Chapter 5 - She Returned to Her Mother's House and Found the Floorboards Already OpenNew Orleans smelled exactly the way Sienna remembered.
Rain.
River water.
Coffee.
Old brick warming beneath the Louisiana sun.
And memories.
Too many memories.
She stood outside the storage building with Lorenzo beside her while four security men spread across the property.
Matthew remained in Chicago with Noah.
That arrangement had taken an argument.
Sienna had wanted Noah nowhere near New Orleans once they realized Navarro had followed them there.
Lorenzo agreed.
Noah complained.
Matthew volunteered.
Noah had looked at Matthew and said, “You're not exactly comforting.”
Matthew replied, “Neither is Lorenzo.”
Noah considered this.
“Fair.”
Now Sienna stared at the storage unit she had not opened since her mother's death.
“You okay?”
Lorenzo stood beside her.
She nodded.
“No.”
He waited.
Sienna smiled faintly.
“I'm learning from you.”
“That is concerning.”
She unlocked the door.
Dust moved through the sunlight.
Boxes lined the walls.
Old furniture stood beneath sheets.
And against the back wall was Marie Holloway's piano.
Sienna stopped.
For several seconds, she became twenty years old again.
Her mother was alive.
Noah was healthier.
Money was scarce, but laughter was common.
Marie would sit at that piano late at night.
Sometimes she played.
Sometimes she simply rested her hands on the keys and stared through the window.
Sienna had once asked what she was thinking about.
Marie replied:
“Things I was brave enough to survive and not brave enough to remember.”
At the time, Sienna hadn't understood.
Now she did.
She walked toward the piano.
Lorenzo remained behind her.
He did not touch her.
Did not hurry her.
That mattered.
Sienna ran her fingers across the dusty wood.
“She used to play when she couldn't sleep.”
“Sophia?”
“My mother.”
Lorenzo nodded.
“Did she play well?”
“No.”
He looked offended.
“Apparently every woman connected to me plays piano badly.”
Sienna laughed despite herself.
“My mother could sing.”
“I noticed.”
“She gave me everything she had.”
The laughter disappeared.
Lorenzo watched her.
Sienna opened the keyboard cover.
Yellowed keys.
A chipped ivory surface.
Nothing unusual.
They searched the bench.
Sheet music.
Old photographs.
A metronome.
No hidden compartment.
Lorenzo examined the back.
Nothing.
One of the security men checked underneath.
Nothing.
After forty minutes, Sienna sat on the bench.
“Maybe Navarro was lying.”
“Probably.”
“But?”
“But men like Navarro rarely lie without purpose.”
Sienna stared at the keys.
Then she remembered something.
A childhood argument.
Marie yelling at Noah because he had tried moving the piano.
Don't touch the left pedal.
It's broken.
Sienna looked down.
“Wait.”
She crouched.
The left pedal wasn't broken.
It had been deliberately disconnected.
Lorenzo knelt beside her.
Sienna reached underneath.
Her fingers found a small metal catch.
Click.
A narrow panel opened beneath the piano.
Both froze.
Inside was a sealed plastic envelope.
Lorenzo exhaled slowly.
“Sophia.”
Sienna removed it.
The envelope contained a flash drive.
Three folded pages.
And a key.
A small brass key with the number 417 engraved on it.
Sienna unfolded the pages.
Sophia's handwriting.
Marie,
If you're reading this, something has gone wrong.
Sienna stopped.
Lorenzo moved closer.
She continued.
Navarro knows I copied the financial records. He doesn't know I discovered the names behind them.
The names behind them.
Lorenzo's expression changed.
The letter described politicians.
Developers.
Police officials.
Judges.
Businessmen.
People who had quietly protected Navarro's network for years.
Some were still powerful.
One name made Lorenzo go completely still.
Sienna noticed.
“What?”
He pointed.
Vincent Calder.
“Who is he?”
Lorenzo did not answer immediately.
Then:
“My father's attorney.”
Sienna stared.
“Your father's?”
“He worked for my family for thirty years.”
“Is he alive?”
“Yes.”
“Does he still work for you?”
Lorenzo's expression darkened.
“Yes.”
The betrayal was immediate and personal.
Vincent Calder had attended Lorenzo's father's funeral.
He had negotiated contracts.
Protected businesses.
Handled trusts.
He had known Sophia.
He had stood beside Lorenzo at Sophia's funeral.
And according to Sophia's records, he had also been transferring information to Navarro.
Lorenzo took out his phone.
Sienna caught his wrist.
“Wait.”
He looked at her.
“If Calder knows Navarro is alive, calling Chicago might warn him.”
Lorenzo stared at her.
Then slowly lowered the phone.
“You're getting disturbingly good at this.”
“I hate that sentence.”
“So do I.”
They examined the key.
Sienna remembered a train station locker system that had existed years earlier.
But the old station had been renovated.
Lorenzo called Matthew using an encrypted line.
Matthew answered immediately.
“Tell me you're alive.”
“We're alive.”
“Sienna?”
“Alive.”
“Good. Noah has eaten everything in my kitchen.”
Sienna smiled.
“He does that.”
Lorenzo interrupted.
“We found something.”
Matthew became serious.
Lorenzo explained Calder.
Silence.
Then Matthew said:
“That son of a bitch.”
“Don't contact him.”
“I wasn't planning to send flowers.”
“Find out what 417 means.”
Sienna handed Lorenzo the key.
He described it.
Matthew said he would investigate.
They ended the call.
Sienna returned to the piano.
She noticed something carved into the underside of the bench.
M + S.
Marie and Sophia.
She smiled sadly.
“They were really friends.”
Lorenzo sat beside her.
