s the only one I have.”
“You could have died.”
“I know.”
“You were scared.”
“Terrified.”
“And you went anyway.”
Sadie was quiet.
“My father died when I was nineteen.”
Dominic waited.
“He had a heart attack in a grocery store. A nurse happened to be shopping there. She kept him alive until the ambulance arrived.”
Sadie swallowed.
“He still died at the hospital that night. But I got six more hours with him because a stranger stopped.”
Dominic understood.
“That’s why you studied nursing.”
“Yes.”
“And why you went inside.”
“Maybe.”
For several seconds, neither spoke.
Then Dominic gently touched her hand.
Her burns were healing.
Sadie did not pull away.
The space between them changed.
Dominic leaned closer.
Sadie’s breath caught.
Then Carmine’s voice came from behind them.
“Boss.”
They separated.
Carmine looked uncomfortable.
“Sorry.”
“What is it?”
“We identified the insider.”
Dominic turned.
“Who?”
Carmine placed a photograph on the table.
Dominic stared at it.
Sadie watched his expression go completely still.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
Dominic picked up the photograph.
The person who had betrayed him was not merely an employee.
He was family.
May you like
And Rosa had trusted him enough to give him a key to her home.
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