Chapter 1 - FIVE MINUTES
"What are you doing?"
Gilbert's whisper struck Evelyn like a hand between the shoulder blades.
She closed her fist around the folded napkin before he could see it.
"Fixing my mistake."
"Your mistake is still sitting at Table Four."
Gilbert glanced toward Lorenzo Moretti and swallowed.
"Get back out there before Mr. Moretti decides the wine stain offended him personally."
Evelyn looked at the clock above the bar.
8:52.
Three minutes.
The dining room seemed to sharpen around her.
Every chandelier sparkled too brightly.
Every fork against porcelain sounded too loud.
Every person at Table Four suddenly looked like someone wearing a mask.
Celeste Vane was smiling again.
Her hand rested beside Lorenzo's as if she had nothing in the world to hide.
Evelyn slipped the folded napkin under a clean saucer.
Her legs felt strangely calm as she crossed the room.
That frightened her more than the shaking had.
She had seen the same calm in her father the night he lost their rent money at a backroom poker table.
He had smiled as if disaster belonged to somebody else.
Then he had looked at twelve-year-old Evelyn and said one sentence she had never forgotten.
"When everyone at the table wants you to hurry, slow down."
She slowed down.
At Table Four, one of Lorenzo's men was telling a story about a senator who had confused loyalty with courage.
The men laughed.
Celeste did not.
Her eyes went to the mirrored wall again.
8:53.
Evelyn set the saucer beside Lorenzo's right hand.
He did not look at her.
She placed the folded napkin beneath the edge of his bread plate.
Then she moved to the next guest.
For two terrible seconds, nothing happened.
Lorenzo lifted his wineglass.
Celeste touched his sleeve.
"To us."
His eyes lowered.
Not to her.
To the tiny corner of white paper showing beneath the plate.
His hand paused.
Evelyn kept walking.
She did not turn around.
She did not need to.
The air behind her changed.
Some men became dangerous when they raised their voices.
Lorenzo Moretti became dangerous when he became quieter.
"Rafe."
That was all he said.
A man near the end of the table stopped laughing.
Evelyn reached the service station.
From the corner of her eye, she saw Lorenzo wipe his fingers with the folded napkin.
He read it without moving his head.
His expression did not change.
Celeste was watching him now.
"Something wrong?"
"Wine."
Lorenzo folded the napkin again.
"I have had better."
Celeste laughed softly.
"You chose the restaurant."
"That was my first mistake tonight."
Her smile tightened by less than an inch.
Evelyn saw it.
So did Lorenzo.
8:54.
Lorenzo stood.
Half the table moved with him.
He lifted one hand.
They sat again.
"Where are you going?" Celeste asked.
"To make a call."
"Now?"
"It is Chicago."
He buttoned his jacket.
"Someone is always disappointing me."
Celeste rose too quickly.
Her chair scraped the floor.
That sound drew more attention than any scream could have.
Lorenzo looked at her.
For the first time that evening, his face showed something almost warm.
"Sit down, Celeste."
She stared at him.
Then she sat.
Evelyn's pulse beat in her throat.
Lorenzo walked toward the south corridor instead of the north exit.
Rafe followed him at a distance of ten feet.
A second man rose and drifted toward the kitchen.
Nobody else seemed to notice.
8:55.
The north hallway exploded.
The first blast punched through the restaurant like a giant fist.
Glass bowed inward.
The chandeliers swung.
A wall of sound swallowed the music.
Evelyn hit the floor before she understood she was falling.
A crystal decanter shattered beside her face.
Someone screamed.
Then everyone screamed.
The second blast came from the loading dock.
The floor jumped.
Lights vanished.
Emergency lamps flooded the Obsidian in red.
Evelyn raised her head.
Smoke rolled from the north corridor.
A security guard staggered into the dining room with blood across his white shirt.
Then gunfire cracked from behind him.
The dining room became chaos.
Guests crawled under tables.
Servers ran toward the kitchen.
One man in a tuxedo tried to reach the elevator and was dragged down by his wife.
Celeste was gone.
Evelyn saw the empty emerald chair and knew immediately.
She had not been surprised by the explosion.
She had moved before it happened.
"Evelyn."
Gilbert grabbed her wrist.
His face had gone gray.
"Kitchen."
She pulled back.
"Where is Celeste?"
"Are you insane?"
"Where did she go?"
Another burst of gunfire answered for him.
A figure in black appeared through the smoke near the north hall.
The man wore a catering jacket over body armor.
He raised a compact rifle.
Evelyn saw the muzzle turn toward Table Four.
"Down!"
She shoved Gilbert behind the service station.
The rifle barked.
Bottles burst in a glittering line above them.
