Chapter 6: The Man Who Already Knew
The hour I had promised Gabriel became something else entirely.
Dov made three phone calls in rapid succession, stepping into the corridor and back again, his voice low and clipped.
Gabriel stood at the window with his phone pressed to his ear.
I sat in the chair nearest the door and listened to the shape of what was happening without hearing most of the words.
Vitelli knew about the boys.
That sentence had changed the temperature of the room.
When Gabriel ended his call, he turned to me.
His face was the controlled, careful face I remembered from the early years of our marriage — the one he wore when something was genuinely dangerous.
"How much do you know about Marco Vitelli?" he asked.
"Only what you told me when we were married.
That he was your main rival.
That he'd been trying to find leverage against you for years."
"He found it," Gabriel said.
"Last spring, according to Serena.
Which means for the past eight months, he's known I have three sons I don't know about.
Three unprotected sons."
The word unprotected settled over me like cold water.
"He hasn't done anything," I said.
"We've been fine.
The boys are fine."
"You've been fine because he's been deciding how to use the information, not because he doesn't intend to." Gabriel crossed to the table.
"Vitelli doesn't act quickly.
He waits until the moment causes maximum damage."
"What kind of damage?"
"Leverage.
Pressure.
A way to make me agree to something I would otherwise never agree to." He sat down.
"Or, if he decides leverage isn't enough, something worse."
I looked at him.
"You think he'd go after children."
"I think he'd go after anything that matters to me." His jaw tightened.
"And now he knows exactly what does."
Dov came back in.
"I've reached out to our contacts in Vitelli's network.
There's been unusual movement in the past seventy-two hours.
Two of his people were in New York as of yesterday."
"Here," I said.
"They were already here."
"Yes."
I stood up.
"My boys are down the hall."
"They're safe," Dov said.
"I have two men on that corridor.
I put them there when we came in."
I looked at Gabriel.
"You anticipated this."
"I anticipated something.
I didn't know what." He met my eyes.
"I've been watching Vitelli's movements for three months.
Something was building.
I didn't know what he had."
"And now you do."
"Now I do."
Serena had been quiet through all of this, sitting with her hands folded, watching.
Now she spoke.
"There's something else," she said.
Gabriel looked at her without warmth.
"There's always something else with you."
"The second photograph — the one Vitelli has.
It's not just you and the doctor, Claire.
It's been altered." She paused.
"Harlan told me six months ago that Vitelli's people contacted him.
They bought a copy of the original and had it digitally modified.
In the version Vitelli has, the man beside you isn't Peter Ashworth."
"Who is it?" Gabriel asked.
"A man named Reeves.
One of your former financial officers.
The one who disappeared four years ago."
The silence that followed was a different kind of silence.
"Reeves," Gabriel said slowly.
"If Vitelli presents that photograph to the right people — federal investigators, rival families, anyone who's been looking for a reason to move against you — it places your ex-wife in contact with a man who vanished under suspicious circumstances." Serena looked at me.
"It doesn't just damage Gabriel.
It implicates you."
I felt the full shape of it then.
Not just leverage.
A constructed case.
A story that could be told to the right audience at the right moment, and by the time anyone untangled the fabrication, the damage would already be done.
"He's been building a trap," I said.
"He's been building several," Gabriel said.
"This is just the one we can see."
He stood up and looked at Dov.
"I need Vitelli's current location.
I need to know who he's meeting with and when.
And I need the original Harlan photographs — both of them — authenticated and documented before morning."
"Already working on it."
Gabriel turned to me.
His voice dropped slightly.
"I know this isn't what you came here for tonight."
"I came here for my sons to meet their father," I said.
"Not for any of this."
"I know." He held my gaze.
"I'm going to fix it."
"Gabriel." I kept my voice steady.
"The last time you decided something needed fixing without talking to me first, I spent five years alone in Brooklyn with three infants."
He absorbed that.
Didn't deflect it.
"You're right," he said.
"So I'm asking.
Will you let me handle Vitelli?"
"I'll let you handle Vitelli," I said.
"But I want to know everything.
Every step.
No decisions about my children without me in the room."
"Agreed."
"And Serena—" I looked at her.
"She doesn't go anywhere until this is finished.
I don't want her warning anyone."
Serena looked at me with an expression I couldn't fully read.
Not resentment.
Something more complicated.
"I'm not going to warn anyone," she said.
"Vitelli threatened me too, six months ago.
He told me if I said anything to Gabriel, he'd release a different set of photographs.
Ones that would destroy what was left of my reputation."
"So you stayed quiet," I said.
"I stayed quiet." She looked down at her hands.
"I've been staying quiet about a great many things for a very long time."
Dov's phone buzzed.
He looked at the screen and his expression changed in a way that made Gabriel look at him immediately.
"What is it?"
"Vitelli," Dov said.
"He just sent a message.
To your personal number." He turned the phone so Gabriel could read it.
Gabriel read it.
His face went very still.
He turned the phone so I could see it too.
May you like
The message was four words.
*Bring me the boys.*
