Chapter 6 - GLASS SAINTSophia had never been inside a car with blacked-out windows before.
She had never had her wrists tied with plastic.
She had never seen her grandmother on the floor of an old laundry room, screaming her name while men in federal jackets dragged her away.
She had never hated adults as much as she hated them now.
The man sitting across from her wore a navy jacket with yellow letters across the front.
FBI.
But Sophia had seen Miss Lane’s badge.
The real one.
This man did not move like Miss Lane.
He moved like Vincent’s men.
Quiet.
Heavy.
Like he expected the world to make space for him.
Sophia swallowed hard.
“Are you really FBI?”
The man smiled.
“You’re a smart little thing.”
“That’s not an answer.”
His smile faded.
“No. It isn’t.”
Sophia looked down at the gold cross in her palm. Vincent’s cross. Her mother’s cross. She had squeezed it so hard the edges marked her skin.
The man noticed.
“Pretty necklace.”
“It’s not yours.”
“Nothing is yours unless you can keep it.”
Sophia closed her fist tighter.
The van turned sharply.
She slid against the seat.
There were two other men in the back. One watched the rear window. The other kept his gun on his knee.
Sophia tried to remember what Vincent had told Paulie.
First ladder up.
Second ladder down.
Boiler wall.
She had not understood why grown-ups said things out loud in dangerous places.
Now she did.
They were leaving crumbs.
Sophia needed crumbs.
The man across from her leaned forward.
“Do you know why everyone is making such a fuss about you?”
Sophia stared at him.
“My grandma says don’t talk to strangers.”
“Your grandmother lied to you your entire life.”
Sophia’s throat tightened.
He saw that and smiled.
Adults always smiled when they found the soft spot.
“Your father is a killer,” he said.
Sophia’s eyes burned.
“My father got shot trying to save Miss Lane.”
“He got shot because men like him always end up bleeding on roofs.”
“He came for her.”
“Did he come for you seven years ago?”
Sophia looked away.
The man leaned back.
“Exactly.”
The van slowed.
Sophia listened.
Horn.
Another horn.
Brakes.
City traffic.
They were not on a highway.
The man opened a small tablet and tapped the screen.
A paused video showed Evelyn tied to the rooftop chair.
Another thumbnail showed Vincent in the garage.
Another showed Sophia running in front of the SUV.
Sophia stared.
“You filmed me?”
“We film everything that matters.”
“I don’t matter.”
The man’s eyes lifted.
“Oh, sweetheart. You matter more than your father’s whole empire.”
The word father still felt strange.
Like wearing shoes that did not fit.
Sophia looked at the cross again.
“My mom hid something.”
The man’s face changed so slightly that most people would have missed it.
Sophia did not.
Children notice tiny changes because they survive on them.
“She hid a list,” the man said.
“I don’t know where.”
“We think you do.”
“I’m seven.”
“That’s why it worked.”
Sophia frowned.
“What worked?”
The man studied her.
Then he reached into a folder and pulled out a photograph.
A young woman smiled at the camera, tired but beautiful, holding a baby wrapped in a yellow blanket.
Sophia stopped breathing.
She knew without being told.
“My mom.”
“Yes.”
Sophia reached for the photo.
The man pulled it back.
“Where is the ledger?”
Sophia’s eyes filled with tears.
“I don’t know.”
The man’s voice hardened. “Elena hid it with you.”
“No, she didn’t.”
“Yes, she did.”
“I was a baby.”
“Exactly.”
Sophia shook her head.
That did not make sense.
Nothing made sense.
“My grandma would know.”
“Your grandmother knows pieces. Not enough.”
“Then ask her.”
“We did.”
The way he said it made Sophia’s stomach hurt.
“What did you do to her?”
The man did not answer.
The van stopped.
The back doors opened.
Light flooded in.
Sophia was pulled out into an underground loading dock that smelled like gasoline and rain. Not Vincent’s building. Somewhere else. Bigger. Colder.
A woman stood waiting near a freight elevator.
She wore a gray suit and red lipstick.
No badge.
No gun visible.
But every man looked at her like she was the one holding the leash.
Sophia knew immediately.
This was the real bad person.
The woman smiled.
“Sophia Torino.”
