Chapter 2 - THE DEBT WITH HIS FATHER'S NAME ON IT
Charlotte woke because her arm hurt.
Not the sharp alley pain.
A deep, pulsing ache beneath plaster and padding.
For one confused second, she smelled clean linen and cedar and thought hospital.
Then saw the ceiling.
DeAgostino estate.
Guest room.
Her good hand closed around key beneath pillow.
Still there.
Good.
A tray sat outside the locked door.
Not inside.
Also good.
Water.
Toast.
Medicine envelope labeled by Dr. Moretti.
No flowers.
No note.
Charlotte approved.
She unlocked door.
Rosa stood twenty feet down hall with arms folded.
"You look terrible."
"Thank you."
"Breakfast."
"I see."
"Mr. DeAgostino says you are not to work."
Charlotte sighed.
"Of course he does."
Rosa's face changed.
"He also says I am not to call you lazy."
"You call everyone lazy."
"New policy."
Charlotte almost laughed.
Then noticed two men near staircase.
Security.
At end of hall as negotiated.
Vincent had listened.
That unsettled her more than disobedience might have.
"What happened?"
Rosa asked quietly.
Charlotte looked at splint.
"Long story."
"Ten men?"
So Vincent told.
Charlotte's jaw tightened.
"Who else knows?"
"Household management."
"Why?"
"Because we were told no one is to ask you to lift anything for six weeks."
That was reasonable.
Still intimate.
Charlotte breathed.
"Okay."
Rosa lowered voice.
"I am sorry I shoved you."
Charlotte looked at her.
Rosa rarely apologized.
"Thank you."
"Do not make me repeat."
"Wouldn't dream."
At ten, Dr. Moretti took Charlotte to an orthopedic specialist in Manhattan through a private clinic.
No mafia doctor hiding fracture.
Real radiology.
Real chart.
Charlotte insisted her own name.
No false record.
Vincent apparently agreed.
The orthopedist confirmed reduction held.
No surgery if alignment remained.
Six weeks.
Maybe eight before heavy lifting.
Charlotte's stomach tightened at each number.
Wages would continue.
Vincent said.
Would that survive his mood?
She had worked for wealthy people before DeAgostino.
Promises turned into payroll mistakes very easily.
At noon, she returned to estate.
Vincent waited in breakfast room with a folder.
No wine.
Coffee.
He stood when she entered.
Weird.
He gestured.
"Sit."
She did.
"What now?"
His expression was different from last night.
Less controlled.
Which on Vincent looked like one molecule displaced.
"We found your father's note."
Charlotte's stomach tightened.
"Mickey's?"
"Yes."
"Then pay it?"
The words came before pride.
Fear did that.
She hated them.
Vincent shook head.
"No."
"Why?"
"Because it isn't valid the way Mickey describes."
Charlotte looked at folder.
"How much?"
Vincent slid copy.
She read.
$400,000.
Her vision blurred.
"No."
"That is original principal line."
"My father owed forty."
"That's what Sullivan told you."
"Yes."
She read again.
Thomas Higgins.
Her father.
Second signature.
Antonio DeAgostino.
Charlotte stopped.
Looked up.
"Who?"
"My father."
She stared.
"Your father co-signed my father's loan?"
"Apparently."
"Why?"
"I don't know."
"That's a lie."
His eyes sharpened.
"I don't know."
Maybe true.
"Your family owns the debt?"
"No."
"Sullivan?"
"Maybe through assignment."
"What does that mean?"
Vincent opened another page.
Original note dated sixteen years ago.
Lender:
HARBOR MUTUAL CREDIT.
Legitimate company? Maybe front.
Transferred repeatedly.
Last assignment to Sullivan Funding LLC two years ago.
Charlotte rubbed forehead.
"My father died three years ago."
"Yes."
"So why did Mickey wait?"
Vincent looked at her.
"Good question."
She stared.
"You didn't answer."
"I don't have one."
"Find it."
The demand surprised both.
Vincent nodded.
