“I don’t know.”
Dominic leaned closer. “You sure?”
“Yes.”
But even as she said it, a memory stirred.
A baby shower that had not really been a shower because she had only known three people well enough to invite. Mrs. Alvarez had brought arroz con leche. A coworker had brought diapers. Caleb had been gone by then, vanished into silence. But one package had arrived by mail with no return address.
Inside was a small silver lamb charm on a thin chain.
Emma had thought it was strange. Too delicate for a baby, too personal from no one. She had cried over it that night because it felt like the only proof that maybe Caleb had remembered.
She had put it away.
Then forgotten it.
Her expression must have betrayed her.
Roman’s eyes narrowed. “Emma.”
She sat down slowly. “There was something.”
Dominic exhaled. “Here we go.”
Roman silenced him with a look.
“What was it?” he asked.
“A necklace. A tiny silver lamb. It came before Lily was born. No note. I didn’t know it was from him.”
“Where is it now?”
“At my apartment.”
Roman reached for his coat. “We go now.”
Emma stood. “No.”
He turned.
“I’m going,” she said. “Not one of your men. Not without me.”
“You and Lily stay here.”
“No.”
His patience visibly strained. “Emma, the man who came here tonight knew your name, your child, Caleb, and something hidden in your home. You are not walking into that apartment.”
“That apartment is all I have.”
“It may already be compromised.”
“Then I need to see it.”
Roman looked as if he wanted to argue.
Lily, exhausted from crying, hiccupped against his chest.
Emma reached for her daughter. “And I’m not leaving her either.”
Roman studied her for a long moment.
Then he said, “Fine. But we do it my way.”
His way involved three black cars, six armed men, Dominic muttering into a phone, and Roman sitting beside Emma in the back seat with Lily asleep between them in her car seat.
The city slid past in black glass and white snow.
Emma had never felt so visible and so hidden at the same time.
Her apartment was on the third floor of a brick building where the heat knocked in the pipes and the hallway always smelled faintly of onions and laundry soap. Roman’s men cleared the building first. Emma waited in the car, every second stretching until she thought she might scream.
When Roman finally opened the door, he said, “No one inside.”
She carried Lily up herself.
Roman followed.
Her apartment looked exactly as she had left it that morning: dishes in the sink, a folded onesie on the radiator, Lily’s stuffed rabbit on the floor. The normalness of it broke something in Emma. She stood in the doorway and had to fight the urge to cry.
Roman said nothing.
Dominic did, but quietly. “Where’s the necklace?”
“In the bedroom.”
Emma handed Lily to Roman before she could think better of it.
He accepted her as if it had already become natural.
That frightened Emma too.
She went to the bedroom and pulled open the bottom drawer of her dresser. Beneath old birthday cards, hospital papers, and Lily’s first tiny hat was a small velvet pouch.
Her fingers trembled as she opened it.
The silver lamb lay inside, tarnished slightly, harmless and sweet.
Roman came to the doorway with Lily asleep on his shoulder.
Emma placed the charm in his palm.
He studied it. “Dominic.”
Dominic took it, turned it under the light, then let out a low whistle.
“What?” Emma asked.
“It opens.”
He pressed the lamb’s tiny head and twisted.
A seam appeared along its belly.
Emma stared as he pulled out something no bigger than a grain of rice, black and metallic.
“A microdrive,” Dominic said.
Roman’s face hardened.
Emma felt suddenly sick. “Caleb sent that to my baby?”
“He sent it to you,” Roman said. “Through her.”
“That doesn’t make it better.”
“No,” he said. “It doesn’t.”
Dominic held the drive up. “We need a clean machine. Offline.”
Roman nodded. “Back to the club.”
But before anyone moved, a sound came from the kitchen.
A floorboard creaked.
Roman pushed Emma behind him.
Dominic drew his gun.
Emma’s heart slammed against her ribs.
From the kitchen doorway, Mrs. Alvarez appeared, wrapped in her old brown coat, leaning on a cane.
Emma gasped. “Mrs. Alvarez?”
The old woman looked at the gun in Dominic’s hand, then at Roman holding Lily.
Her face did not show surprise.
That was the first thing Emma noticed.
Not fear.
Not confusion.
Recognition.
Roman noticed too.
His voice became ice. “Who are you?”
Mrs. Alvarez sighed.
“Oh, Emma,” she said sadly. “I was hoping you wouldn’t find it tonight.”
Emma took a step back. “What?”
Mrs. Alvarez looked older than she had that morning, but not weaker. Never weaker. Her eyes were steady, almost apologetic.
“I did hurt my knee,” she said. “That part was true.”
