CHAPTER 2 — THE MAN WHO KNEW MY FATHER'S SECRET
The drive to Cicero took nineteen minutes.
It felt like an hour.
Dominic drove himself.
No bodyguards.
No police escort.
Just a black Mercedes cutting through the rain while I sat rigidly in the passenger seat, staring at my phone.
Mom still wasn't answering.
I called again.
Voicemail.
Again.
Voicemail.
I pressed the phone against my forehead.
“She always answers.”
Dominic kept his eyes on the road.
“Does she live alone?”
“Yes.”
“Any security system?”
“No.”
“Anyone with a key?”
“My landlord.”
“Family nearby?”
“No.”
“Friends?”
“Not many.”
He nodded.
His questions were calm.
Precise.
Like he was building a map inside his head.
I turned toward him.
“You said my father's death wasn't an accident.”
“I said someone may have attacked him.”
“You know something.”
“I know enough to be concerned.”
“That isn't an answer.”
“No.”
His eyes remained on the road.
“It isn't.”
I stared at him.
“Then give me one.”
Silence.
Rain hammered the windshield.
Finally, Dominic spoke.
“Your father was named Michael Carter.”
I froze.
“Yes.”
“He worked at Northstar Industrial?”
“Yes.”
“Maintenance supervisor?”
“Yes.”
My throat tightened.
“How do you know that?”
Dominic's hands tightened slightly around the steering wheel.
“Because eight years ago, Northstar had a security breach.”
“What does that have to do with my father?”
“Everything.”
I waited.
He continued.
“The official report said your father died when a hydraulic lift failed.”
“That is what they told us.”
“It wasn't the first report.”
My heartbeat quickened.
“What do you mean?”
“The first report disappeared.”
“Disappeared?”
“Someone replaced it.”
I stared at him.
“Who?”
“We never found out.”
“We?”
Dominic said nothing.
I turned toward him.
“Who is ‘we’?”
He didn't answer.
Instead, he asked:
“Did your father ever tell you to memorize anything?”
I frowned.
“What?”
“A number. A phrase. A name.”
“No.”
“Think carefully.”
“I was nineteen.”
“You were sixteen when he started training you.”
My head snapped toward him.
“How do you know that?”
He looked at me.
“I know because I knew what kind of man your father was.”
I swallowed.
“My father wasn't a criminal.”
“I didn't say he was.”
“Then what are you saying?”
“That he was protecting something.”
The words landed heavily.
I looked through the windshield.
Streetlights blurred through the rain.
Protecting something.
My father had always been protective.
But there was something else.
A memory.
One I hadn't thought about in years.
My father sitting beside my bed when I was seventeen.
His face unusually serious.
He had placed a small metal object in my hand.
A key.
Old.
Blackened.
He had said:
“If anything ever happens to me, don't give this to anyone.”
I remembered laughing.
“Why would anything happen to you?”
He hadn't laughed.
“Promise me.”
I had promised.
The next year, he died.
And I had forgotten the key.
Or at least I thought I had.
My stomach tightened.
“Dominic.”
“Yes?”
“I think I know what you're talking about.”
He looked at me.
“My father gave me something.”
“What?”
“A key.”
“Where is it?”
“I don't know.”
His expression hardened.
“Think.”
“I haven't seen it in eight years.”
“Where did you keep it?”
“I don't remember.”
“Avery.”
His voice was firm.
“Try.”
I closed my eyes.
Then I remembered.
My old martial-arts bag.
The blue one with the broken zipper.
After Dad died, Mom had packed my things into boxes.
I hadn't opened that bag since.
“I might know where it is.”
Dominic accelerated.
“Where?”
“My apartment.”
He glanced at me.
“Then we're going there first.”
The apartment building appeared ten minutes later.
Three floors.
Cracked concrete.
One flickering hallway light.
My home.
I jumped out before Dominic had fully stopped.
“Avery.”
I ignored him.
I ran upstairs.
The front door to our apartment was open.
I stopped.
My heart slammed against my ribs.
“Mom?”
No answer.
Dominic came up behind me.
His entire posture changed.
The businessman disappeared.
Something colder took his place.
He pulled a weapon from beneath his jacket.
“Stay behind me.”
I stared at him.
“You carry a gun?”
“Tonight, yes.”
“That doesn't answer—”
“Quiet.”
He entered.
I followed.
The apartment was destroyed.
Drawers pulled open.
Cushions sliced.
Cabinet doors hanging loose.
Medication bottles scattered across the floor.
The kitchen table overturned.
“Mom!”
I ran toward the bedroom.
Dominic caught my arm.
“Wait.”
“She could be hurt.”
“Which is why you don't run into an unknown room.”
He moved first.
Bedroom empty.
Bathroom empty.
Kitchen empty.
Then I heard something.
A soft sound.
A breath.
From the hallway closet.
“Mom?”
I opened it.
Linda was sitting inside.
Her wrists were tied.
Her mouth covered with tape.
“Mom!”
I dropped to my knees.
Dominic cut the restraints.
I pulled the tape away.
Mom gasped.
“Avery…”
I hugged her.
“I'm here.”
