Chapter 1 - THE MAN WHO WAS WATCHING MEI did not turn around.
That was the first instinct Frankfurt had taught me.
When someone tells you that you're being watched, you do not look for the watcher.
You look for the exit.
The kitchen door was twelve feet behind me.
The private dining room entrance was blocked by two men in dark suits.
A narrow service hallway ran beside the wine cabinet.
And standing directly in front of me was Luca Vescari.
I had learned his name three months after moving to Chicago.
Everyone in the restaurant business knew it.
Some said he owned half the warehouses along the river.
Others said he owned the men who claimed to own them.
Nobody agreed on the details.
They agreed on one thing.
If Luca Vescari remembered your face, your life had probably changed.
Usually for the worse.
“My manager?” I whispered.
Luca's expression did not move.
“Don't look.”
“I wasn't going to.”
That made something change in his eyes.
Not warmth.
Interest.
Which somehow frightened me more.
“Good,” he said. “Because he's waiting for you to make that mistake.”
My fingers tightened around the wet napkin.
Across the room, Luca's bodyguard was wiping blood from his knuckles.
The translator was gone.
I did not ask where.
The contract still rested on the table.
Unsigned.
A black fountain pen lay beside it.
Five minutes earlier, that pen had nearly signed Luca's death warrant.
Now he was studying me.
“His name is Martin,” I said.
“I know his name.”
“Then why are you asking me?”
“I didn't ask you anything.”
I swallowed.
He was right.
That was another thing I remembered from Frankfurt.
Powerful men rarely wasted questions.
They made statements and waited for frightened people to fill the silence.
I closed my mouth.
Luca smiled.
Barely.
“Frankfurt taught you more than German.”
My stomach tightened.
“I waited tables there.”
“No.”
The answer came too quickly.
Too confidently.
“You worked somewhere people spoke carefully.”
I said nothing.
“You recognize Berlin street terminology.”
Silence.
“You knew the difference between Schütze and Scharfschütze despite the speaker swallowing half the word.”
My heart beat harder.
Luca stepped closer.
“And you understood when Keller called me an idiot.”
“I thought that part was obvious.”
The bodyguard actually laughed.
Once.
Then Luca looked at him.
The laughter died.
I wished I could disappear.
Instead, Luca reached past me.
For half a second, my entire body locked.
He noticed.
Of course he noticed.
But he only lifted the wine bottle from the table.
He studied the label.
“Two hundred dollars.”
I stared at him.
“What?”
“The wine you spilled.”
“I'll pay for it.”
His eyebrows rose.
I realized how ridiculous that sounded.
I made six dollars an hour before tips.
My rent was eleven days late.
The sole of my right shoe had been repaired with restaurant tape.
Luca looked down.
At my shoes.
I hated him for noticing.
Then his attention moved toward the mirrored cabinet behind me.
“Martin is gone.”
My stomach dropped.
“What?”
“Your manager.”
I turned before I could stop myself.
The doorway was empty.
Martin had been standing near the register minutes earlier.
Now he was gone.
Luca's expression hardened.
“Marco.”
The bodyguard moved immediately.
“Find him.”
Marco disappeared.
I looked at Luca.
“What is happening?”
“That depends.”
“On what?”
“Whether Martin was watching you for me.”
My blood turned cold.
“Or for them.”
The Germans.
I thought of Keller's expression when Luca refused to sign.
Not anger.
Calculation.
He had looked around the room.
At the exits.
At the guards.
At me.
I suddenly remembered something.
“He saw me.”
Luca went still.
“Who?”
“The older German. Keller.”
“When?”
“When I spilled the wine.”
“Obviously.”
“No.”
I shook my head.
“Before.”
The room became silent.
Luca waited.
“He looked at me when they mentioned the docks.”
“Why didn't you tell me?”
“Because five men had guns and your translator was crying blood.”
Marco returned before Luca could answer.
His face told us everything.
“Martin's car is gone.”
“When?”
“Security says two minutes ago.”
Luca's jaw tightened.
“Lock the building.”
Marco nodded.
“And find Blair's coat.”
I stared at Luca.
“Why?”
He looked at me.
“Because you're leaving.”
Relief hit me so quickly my knees almost weakened.
“Thank God.”
“With me.”
The relief died.
“No.”
Luca blinked.
Marco looked at me like I had just slapped a lion.
“I mean...” I began.
“No?”
Luca sounded almost curious.
“I have an apartment.”
“So did three men who testified against Keller.”
I stopped breathing.
“What happened to them?”
“You already know.”
I did.
I wished I didn't.
Luca took his jacket from the chair.
“You understood the conversation.”
“Yes.”
“Keller saw you understand it.”
“Maybe.”
“Your manager watched you.”
“Yes.”
“And then disappeared immediately after the deal failed.”
I closed my eyes.
When he arranged the facts like that, my apartment suddenly seemed less comforting.
It seemed like a coffin with cheap plumbing.
“I have a cat,” I said.
Luca stared at me.
Marco coughed.
I folded my arms.
“I am not abandoning my cat.”
Luca looked toward Marco.
“Get the cat.”
“You don't know where I live.”
Luca said my address.
Every muscle in my body froze.
He watched the realization cross my face.
“You investigated me.”
“In the last eleven minutes.”
“That is insane.”
“That is survival.”
I hated that answer.
Because I understood it.
Marco left again.
Luca walked toward the door.
I remained where I was.
He stopped.
“Blair.”
“I don't work for you.”
“No.”
He looked over his shoulder.
“Tonight, that's the only reason you're still alive.”
I followed him.
Not because I trusted him.
Because Frankfurt had taught me one final lesson.
Sometimes the safest place in a room was beside the most dangerous man.
I discovered how wrong that lesson could be twenty minutes later.
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We had barely reached the underground garage when the first bullet shattered the windshield.
And Luca Vescari threw his body over mine.
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