“I wish she'd told me.”
“Would you have listened?”
The question wasn't cruel.
Lorenzo considered it.
Nine years earlier, he had been younger.
Harder.
More certain that control could solve everything.
“Maybe not.”
“Sophia probably knew that.”
He looked at her.
“She knew everything irritating about me.”
“Smart woman.”
He nudged her shoulder.
Sienna smiled.
Then glass shattered.
Lorenzo moved before she understood.
He pulled her to the floor.
A bullet struck the piano.
Wood exploded.
Security shouted outside.
Another shot.
Then another.
Lorenzo covered Sienna with his body.
“Stay down.”
Her ears rang.
Footsteps thundered.
Someone returned fire.
Then silence.
Terrible silence.
Lorenzo lifted his head.
“Report!”
A security man shouted from outside.
“Shooter moving east!”
Another voice.
“Vehicle!”
Tires screamed.
Lorenzo looked at Sienna.
“You hit?”
“No.”
“Sure?”
“Yes.”
He checked anyway.
Arms.
Shoulders.
Face.
Sienna grabbed his hands.
“I'm okay.”
His breathing was too fast.
She recognized it.
Not panic.
Memory.
Michigan Avenue.
Glass.
Sophia.
Explosion.
Lorenzo's eyes were physically seeing Sienna, but some part of him was three years in the past.
She touched his face.
“Lorenzo.”
Nothing.
“Look at me.”
His eyes focused.
“I'm here.”
He swallowed.
“I know.”
“No. Look.”
She placed his hand against her chest.
Heartbeat.
Fast.
Alive.
“I'm here.”
Lorenzo closed his eyes.
Then he pulled her against him.
Not gently.
Not elegantly.
Desperately.
Sienna held him.
Outside, men shouted into radios.
Inside, the old piano carried a bullet hole through its side.
Finally Lorenzo whispered:
“I almost—”
“But you didn't.”
“They knew we were here.”
“Yes.”
“Someone told them.”
Sienna pulled back.
“Calder?”
“Possibly.”
Lorenzo stood.
The softness disappeared.
But this time Sienna recognized the difference.
He wasn't becoming empty.
He was becoming focused.
“Take everything.”
The security team collected the documents.
Lorenzo personally took the flash drive.
They left through a rear exit.
Twenty minutes later, they were inside an armored SUV heading toward a secure property.
Sienna stared out the window.
Her phone vibrated.
Unknown number.
She showed Lorenzo.
He took the phone.
A message appeared.
YOU SHOULD HAVE STAYED INVISIBLE.
Sienna's stomach tightened.
Then another.
YOUR MOTHER UNDERSTOOD THAT.
Lorenzo's expression became lethal.
Sienna took the phone back.
A third message appeared.
SOPHIA DIDN'T.
Then a photograph.
Sienna gasped.
Marie Holloway.
Her mother.
Standing outside their New Orleans home twelve years earlier.
Taken from across the street.
Someone had been watching her.
Sienna covered her mouth.
Lorenzo looked at the image.
The timestamp was visible.
Twelve years ago.
Long before Sophia died.
Long before Sienna came to Chicago.
“They watched my mother.”
“Yes.”
“For years?”
“Possibly.”
Sienna's eyes filled.
“All those times she checked the locks.”
Lorenzo said nothing.
“She wasn't paranoid.”
“No.”
“All those times she told me not to tell people where we lived.”
Sienna pressed the phone against her chest.
“She was protecting us.”
Lorenzo took her hand.
Suddenly the story of Sienna's childhood changed.
Marie had not simply been private.
She had been afraid.
And Sienna realized something else.
“My mother didn't die because of Navarro.”
Lorenzo looked at her.
“No.”
Marie had died from cancer.
Natural.
Cruel.
Ordinary.
Yet she had spent years expecting another kind of death.
Sienna whispered:
“She survived him.”
Lorenzo nodded.
“Yes.”
Something inside her changed.
Fear remained.
But beneath it came anger.
Not Lorenzo's kind.
Not destructive.
Clear.
“My mother spent years afraid of that man.”
Lorenzo watched her.
“Sophia died because of him.”
“Yes.”
“And now he thinks I'm going to run.”
Lorenzo understood.
“Sienna—”
“No.”
She looked at him.
“I won't do anything stupid.”
“Good.”
“But I'm done letting dead women's fear become my inheritance.”
Lorenzo was silent.
Then his phone rang.
Matthew.
“I found 417.”
“What is it?”
“A private deposit box.”
“Where?”
Matthew gave him the name of an old New Orleans bank.
Sienna knew it.
Her mother had once worked two blocks away.
Matthew continued.
“The box is still active.”
“Owner?”
“Marie Holloway.”
Sienna stopped breathing.
Matthew added:
“And somebody tried accessing it yesterday.”
Lorenzo looked at Sienna.
“Who?”
“We don't know. They failed the identification requirement.”
“When does the bank open?”
“Nine.”
Lorenzo checked the time.
6:43 p.m.
Fourteen hours.
Fourteen hours before they discovered what Sophia and Marie had protected for more than a decade.
Fourteen hours during which Navarro would almost certainly try again.
Sienna leaned back.
Lorenzo looked at her.
“You're not going.”
She stared.
He held up one hand.
“I know.”
“Do you?”
“I know exactly what you're about to say.”
“Good.”
He sighed.
“We go together.”
Sienna smiled.
“Progress.”
Lorenzo looked out the window.
“No.”
His expression became grim.
“This is insanity.”
But Sienna saw his hand searching for hers.
May you like
She gave it to him.
And neither of them noticed the motorcycle that followed their SUV for the next eleven miles.
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