Her hands trembled against my back.
“They were looking for you.”
My blood turned cold.
“Who?”
“I don't know.”
“How many?”
“Two men.”
“Did they hurt you?”
“No.”
She looked toward Dominic.
Then back at me.
“They asked about your father.”
I felt the room tilt.
“What did they ask?”
Mom's eyes filled with fear.
“They wanted something.”
“What?”
She looked at me.
“The key.”
I stopped breathing.
Dominic slowly looked at me.
“What key?”
Mom's expression changed.
She realized he didn't know.
“You have it?”
I shook my head.
“I don't know where it is.”
Mom closed her eyes.
“Yes, you do.”
“What?”
She reached for my hand.
“Your father made me promise never to tell you unless they came back.”
“Who?”
“The men who killed him.”
The words destroyed the last piece of certainty I had.
I sat beside her.
“Mom…”
She squeezed my hand.
“Your father wasn't killed at work.”
I couldn't speak.
“He knew they were coming.”
Dominic crouched in front of us.
“Who were they?”
Linda looked at him.
Her eyes widened.
“You're Dominic Moretti.”
“Yes.”
She stared at him for several seconds.
Then whispered:
“Your father was involved too.”
Dominic's face became still.
“My father?”
Linda nodded.
“Eight years ago.”
She looked at me.
“Michael discovered that someone was moving money through Northstar.”
Dominic's expression hardened.
“How much?”
“Hundreds of millions.”
My mouth fell open.
“What?”
Linda continued.
“Your father found shipments that weren't supposed to exist.”
“Shipments of what?”
“I don't know.”
She looked toward Dominic.
“But your father did.”
Dominic stood.
“Where is the key?”
Mom's voice trembled.
“It's not just a key.”
“What is it?”
“Avery's father called it…”
She paused.
“The Black Ledger.”
The room went silent.
Dominic looked at me.
“Do you have it?”
I shook my head.
“I thought it was a key.”
Mom whispered:
“It is a key.”
“To what?”
“The ledger.”
I stared at her.
“Where is it?”
Mom's eyes filled with tears.
“Your father hid it somewhere only you could find.”
I looked around the destroyed apartment.
“How?”
“He told me that if he died, you would know.”
I shook my head.
“I don't.”
“You will.”
Mom reached toward my old martial-arts bag lying beside the closet.
My heart stopped.
I hadn't even noticed it.
Dominic picked it up.
The zipper was broken.
Inside were old hand wraps.
A pair of worn gloves.
A photograph.
And beneath them—
a small black metal key.
My hands began to shake.
I picked it up.
On one side was a symbol.
A circle.
Inside it—
the letter M.
Dominic stared at it.
His face changed.
“What?”
He took one step backward.
“You know this symbol?”
“Yes.”
“What is it?”
He looked at me.
“That symbol belonged to my father.”
I couldn't breathe.
“Then why did my father have it?”
Dominic didn't answer.
He turned toward the window.
Outside, a black SUV was parked across the street.
Its headlights switched on.
Dominic's expression became deadly.
“They're here.”
Mom gripped my arm.
“Avery…”
“What?”
Her voice dropped.
“Your father didn't trust the police.”
“Why?”
“Because the police were already working for them.”
The SUV door opened.
Three men stepped into the rain.
Dominic pulled his weapon.
“Take your mother upstairs.”
“What about you?”
He looked at me.
“This time, stay behind me.”
The first gunshot shattered the window.
Glass exploded across the room.
Mom screamed.
Dominic pushed us down.
Another shot.
Then another.
I pulled Mom behind the kitchen counter.
Dominic returned fire.
The men outside scattered.
My heart was pounding.
Then I saw something through the broken window.
One of the attackers was looking directly at me.
He wasn't aiming at Dominic.
He wasn't aiming at Mom.
He was staring at the black key in my hand.
Then he smiled.
And mouthed four words.
“He was waiting for you.”
The man disappeared into the rain.
I looked at Dominic.
“Who was waiting?”
He stared at the empty street.
Then at the symbol on the key.
“My father.”
I shook my head.
“Your father is dead.”
Dominic's expression darkened.
“That's what everyone believes.”
He turned toward me.
“But eight years ago, my father disappeared.”
I stared at him.
“Disappeared?”
Dominic nodded.
“And the night he disappeared…”
He looked at the black key.
“…was the same night your father died.”
For eight years, I had believed my father died in an accident.
For eight years, Dominic had believed his father disappeared.
Now we were standing in my destroyed apartment with the same mysterious symbol between us.
Two fathers.
One night.
One missing ledger.
And a secret powerful enough to make someone kill twice.
Dominic looked at me.
“We need to find that ledger before they do.”
I closed my fingers around the key.
“No.”
He frowned.
“What?”
I looked at the shattered window.
At my terrified mother.
At the blood on the floor.
Then I looked at him.
“We don't find it for them.”
I stood.
“We find it for us.”
And somewhere outside, hidden in the darkness, someone was already watching our apartment.
Waiting.
Because they knew something we didn't.
May you like
The Black Ledger wasn't the real secret.
It was only the beginning.
