Chapter 3 - The Price of StayingAt 6:17 the next morning, Sheree Murphy discovered that choosing to stay with Leo Calvino was considerably easier than understanding what staying actually meant.
She woke alone.
For several seconds, she stared at the unfamiliar ceiling and listened to the silence of the penthouse.
There were no pipes knocking behind thin walls.
No elevated train screaming around a curve.
No neighbor arguing through plaster.
No ambulance siren stopping beneath her bedroom window.
Only the low hum of climate control and the muted sound of Chicago forty-two floors below.
Then memory returned.
The snow.
The alley.
Leo bleeding on her kitchen floor.
Vic grabbing her inside St. Jude’s.
The war.
The passport Leo had offered her.
And the choice she had made.
Sheree sat up.
She had slept in one of the guest bedrooms because neither she nor Leo had discussed what “staying” meant after their foreheads had touched beside the windows.
That was probably wise.
She had spent years watching people make catastrophic decisions because adrenaline felt like intimacy.
A man nearly dying in your arms could create strange attachments.
So could being hunted.
So could surviving.
Sheree refused to confuse any of those things with love.
She showered, dressed in jeans and a gray sweater Finn had retrieved from her apartment, and followed the smell of coffee toward the kitchen.
Leo stood at the island.
He wore black trousers and a white shirt with the sleeves rolled to his forearms. A newspaper lay open beside him.
He looked infuriatingly normal.
Not like a man who had admitted to destroying an entire criminal organization less than twelve hours earlier.
Not like a man who had offered her a new identity.
Not like the man whose hands had been bruised when they touched her face.
He looked like someone preparing for a board meeting.
“Morning,” Sheree said.
Leo looked up.
Something changed in his expression.
Only slightly.
But she saw it.
Relief.
“You’re still here.”
Sheree stopped.
“Were you expecting me to climb down forty-two floors?”
“There are elevators.”
“You control the elevators.”
“I control most things in this building.”
“That sentence is exactly why normal women would have taken the passport.”
Leo poured coffee into a second cup.
“No sugar. Extra espresso.”
Sheree stared at it.
“You knowing my coffee order is still creepy.”
“Finn knows your coffee order.”
“That does not improve the situation.”
Leo almost smiled.
She accepted the cup anyway.
Then she noticed three men waiting beyond the kitchen.
Finn was one.
The other two wore suits.
Neither appeared interested in breakfast.
Leo saw her looking.
“We have business.”
“Crime business?”
“Yes.”
Sheree appreciated the answer.
At least he had stopped pretending.
She took her coffee toward the living room.
Leo spoke before she reached it.
“You don’t have to leave.”
She turned.
The two unfamiliar men looked uncomfortable.
Finn looked amused.
“You want me sitting in on a syndicate meeting?”
“You said you wouldn’t look away.”
“That doesn’t mean I want quarterly earnings reports from Murder Incorporated.”
One of the men coughed.
Finn suddenly became fascinated by the floor.
Leo's mouth twitched.
“Sit.”
Sheree raised an eyebrow.
“Ask.”
Leo paused.
“Would you sit?”
“Much better.”
She returned.
The first man introduced himself as Daniel Russo, Leo’s attorney.
The second was Marcus Vale, who controlled several transportation companies associated with Calvino interests.
For the next forty minutes, Sheree listened.
What surprised her most was how boring organized crime sounded when discussed professionally.
Warehouses.
Trucking contracts.
Construction bids.
Restaurant ownership.
Union negotiations.
Property leases.
Leo asked precise questions and received precise answers.
Nobody mentioned drugs.
Nobody mentioned guns.
Nobody mentioned bodies in rivers.
Then Marcus said, “We still have a problem at St. Jude’s.”
Sheree stopped drinking.
Leo’s eyes hardened.
“What problem?”
“The detective.”
“Brody understands the arrangement.”
“Brody does. Someone else doesn’t.”
Marcus placed a photograph on the counter.
Sheree recognized the man immediately.
Dr. Ethan Cole.
Trauma surgeon.
Forty-two.
Divorced.
Arrogant.
Brilliant.
He had worked at St. Jude’s for nine years.
Sheree had assisted him through dozens of emergency procedures.
“What does Ethan have to do with anything?”
Marcus looked toward Leo.
Leo nodded.
Marcus continued.
“Dr. Cole accessed security footage from the night Vic approached you.”
Sheree frowned.
“Why?”
“He filed an internal incident report after noticing bruising on your arm the previous week. When you disappeared from the hospital without clocking out, he started asking questions.”
That sounded exactly like Ethan.
Annoying.
Persistent.
Sometimes self-righteous.
But not corrupt.
“He thinks I was kidnapped.”
“Yes.”
Sheree set down her coffee.
“Then I’ll call him.”
“No,” Leo said.
She looked at him.
“That was not a request.”
“It should have been.”
“Sheree—”
“Leo.”
The room went silent.
Finn scratched his jaw.
Daniel Russo carefully closed his notebook.
Sheree continued.
“Ethan is a doctor. He isn’t Lucchesi. He isn’t Brody. He’s worried because I vanished from my job after someone assaulted me.”
“He has spoken with police.”
“Because that is what normal people do.”
“The police department is compromised.”
“Parts of it.”
“Enough.”
Sheree stepped closer.
“You said I could stay knowing what you are. Fine. But you need to understand what I am.”
Leo said nothing.
“I am not one of your employees. I am not territory. I am not a hostage you keep in expensive clothes.”
“I never called you a hostage.”
“You told me I belonged under your protection.”
