Chapter 6 - The Debt at Hunter's Door.
Hunter did not sleep that night.
Every time she closed her eyes, she saw the message on her phone and Tommy standing outside her old apartment.
Every time Leo made a sound, she opened them again.
At six in the morning, Lorenzo entered the nursery carrying coffee for himself and a paper cup of tea for her.
Hunter stared at the tea.
“You remembered I don’t drink coffee?”
“You made a face yesterday when Halloran offered you some.”
“That is a disturbing level of observation.”
“I survive by noticing things.”
The answer was matter-of-fact, but it reminded Hunter exactly who he was.
Lorenzo placed the tea beside her.
“Gabriel found Tommy.”
Hunter stopped breathing.
“Where?”
“Outside a motel in Hempstead.”
“Is he alive?”
Lorenzo’s gaze sharpened.
“Do you want him to be?”
Hunter looked down at Leo.
“Yes.”
She surprised herself with the answer.
“I want him alive enough to face what he did.”
Lorenzo nodded once.
“That is what I told Gabriel.”
Hunter’s eyes lifted.
“You had to tell him?”
Lorenzo did not answer.
An hour later, Hunter stood behind one-way glass in a small security room beneath the east wing.
Tommy sat on the other side of the glass with his wrists secured to the chair.
His hair was greasy, his face bruised from a recent fight, and arrogance still clung to him like cheap cologne.
Gabriel stood against the wall.
Lorenzo sat opposite Tommy.
“Who sent the message to Hunter?” Lorenzo asked.
Tommy smirked.
“You people think everything is about you.”
Lorenzo remained still.
“Who sent it?”
Tommy’s smile weakened.
“I don’t know.”
Lorenzo placed a photograph on the table.
It showed the black sedan reflected behind Tommy at Hunter’s apartment.
“You were watched by one of my brother’s security contractors.”
Tommy looked at the picture.
For the first time, real fear appeared.
“That wasn’t his car.”
“Whose was it?”
Tommy swallowed.
“I borrowed money through a guy called Nicky Vale.”
Gabriel looked at Lorenzo.
The name meant something to both men.
Lorenzo leaned forward.
“Nicholas Vale has been dead for five years.”
Tommy’s face changed.
“That’s what he called himself.”
“What did he want from you?”
“Information.”
Hunter’s stomach turned.
“What information?” Lorenzo asked.
Tommy stared at the table.
“About Hunter.”
Lorenzo’s expression became cold.
Tommy rushed to continue.
“They knew she was pregnant.”
Hunter pressed both hands against the glass.
“They asked where she worked, when she was due, whether she had family.”
Lorenzo’s voice dropped.
“Why?”
“I thought they were trying to scare me into paying.”
“You gave strangers information about a pregnant woman you lived with?”
Tommy’s jaw tightened.
“I needed time.”
Hunter felt sick.
Lorenzo placed another photograph on the table.
This one showed Marco Rossi leaving a restaurant with a man in a gray overcoat.
“Was this the man calling himself Vale?”
Tommy looked once.
Then again.
His face went white.
“That’s him.”
Behind the glass, Hunter’s blood turned cold.
The man beside Marco was not a stranger.
May you like
She had seen him inside the mansion that morning.
He was one of the guards stationed outside Leo’s nursery.