Evelyn crawled toward the kitchen doors.
A pair of black shoes stepped into her path.
She looked up.
Lorenzo Moretti stood over her.
He had removed his suit jacket.
A pistol was in his right hand.
His white shirt was dusted with plaster.
He looked exactly as calm as he had before the explosion.
Only his eyes had changed.
They were looking at Evelyn now as if she were the only object in the room with a clear outline.
"You."
Evelyn froze.
Rafe appeared behind Lorenzo and fired twice toward the north corridor.
A man in black dropped behind an overturned table.
"Move," Rafe snapped.
Lorenzo did not.
He held Evelyn's gaze.
"How did you know?"
"I saw a message."
"On whose phone?"
"Celeste's."
A bullet struck the service station.
Lorenzo did not flinch.
"What did it say?"
"North exit secured."
Evelyn swallowed.
"Cleaners in position."
"Anything else?"
"8:55."
Rafe looked at Lorenzo.
"Boss, we have to go."
Lorenzo reached down.
Evelyn thought he was going to drag her up.
Instead, he took her hand and pulled her behind him.
"She comes with us."
Rafe's eyebrows lifted.
"That is a civilian."
"She is the reason I am still breathing."
Lorenzo fired once into the smoke.
"That makes her our problem."
Evelyn did not like the word our.
She liked problem even less.
They moved through the kitchen.
Cooks had abandoned stations.
A pot burned on a stove.
Sprinklers hissed overhead.
Water turned flour on the floor into pale paste.
One of Lorenzo's men held the south service door open.
"Garage is compromised."
"River stairs?" Rafe asked.
"Unknown."
Lorenzo looked at Evelyn.
"Is there another way out?"
She almost laughed.
The most feared man in Chicago was asking the waitress for directions.
"Laundry lift."
Rafe frowned.
"What?"
"Old dumbwaiter shaft behind dry storage."
Evelyn pointed.
"They sealed the upstairs opening during renovation, but the lower service door still opens into the alley beside the parking ramp."
Lorenzo stared at her for half a second.
"Show me."
They ran.
The dry storage room was narrow and dark.
Evelyn shoved aside stacked cases of imported water.
Behind them was a painted steel panel almost invisible against the wall.
She yanked the handle.
It stuck.
"Lift it first," she said.
That thought made her think of her broken apartment door.
She lifted.
Rafe pulled.
The panel opened.
A black shaft dropped six feet to a lower landing.
"You first," Lorenzo said.
Evelyn looked down.
"I am wearing restaurant shoes."
"Then ruin them."
A crash sounded from the kitchen.
Voices followed.
Not panicked voices.
Searching voices.
Evelyn sat on the edge and lowered herself.
Lorenzo caught her waist from above and eased her down.
His hands were careful.
The unexpected gentleness unsettled her more than his gun.
Her feet touched the lower platform.
Rafe dropped beside her.
Lorenzo came last.
They opened the lower service door into freezing river air.
The alley was empty except for a delivery van and drifting smoke.
Rafe raised his weapon.
"Car is two blocks west."
Lorenzo touched an earpiece.
"No phones."
"Already dark."
They moved beneath the elevated roadway.
Behind them, alarms screamed over the river.
Evelyn's lungs burned.
She had made it halfway to the next block when Lorenzo suddenly caught her arm and pulled her into the shadow of a concrete pillar.
A black SUV rolled slowly past the alley mouth.
Its headlights were off.
Evelyn recognized the driver.
Gilbert.
Her manager was behind the wheel.
He was not alone.
Celeste sat in the passenger seat.
She had removed her diamond necklace.
Her emerald dress glowed in the darkness like a signal flare.
Gilbert turned toward her.
Celeste said something.
Then she handed him a phone.
The SUV accelerated west.
Straight toward the route Rafe had said led to Lorenzo's car.
Rafe cursed.
Lorenzo's face became absolutely still.
Evelyn whispered the only useful thing she could think of.
"They know where your car is."
Lorenzo looked at her.
"No."
His voice was quiet.
"They know where all my cars are."
A second later, somewhere two blocks west, another explosion lit the underside of the Chicago sky.
Rafe stared toward the orange flash.
Lorenzo did not.
He kept looking at Evelyn.
"Miss Carter."
She had never told him her last name.
A cold feeling crawled across her skin.
"How do you know my name?"
Lorenzo reached into his pocket and unfolded the napkin she had given him.
"Because your father used to write warnings exactly like this."
Evelyn forgot the explosions.
Forgot the gunfire.
Forgot how cold the alley was.
"You knew my father?"
Lorenzo's expression gave her no comfort.
May you like
"I knew the night he disappeared."
