Chapter 13 - THE FAVOR HE COULDN’T REFUSE
Z
Union Station was full of ordinary people.
That was what made it terrifying.
Families pulling suitcases.
Business travelers staring at phones.
Children dragging backpacks.
Nobody knew a seventy-year-old man had turned the building into a battlefield without firing a single shot.
Rebecca fitted a wire beneath my coat.
Vincent stood three feet away.
He said nothing.
His silence was different now.
Not withholding.
Restraint.
Trust.
The favor was costing him every second.
“You can still change your mind,” Rebecca said.
“No.”
“Claire,” Vincent started.
I looked at him.
He stopped.
Progress.
Federal agents positioned throughout the station.
No visible weapons.
No panic.
Rafe texted me.
GREAT HALL. SOUTH BENCHES.
I walked.
Vincent remained behind the barrier where Rebecca ordered him.
Every instinct in his body fought it.
I could feel that from fifty yards away.
Rafe sat alone near a pillar.
He looked terrible.
His suit was wrinkled.
His left hand shook.
“Where’s Madison?”
“Safe.”
“Prove it.”
He showed me a live video on his phone.
Madison was tied to a chair.
Different location.
Alive.
Angry.
Even gagged, she somehow looked sarcastic.
“Where is she?”
“My father has her.”
“Where?”
Rafe stared at me.
“You think he’s here?”
My stomach dropped.
“He isn’t.”
“No.”
Union Station was another diversion.
I nearly screamed.
“What do you want?”
“To get out.”
“Then surrender.”
“You don’t understand.”
“I understand enough.”
“My father will kill me.”
“Maybe.”
He stared.
“That’s supposed to help?”
“No. It’s supposed to make you stop pretending you have a good option.”
He laughed bitterly.
“You sound like Vincent.”
“Don’t insult me.”
For the first time, Rafe almost smiled.
Then he handed me a key.
“Locker 418.”
“What’s inside?”
“Everything my father kept off the books.”
My heart raced.
“Where’s Madison?”
“Old Saint Agnes Hospital.”
I knew it.
Everyone in Chicago knew it.
Closed for twelve years.
South Side.
“Why there?”
“My father bought the property through a shell company.”
Rafe leaned closer.
“He’s leaving tonight.”
“Then why take Madison?”
“To make sure Vincent follows.”
I understood.
Angelo didn’t want to escape.
He wanted one final confrontation.
“Why are you helping us?”
Rafe looked down.
“Because my father killed my mother.”
I froze.
“He told everyone it was an overdose.”
His eyes filled.
“I found the records last year.”
“Why didn’t you leave?”
“Because cowardice gets comfortable.”
That sentence sounded like something my father might have said.
Agents moved in.
Rafe didn’t resist.
Rebecca collected the key.
Then we ran.
Not me.
I was escorted quickly.
Vincent reached me near the exit.
“You’re okay?”
“Yes.”
“Baby?”
“Yes.”
“Madison?”
“Saint Agnes.”
His expression changed.
Rebecca blocked him.
“You are not going in first.”
“I know the building.”
“How?”
“Moretti used the basement for storage twenty years ago.”
Rebecca stared.
“You really are the gift that keeps giving.”
He ignored her.
We reached Saint Agnes in eleven minutes.
The abandoned hospital looked dead.
Broken windows.
Faded brick.
A rusting ambulance sign.
Federal tactical teams entered from three sides.
Vincent gave them the old floor plans.
I remained in the command vehicle.
This time, willingly.
I had called in my favor.
He had trusted me.
Now I would trust him.
The operation lasted sixteen minutes.
It felt like sixteen years.
Then radio chatter erupted.
“Hostage located.”
I gripped the seat.
“Status?”
“Alive.”
Madison.
I cried.
Then another voice shouted.
“Suspect moving to roof.”
Angelo.
Vincent was already inside.
I knew before Rebecca swore.
“He broke the perimeter.”
Of course he did.
We watched body-camera footage.
Vincent climbed a stairwell.
Angelo reached the roof.
Wind tore across the abandoned building.
Angelo held a gun.
Vincent held nothing.
“What are you doing?” I whispered at the screen.
Angelo pointed the weapon at him.
“You destroyed everything.”
Vincent stopped ten feet away.
“No.”
His voice carried through the feed.
“You did.”
“I built this family.”
“You buried it.”
“You think that woman changed you?”
Vincent stared at him.
“No.”
My breath caught.
“I changed because she showed me I could.”
Angelo laughed.
Then raised the gun.
A shot rang out.
I screamed.
But Vincent didn’t fall.
Angelo did.
Rafe stood in the doorway behind him.
A gun dropped from Rafe’s shaking hand.
He had shot his father.
Not fatally.
In the shoulder.
Agents flooded the roof.
Angelo screamed as they restrained him.
Vincent stood motionless.
Alive.
Again.
Twenty minutes later, he walked out of the hospital.
Madison was behind him wrapped in a blanket, yelling at an agent because they had apparently lost one of her earrings.
I ran toward her first.
She hugged me.
Then I turned.
Vincent stood several feet away.
Waiting.
I crossed the distance.
And kissed him.
There were federal agents.
Paramedics.
Reporters beginning to arrive.
His mother.
Marco.
Madison.
I didn’t care.
Vincent froze for half a second.
Then his hand came gently to the back of my neck.
The kiss wasn’t dramatic.
It wasn’t desperate.
It was quiet.
An answer to something neither of us had dared ask.
When I pulled away, Vincent looked stunned.
“That wasn’t the favor,” he said.
I laughed through tears.
“No.”
“Good.”
“Why?”
“Because I would like another one someday.”
I touched his chest.
“You only promised one.”
“Then I’ll negotiate.”
“You’re terrible at negotiation.”
“I got you to marry me once.”
“And then divorced me.”
His face fell.
I kissed him again.
“Work in progress, Moretti.”
Behind us, Madison shouted,
“Please remarry him before I have to keep listening to this.”
We both laughed.
But the war wasn’t completely over.
May you like
Angelo was alive.
And men like Angelo rarely accepted defeat quietly.
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