Dominic aimed the gun. “Hands where I can see them.”
She obeyed, slowly.
Emma shook her head. “No. No, what is this?”
Mrs. Alvarez looked at Lily. “I watched that child because Caleb asked me to.”
Emma’s throat closed.
Roman’s arms tightened around Lily.
“You knew Caleb?” he asked.
“I knew both of you when you were boys,” she said.
Dominic cursed under his breath.
Roman’s stare turned lethal. “Explain.”
Mrs. Alvarez looked at Emma instead.
“Caleb came to me before he disappeared. He was scared. Not for himself. For you. For the baby. He said if anything happened, I was to stay close. Make sure you had help, but not too much help. Too much would make you suspicious.”
Emma felt as if the floor had tilted. “You let me think I was alone.”
The old woman flinched.
“I paid what I could without you knowing. A grocery card here. A landlord delayed there.”
Emma remembered sudden kindnesses. A waived late fee. A bag of food left by mistake. Heat fixed after weeks of complaints.
Her eyes burned.
“You lied to me every day.”
“Yes,” Mrs. Alvarez said.
Roman stepped forward. “Who do you work for?”
The old woman lifted her chin. “Not Novak.”
“Then who?”
Her gaze moved to the silver lamb.
“For Caleb.”
Roman’s face twisted with anger. “Caleb is alive.”
“Yes.”
The word hit the room like a gunshot.
Emma’s voice shook. “Where is he?”
Mrs. Alvarez’s eyes filled with tears.
“I don’t know anymore.”
“But you did.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t he come back?” Emma asked. “Why didn’t he come back for us?”
Mrs. Alvarez looked at Roman.
“Because your brother made a deal with the devil,” she said. “And then he became useful to him.”
Roman’s voice was low. “Novak.”
She nodded.
Emma felt numb. “The man tonight said Caleb wants to see Lily.”
Mrs. Alvarez looked sharply at her. “No. Caleb would never send Novak’s man to his daughter.”
Dominic lowered the gun slightly. “Then who sent the photo?”
Mrs. Alvarez’s face went pale.
Roman handed Lily back to Emma and took the photograph from Dominic. He turned it over, reading the six words again.
Ask Emma about the silver lamb.
Then he looked at Mrs. Alvarez.
“Who knew about it?”
“Caleb,” she said. “Me. And the priest.”
Dominic blinked. “There’s always a priest.”
Roman ignored him. “What priest?”
“Father Michael. St. Agnes.”
Roman’s expression changed.
Emma saw it instantly.
“You know him,” she said.
Roman did not answer.
Mrs. Alvarez whispered, “Roman?”
But Roman was already moving.
Dominic caught his arm. “You can’t go charging into a church in the middle of the night.”
Roman looked at his hand.
Dominic released him.
Emma stepped forward. “What is St. Agnes?”
Roman’s jaw worked.
“My mother’s church,” he said. “The place Caleb and I hid when our father was drunk.”
Mrs. Alvarez crossed herself.
Roman looked at the microdrive in Dominic’s hand. “We go there.”
Emma shook her head. “What about Lily?”
Roman looked at the baby, then at Emma.
“You both come with me.”
The words surprised everyone, maybe Roman most of all.
Snow fell harder by the time they reached St. Agnes.
The church stood wedged between old brick buildings, its stone steps glazed white, its stained-glass windows dark except for one small light near the altar. Emma had passed it before without noticing. Now it looked like a place waiting to confess.
Roman entered first.
The air inside smelled of wax, cold stone, and old wood. Their footsteps echoed down the aisle.
A priest knelt near the front pew.
He was gray-haired, thin, and calm in the way of men who had seen too much and forgiven none of it cheaply.
He stood before Roman spoke.
“I wondered when you’d come,” Father Michael said.
Roman’s hand curled at his side. “You knew.”
The priest looked at Lily in Emma’s arms.
“I knew Caleb had a child,” he said. “Not where she was. Not until tonight.”
Dominic stepped from the shadows near the aisle. “Popular secret.”
Father Michael ignored him. “The drive is not what you think.”
Roman held out his hand.
Dominic gave him the microdrive.
The priest looked at it as if it were something poisonous.
“Caleb stole Novak’s ledger,” he said. “Yes. But not for money. Not for freedom. He stole it because he found Lily’s name in it.”
Emma felt the world stop.
“My daughter’s name?”
Father Michael nodded once. “Not Lily Hart. Lily Callahan.”
Roman went utterly still.
Emma whispered, “Why would my baby’s name be in a criminal ledger?”
Father Michael’s eyes were full of sorrow.
“Because Novak was not tracking debts. He was tracking bloodlines.”