Sophia lifted her chin.
“My name is Sophia Marino.”
The woman’s smile widened.
“For now.”
She crouched in front of Sophia.
“My name is Caroline Vale.”
“I don’t care.”
One of the men grabbed Sophia’s shoulder.
Caroline raised a finger and he let go.
“Careful,” she said. “Courage in children is usually grief wearing a costume.”
Sophia did not understand every word.
But she understood the insult.
“Where’s my grandma?”
“Safe if you cooperate.”
“That means not safe.”
Caroline laughed softly.
“You really are Elena’s daughter.”
Sophia stared at her.
“You knew my mom too?”
“Everyone knew your mother, sweetheart. That was the problem.”
Caroline stood.
“Bring her.”
The freight elevator took them up.
Not very high.
Sophia counted seconds.
One.
Two.
Three.
Twenty-nine.
Thirty.
The doors opened into a large empty office floor covered with plastic sheets. Windows overlooked the city. The sun was high now, bright and careless.
In the middle of the room sat a table.
On the table was a teddy bear.
Old.
Yellow.
One eye missing.
Sophia’s heart stopped.
“Mr. Buttons.”
Caroline watched her face.
“There it is.”
Sophia ran before anyone stopped her.
She grabbed the bear and hugged it so tightly the dust made her cough.
Mr. Buttons had been missing for two years.
Her grandmother said he was lost when they moved apartments.
Sophia had cried for three nights.
Caroline walked slowly around the table.
“Your mother gave that to you in the hospital.”
Sophia looked up.
“How do you have it?”
“We took it from Lucia’s storage unit after she got careless.”
Sophia pulled the bear closer.
Caroline’s voice became gentle.
Too gentle.
“Elena was brilliant. She knew grown men search safes, bank accounts, computers, hidden walls. They search everything that looks important.”
Sophia looked down at Mr. Buttons.
Caroline smiled.
“But no guilty man looks twice at a child’s toy.”
Sophia’s fingers went cold.
Inside the bear, under the worn yellow fabric, something hard pressed against her thumb.
Not stuffing.
Not a button.
A tiny shape.
Caroline saw her feel it.
“There,” she whispered.
Sophia hugged the bear tighter.
“No.”
Caroline’s smile vanished.
“Sophia, give me the bear.”
“No.”
The man from the van stepped forward.
Caroline stopped him again, but this time her patience was thinner.
“Do you know what happens when little girls say no to powerful people?”
Sophia thought of Vincent bleeding but standing.
She thought of Miss Lane firing from behind the SUV.
She thought of Grandma with a kitchen knife.
She thought of her mother, a woman everyone said was brave.
Then she looked Caroline Vale in the eye.
“They get louder.”
Caroline stared at her.
Then a phone rang.
Caroline answered without looking away.
Her expression changed as she listened.
“What do you mean he left Dante alive?”
Silence.
Then her face hardened.
“Then kill Dante before he talks.”
Sophia’s breath caught.
Dante was bad.
But if bad people wanted him dead, he knew something.
Caroline ended the call.
Too late, she realized Sophia had heard.
Sophia looked down at Mr. Buttons.
The one-eyed bear had become the most dangerous thing in the room.
Caroline held out her hand.
“Last chance.”
Sophia stepped back.
The office lights flickered.
Once.
Twice.
Then every screen on the floor turned on.
There were dozens of them.
Computer monitors.
Wall displays.
Old conference screens.
All at once, they showed the same image.
A scarred man smiling into a camera.
Marco Santini.
“Caroline,” he said through the speakers. “You always did steal toys from children.”
Caroline’s face went white with rage.
At the far window, a window washer platform rose into view from outside the building.
On it stood Vincent Torino.
Bleeding.
Furious.
Alive.
Sophia saw him.
For one second, she forgot she was angry.
Vincent looked through the glass at his daughter.
Then he lifted one hand and pointed down.
Sophia looked down at Mr. Buttons.
A seam had come loose beneath the bear’s arm.
Inside, a tiny red light blinked.
Not a bomb.
Not a tracker.
A recorder.
And it was still running.
Caroline saw it too.
Her face changed.
May you like
Because Sophia had not just been holding the ledger.
She had been broadcasting every word.
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