"I will."
Charlotte looked at Antonio signature.
"Did your father know mine?"
"Likely."
"How?"
"I don't know."
She laughed.
"Very useful meeting."
Vincent leaned back.
"There's more."
Of course.
"The note includes collateral."
Her stomach dropped.
"What?"
"A warehouse share."
"My father didn't own warehouse."
"According to this, he did."
"Where?"
"Long Island City."
Charlotte knew.
Her father had worked maintenance at an old refrigeration facility for twenty years.
Never owned.
"Which warehouse?"
Vincent read address.
She stopped breathing.
That one.
Higgins Cold Storage.
Not named for family.
Owner surname coincidence? Her father used to joke.
Apparently not.
"Twenty percent interest," Vincent said.
Charlotte stared.
"He never told us."
"Maybe he didn't own it openly."
"Us?"
"My mother."
She had died when Charlotte was nineteen.
Thomas never explained money.
They had lived modestly.
Too modestly for warehouse ownership.
Vincent continued.
"Antonio owned remaining eighty through shell company."
Charlotte's skin went cold.
"So they were partners."
"Looks like."
"Doing what?"
Vincent was silent.
That was answer.
"Crime."
"Possibly."
She laughed.
"Your vocabulary is adorable."
His mouth twitched.
"What kind?"
"We're checking."
"Was my father mafia?"
"I don't know."
"Stop saying that."
"It remains true."
Charlotte stood.
Pain reminded her.
She sat again.
"I spent three years believing he left me debt because he gambled."
"Did he?"
"He bet horses."
"That doesn't make four hundred thousand."
"No."
She looked at note.
"Maybe this wasn't gambling."
Vincent nodded.
"What was loan for?"
"Warehouse renovation."
Legitimate line.
Then handwritten clause:
PRIVATE STORAGE INFRASTRUCTURE.
Charlotte looked at Vincent.
"What did they store?"
He did not answer.
"Vincent."
First name.
It slipped.
His eyes changed.
Not offended.
Noted.
"Sixteen years ago, my father moved contraband through cold storage."
"Drugs?"
"Sometimes."
"Guns?"
"Sometimes."
Her stomach turned.
"People?"
Vincent's face hardened.
"No."
"You know?"
"That line I know."
Charlotte believed him.
Maybe foolish.
"What else?"
"Cash. stolen goods. untaxed imports."
She looked at father's name.
Thomas Higgins.
Man who packed school lunches.
Fixed radiator.
Cried when her mother died.
Could he have helped this?
People contained rooms children never saw.
She knew.
Vincent said:
"I am not asking you to decide who he was today."
Charlotte laughed.
"Convenient."
"No."
He leaned forward.
"I learned at twenty-six that my father ordered a man's beating over a business dispute."
His voice flat.
"I wanted an answer that made Antonio either monster or father."
Charlotte listened.
"I never got one."
"Which was he?"
"Both."
She looked away.
Her own father maybe both.
Then:
"What happens to debt?"
Vincent said:
"Nothing until authenticity review."
"Mickey will not wait."
"He doesn't have ten men anymore."
Charlotte looked.
"What did you do?"
"Kept promise."
"No bodies?"
"No bodies."
"Where are they?"
"Two arrested on existing warrants. One left city. Others lost access to Sullivan work."
She stared.
"You erased their jobs."
"Yes."
"Before sunrise."
"Yes."
Title fulfilled literally.
"Frankie?"
"Fired."
"From towing?"
Vincent raised eyebrow.
"You know his job."
"He bragged while holding bat."
Something dangerous crossed Vincent.
"Anything else?"
"One man filmed."
"We're trying to locate video."
Charlotte tensed.
"Why?"
"Evidence."
"For police?"
"If you want."
There.
Choice.
She breathed.
"I don't know."
"Fine."
"Stop saying fine like you own time."
His mouth twitched.
"Noted."
Charlotte looked at debt.
"Who is Mickey Sullivan to you?"
"Small operator."
