Chapter 2 - THE WOMAN IN THE PHOTOGRAPH
I drove home with the photograph face down on the passenger seat, as if turning it over could keep it from changing my life.
At every red light I heard the caller's warning again. Don't believe the story they told you about his mother. The reasonable thing was to assume a prank. Rich people attracted strange attention. Maybe someone wanted to embarrass Luca Moretti. Maybe I was a convenient prop. But the envelope had used my birth surname, a name I'd stopped using at eighteen, and the necklace in the picture was too distinctive to mistake.
I lived in a second-floor apartment above a tailor shop in South Philadelphia. Its radiator clanged at odd hours and the kitchen light flickered when the microwave ran, but it was mine. My younger sister, June, was sprawled on the couch wearing headphones when I came through the door.
“You look like someone stole your car,” she said.
“Worse. Somebody tried to pay my rent.”
“An angel?”
“A mob boss.”
She removed the headphones. “Please tell me that's a metaphor.”
I put the photograph on the coffee table. June sat up. We had the same dark hair and the same tendency to twist a ring around our fingers when nervous. She was twenty-one, studying respiratory therapy, and had survived enough of my bad luck to distrust surprises on principle.
“Who is she?” June asked.
“I was hoping you knew.”
June held the photograph close to the lamp. “She looks like Mom.”
“Like Mom's younger sister, maybe.”
“Mom never said she had a sister.”
Our mother, Elena Brooks, had avoided talking about her family. She claimed her parents had died before we were born. There were no holiday visits, no cousins, no old letters on the refrigerator. When she passed away after a brief illness, I discovered she had kept very few records of her earlier life. I had accepted that privacy as part of her personality. Now it looked like a lock on a door.
June turned the photo over. “Ten months ago. That's when the baby was born?”
I nodded.
“And somebody left this on your car after you held him?”
“Yes.”
“You should call the police.”
“And tell them someone gave me a picture?”
“Tell them somebody knows where you work and where you parked. That's already too much.”
She was right. I took pictures of the envelope and the note, then placed the originals inside a kitchen drawer. Before bed I sent a message to Greg, asking if our security cameras covered the parking lot. He replied with a single word: Why?
I didn't answer.
At seven the next morning, a knock rattled our apartment door. June looked up from her cereal. We weren't expecting anyone. I peered through the peephole and saw Rocco standing in the hallway, raincoat buttoned to his throat, holding two coffees.
I opened the door only as far as the security chain permitted. “How did you find me?”
“Your employee paperwork.”
“That doesn't make it less creepy.”
He acknowledged the criticism with a small nod. “Mr. Moretti asked me to see whether you got home safely. He was concerned after what Leo said.”
“Leo said a sound. Babies do that.”
“Of course.”
His careful agreement told me he didn't believe it either.
I glanced at the coffee cups. “Did Luca send breakfast as well, or just a surveillance team?”
For the first time, Rocco looked embarrassed. “I came alone.”
I took off the chain but kept the door half closed. “Somebody left something on my windshield.”
His expression sharpened. “What?”
“A photograph. A warning.”
“May I see it?”
“Not until I know why you care.”
He exhaled. “Because the woman who gave birth to Leo was named Isabel Vale. She died in a hospital shortly after a fire. And for eight months, Mr. Moretti hasn't forgiven himself for failing to protect her.”
“Was she his wife?”
“No. They were engaged.”
I thought of the blond newborn, the woman who looked like family, and the date printed on the photo. “If I told you I might be related to Isabel, would Luca tell me the truth?”
Rocco's face gave almost nothing away. Almost. His gaze flicked toward the necklace at my throat.
“Where did you get that?”
“My mother.”
He looked away. “You should speak to Mr. Moretti directly.”
“That wasn't my question.”
“No, it wasn't.”
He left his business card beside the coffee and walked down the stairs. I watched him through the window until he disappeared into an ordinary gray sedan, not the intimidating SUV I'd expected.
June came up beside me. “They know something.”
“Or they're trying to learn what I know.”