“Because men were hunting you.”
“They aren’t anymore.”
Leo’s expression became unreadable.
Sheree folded her arms.
“Are they?”
Nobody answered.
That frightened her.
“Leo.”
Finn finally spoke.
“We intercepted something last night.”
Leo shot him a look.
Finn ignored it.
Sheree appreciated him immediately.
“What?”
“A message.”
“From whom?”
“We don’t know.”
Finn removed a folded sheet of paper from inside his jacket.
It contained six words.
CALVINO SURVIVED.
THE NURSE IS THE KEY.
Sheree read it twice.
Her stomach tightened.
“I thought Lucchesi was finished.”
“They are,” Leo said.
“Then who sent this?”
“That is what we are determining.”
Sheree looked toward the windows.
Yesterday she had believed she was making a choice between safety and danger.
Apparently, she had misunderstood.
Danger had already chosen her.
Her phone rang.
Everyone looked at it.
Sheree glanced at the screen.
Unknown number.
Leo extended his hand.
“Give it to me.”
“No.”
“Sheree.”
“It’s my phone.”
She answered.
“Hello?”
Silence.
Then breathing.
Slow.
Controlled.
A man spoke.
“Miss Murphy.”
Sheree’s blood chilled.
“Yes?”
“You saved the wrong man.”
Leo was beside her instantly.
Sheree put the call on speaker.
The voice continued.
“Ask Leo what happened to Gabriel Calvino.”
Leo became completely still.
The call ended.
Sheree looked at him.
For the first time since meeting Leo, she saw something she had never seen before.
Fear.
Not fear for himself.
Something older.
Something buried.
“Who is Gabriel?”
Leo did not answer.
Finn looked away.
Sheree understood immediately.
Everyone in the room knew.
Except her.
“Leo.”
He picked up his jacket.
“We need to move.”
“No.”
“Now.”
“Who is Gabriel?”
“Not here.”
Sheree blocked his path.
“You don't get to tell me I have to understand your world and then hide the parts you don't want me to see.”
His jaw tightened.
“Gabriel was my younger brother.”
The words landed softly.
That made them worse.
Sheree lowered her arms.
“What happened to him?”
“He died.”
“How?”
Leo looked toward the windows.
“Because of me.”
Before Sheree could ask anything else, the penthouse lights went out.
Every window turned black.
The elevators stopped.
A mechanical alarm began somewhere behind the walls.
Finn drew a gun.
Marcus did the same.
Leo grabbed Sheree and pulled her behind the stone kitchen island.
“What happened?”
“Backup power should have engaged.”
It had not.
Finn touched his earpiece.
Nothing.
Communications were dead.
Then came the first explosion.
It struck somewhere below them.
The floor trembled.
Glassware shattered.
Sheree instinctively covered her head.
Leo pulled her closer.
A second explosion followed.
Closer.
Smoke began creeping from the elevator shaft.
Finn checked the service corridor.
“Stairwell.”
Leo nodded.
They moved.
Forty-two floors suddenly felt much higher.
The emergency stairwell was lit only by dim red battery lamps.
Sheree descended behind Finn while Leo remained immediately behind her.
At floor thirty-nine, they found the first body.
A security guard lay against the wall.
Gunshot wound to the chest.
Sheree dropped beside him.
Leo grabbed her shoulder.
“He's dead.”
She checked anyway.
No pulse.
He was right.
They continued.
Floor thirty-seven.
Another guard.
Alive.
Barely.
Sheree stopped.
“Keep moving,” Leo ordered.
“No.”
“Sheree.”
“He's alive.”
The guard had been shot through the thigh.
Arterial bleeding.
Sheree ripped off her belt.
“Finn, pressure here.”
Finn obeyed without hesitation.
Leo stared at her.
“We have people coming up those stairs.”
“Then shoot them.”
For one second, something almost like pride appeared in his face.
Then footsteps echoed below.
Many footsteps.
Finn looked over the railing.
“Company.”
Leo drew his pistol.
“Can he move?”
Sheree tightened the improvised tourniquet.
“He can now.”
Finn hauled the guard upright.
Gunfire erupted below.
Leo fired downward.
The sound inside the concrete stairwell was deafening.
Sheree flinched but continued moving.
Thirty-six.
Thirty-five.
Thirty-four.
Then the stairwell door ahead opened.
A man stepped through with a shotgun.
Sheree saw him before Leo did.
“LEO!”
Leo turned.
The shotgun fired.
Leo slammed Sheree against the wall.
Concrete exploded beside them.
Finn fired twice.
The attacker fell.
For several seconds, Sheree could hear nothing except ringing.
Leo’s hands were on her shoulders.
“Are you hit?”
She checked herself.
“No.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
Blood covered his collar.
“Leo.”
“It isn't mine.”
She looked at the dead attacker.
His shirt had ridden upward.
A tattoo covered his abdomen.
A black crown pierced by a silver knife.
Finn saw it.
His face changed.
“What?”
Finn looked at Leo.
“You know that mark.”
Leo nodded.
Sheree demanded an explanation.
Leo stared at the tattoo.
“The Argent Circle.”
“What is that?”
Marcus answered from behind them.
“Something that shouldn't exist anymore.”
Another burst of gunfire echoed below.
Leo took Sheree's hand.
“Move.”
They descended into smoke, blood, and darkness.
And as Sheree followed the criminal king of Chicago down thirty-four flights of stairs, one thought became impossible to ignore.
May you like
The Lucchesi family had never been the real war.
They had only been the opening move.
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