"That sounds insulting."
"It is accurate."
"Does he work under you?"
"No."
"Does he pay you?"
Vincent paused.
"Indirectly."
Charlotte laughed.
"Here we go."
Vincent did not dodge.
"Some of his businesses pay protection through a crew affiliated with us."
"So he breaks my arm with money partly flowing to you."
Silence.
Vincent's face changed.
"Yes."
The answer mattered.
No excuse.
Charlotte leaned back.
"Then you are involved."
"Yes."
"Even if you didn't order it."
"Yes."
She stared.
He was learning? Or always capable of precision.
"Why keep me employed?"
"What?"
"If you think this becomes complicated."
"Your employment is separate."
"No."
"It should be."
Charlotte looked at him.
"Power doesn't separate because you say it does."
He was silent.
Good.
"If I accuse your affiliated collector, I'm still your maid."
"On medical leave."
"Same power."
Vincent looked toward window.
Then back.
"What do you want?"
Again.
Charlotte hated that he kept making her answer.
Because she was used to reacting.
Wanting required imagination.
"I want independent counsel."
His eyebrows lifted.
"For?"
"Debt. Assault. Employment."
"Not my lawyers."
"No."
"Agreed."
She almost stopped breathing.
"I want to choose."
"Yes."
"And pay?"
"You."
"No."
He frowned.
"You are my employee."
"Exactly."
She thought.
"Set up legal-aid referral. I pay what I can."
"That could be nothing."
"Then nothing."
Vincent nodded.
"I know a nonprofit clinic with no DeAgostino funding."
She narrowed eyes.
"Check."
He almost smiled.
"You don't trust me."
"No."
"Good."
That word again.
Charlotte looked down at father's signature.
Then saw something.
Witness.
Initials:
M.S.
"Mickey Sullivan?"
Vincent leaned.
"No."
"Who?"
He stared.
"Mara Sullivan."
"Related?"
"Mickey's mother."
Charlotte looked up.
"Alive?"
Vincent's face hardened.
"Very."
"Who is she?"
He breathed.
"She was my father's bookkeeper."
The debt had not merely passed through Mickey.
It came from his mother.
A woman who had worked beside Antonio and Thomas sixteen years ago.
Maybe she knew exactly what the loan was.
Maybe she had waited three years after Thomas died for a reason.
Vincent picked up phone.
Charlotte lifted her good hand.
"No."
He stopped.
"What?"
"No men."
"I was calling counsel."
"Oh."
His mouth twitched.
"You're jumpy."
"I got beaten by ten men yesterday."
He went still.
"Right."
Small correction.
Important.
He placed phone down.
"You call."
He wrote a number on paper.
Legal clinic.
Then another.
"Mara Sullivan's current address."
Charlotte stared.
"You want me to visit?"
"No."
"Then why give it?"
"You asked who she was."
He looked at her.
"Information is not instruction."
Charlotte folded the paper.
For years, debt had been something done to her.
Maybe now it could become something examined.
She stood carefully.
At door, Vincent said:
"Charlotte."
She turned.
"I am sorry my family's system touched yours."
Not "for your father."
Not claiming.
She nodded.
"I don't know if I accept that yet."
"You don't have to."
Good.
She left.
In hallway, Rosa waited with soup.
Charlotte groaned.
"Everyone is feeding me."
"You are injured."
"I am plus-sized, not starving."
Rosa gave her a look.
"Body size does not make you immune to lunch."
Charlotte laughed.
There.
No joke at her expense.
Just lunch.
She took bowl with good hand.
Behind her, Vincent's study door closed.
Inside, he reopened the loan file and found one detail he had not shown Charlotte yet.
The warehouse collateral had been released fourteen years ago.
Signed by Antonio DeAgostino.
Reason:
T. HIGGINS PERFORMANCE SATISFIED.
The debt should have been extinguished.
May you like
Someone had resurrected it after both men were dead.
And the person who filed the fraudulent reinstatement was Mara Sullivan.