“What do you know?”
I touched the necklace. “Not enough.”
By noon I was at the municipal records office, requesting copies of the documents I had never thought to question. Mom's birth certificate listed her parents, but the place of birth had been altered in a way the clerk called unusual. An amended record had been filed twenty-eight years earlier. The original was sealed under a court order. I asked what justified sealing it. The clerk said she couldn't tell me.
Then I searched public records for Isabel Vale. There were articles about the fire at a waterfront warehouse, framed as a tragic industrial accident. Isabel was identified as a community organizer who supported housing projects. Her obituary mentioned no surviving family except her infant son and fiancé, Luca Moretti. There were no photographs of her parents. A charitable foundation bore her name.
One article contained a photo from a fundraiser. Isabel stood beside a smiling blond woman with a diamond bracelet. Celeste. The caption called them close friends.
My stomach tightened.
I called the number that had warned me the night before. An automated message said it was unavailable. I tried twice more. Nothing.
At four, I went to Aurelia for my shift. Greg was waiting by the service entrance, arms folded. “Did you ask about security footage?”
“Yes.”
“Forget it. The cameras went offline at eleven.”
“All of them?”
“Parking lot only.”
“Convenient.”
He rubbed his temple. “You need to stop poking around Mr. Moretti's life.”
“I didn't go looking for him. He brought a baby to my table.”
Greg lowered his voice. “That baby is the center of a custody dispute you do not understand.”
The word custody landed heavily. “With whom?”
Greg glanced over his shoulder. “I shouldn't have said that.”
“Then you shouldn't have started.”
He walked away.
At nine, I was carrying bread to Table Six when Celeste appeared at the bar. She sat with perfect posture and ordered a sparkling water she barely touched. When I passed, she spoke without looking up.
“Avery. I believe that's your name.”
I stopped. “Can I help you?”
“People sometimes confuse kindness with opportunity. You would be wise not to.”
“I held a crying baby, Ms. Whoever-You-Are.”
“Celeste Voss.” She tapped a pale fingernail against the glass. “I was Isabel's closest friend. I don't want Leo used by someone trying to get close to his father.”
“Then we're in agreement.”
She inspected my necklace. “That design belonged to a family with a complicated history.”
“Which family?”
“Ask your mother.”
“She died ten years ago.”
For a fraction of a second, Celeste's expression failed. Her eyes widened, then narrowed. “I'm sorry to hear that.”
She slid a card across the counter. “There are people who can help you find a better job. Somewhere far from Philadelphia. A fresh beginning, if you want one.”
The card belonged to a high-end hospitality recruiter in Seattle. On the back was a number handwritten in silver ink. “You want me to leave town?”
“I want you to make a sensible decision.”
I pushed it back. “Then you should stop making that sound like a threat.”
Celeste rose, smoothed her jacket, and walked toward the door. Halfway there she turned. “Your mother should have taught you what happens when a Brooks woman mistakes attention for safety.”
I followed before I could think better of it. “How do you know her surname?”
She didn't stop.
Outside the restaurant, the street smelled of wet pavement and exhaust. Celeste climbed into a silver car. The driver pulled away just as I reached the curb. I stood there shivering, full of questions that had abruptly become personal.
My phone buzzed. An unknown sender had texted a single image: a scanned hospital form. On it were Isabel Vale's details, a birth date twenty-eight years earlier, and the name of her mother.
Elena Brooks.
I stared until the letters blurred.
My mother had given birth to Isabel before she had me. Which meant the woman in the photograph wasn't a distant cousin or a strange coincidence.
She was my older sister.
And the boy who had reached for me at Table Twelve was my nephew.
Then a second message arrived.
May you like
THEY HAVE LIED TO LUCA TOO. IF YOU TELL HIM, DO IT WHERE CELESTE CANNOT HEAR.
Across the street, a black SUV rolled slowly past the restaurant, its tinted windows reflecting my small, motionless figure. I couldn't tell whether someone inside was protecting me or watching me. For the first time, those possibilities felt equally frightening.
