Chapter 3 - The Copy They Didn't Know About
The police arrived while smoke still curled from the office wall.
By then, my camera computer was dead.
The hard drive was blackened.
The surge had burned through the router, the register terminal, and half the security system.
But the people outside had made one mistake.
They did not know I had already made a copy.
The flash drive sat inside my jeans pocket.
I kept my hand over it while two Boston officers stepped through the front door.
One of them recognized Roman immediately.
His posture changed.
The second officer recognized the four armed men.
His hand rested closer to his holster.
Roman calmly instructed his guards to show permits and keep their hands visible.
I watched the exchange with a strange sense of unreality.
Twenty minutes earlier, I had been closing a pet supply store on a rainy Thursday night.
Now police officers were photographing a broken window while a billionaire with rumored criminal ties stood beside a terrified Cane Corso and asked me whether I had somewhere safe to sleep.
"I have an apartment upstairs," I said.
Roman looked toward the ceiling.
"Not tonight."
"That wasn't an invitation for you to make decisions about my apartment."
"Someone accessed your electrical system weeks ago."
"I heard you the first time."
"They remotely destroyed evidence after Lucian escaped."
"Also heard that."
"Then you understand why staying upstairs would be reckless."
"And going where you tell me would be smart?"
His mouth almost moved.
Almost.
"No."
"But it would be safer."
The older police officer walked over.
"Ms. Bennett?"
"Yes."
"Can we speak privately?"
Roman took one step back.
It was a small courtesy, but I noticed it.
The officer introduced himself as Sergeant Daniel Reeves.
He asked about the break-in, the power failure, Lucian, the remote, and Titan.
I answered carefully.
I did not hide the receiver.
I did not hide the fact that Lucian had used it.
I did not mention my copied footage.
Not yet.
Reeves wrote everything down.
Then he looked toward Roman.
"Mr. Calder says Lucian Reed was his director of private security."
"Apparently."
"How long have you known Mr. Calder?"
"About forty minutes."
That earned the first genuine expression I had seen from him.
"Forty minutes?"
"It's been a long forty minutes."
Reeves glanced at Titan.
"And the dog?"
"Same."
Titan was now lying near my feet.
Roman had offered him water twice.
Titan had refused until I moved the bowl closer.
Reeves noticed.
"He seems attached to you."
"At the moment."
"Any reason?"
"Fear can make animals choose the safest thing in the room."
Reeves looked at Roman again.
"And he decided that was you?"
"Apparently."
Roman heard him.
He said nothing.
The officer's radio crackled.
Another unit had found the gray sedan abandoned four blocks away.
No driver.
No plates.
The interior had been wiped.
Reeves frowned.
"Professional."
Roman answered from across the room.
"Yes."
Reeves turned.
"You know who did this?"
"No."
"You have suspicions?"
Roman's face closed.
"I have several."
"Names?"
"Not until I know which one wants me looking in the wrong direction."
Reeves stared at him for a long moment.
"This is why people hate interviewing you."
"I've heard."
To my surprise, there was history in the exchange.
Not friendship.
Recognition.
Reeves looked at me again.
"If you remember anything else, call me directly."
He handed me a card.
Roman's eyes dropped to it.
I put it in my pocket with the flash drive.
Twenty minutes later, the police left with photographs, statements, and the hidden receiver sealed in an evidence bag.
Roman watched the cruiser pull away.
Then he turned to Mason.
"Call Harker again."
Mason did.
Still disconnected.
"Find his home."
"Already sent someone."
"And North Beacon Systems?"
"Fake company."
My stomach tightened.
"How fake?"
Mason looked at me.
"Registered five months ago to a mailbox in Delaware."
"Website went live two weeks before your service appointment."
"The listed owner doesn't exist."
I leaned against the counter.
"So somebody created an entire company to install a device in my store."
"Yes," Mason said.
"Why?"
No one answered.
Titan lifted his head.
Roman looked at him.
Then at me.
"When did you open this store?"
"Three years ago."
"What was here before?"
"A pharmacy, I think."
"Before that?"
"I don't know."
"Who owns the building?"
"Beacon Hill Commercial Holdings."
Mason's head snapped up.
Roman said,
"Check it."
Mason typed into his phone.
His face changed less than a minute later.
"Sir."
Roman did not look away from me.
"Say it."
"Beacon Hill Commercial is controlled by a holding company called Ashford Harbor Group."
Roman's expression sharpened.
"Who owns Ashford?"
Mason hesitated.
"It was incorporated by Calder Maritime legal counsel eleven years ago."
I stared at him.
"Your company owns my building?"
Roman shook his head.
"Not my company."
"You just said Calder."
"There are several Calder entities I don't control."
"Convenient."
He ignored the jab.
"Who signed your lease?"
"A property manager named Elaine Morris."
Mason searched again.
"No Elaine Morris employed by Ashford."
A cold pressure formed behind my ribs.
"You're telling me my landlord doesn't exist either?"
"I'm telling you the name may not be real."
I pulled out my phone.
"I have emails."
"Show me."
I opened the lease correspondence from three years earlier.
There it was.
Elaine Morris.
Professional signature.
Company logo.
Phone number.
I tapped the address.
The email domain ended in ashfordharborgroup.com.
Mason took a screenshot.
"This domain was shut down last year."
"I pay rent every month."
"To what account?"
I opened my banking app.
The automatic transfer went to a routing number I had never questioned.
Mason read it.
Roman's face turned hard.
"That's Harbor Commonwealth."
"Is that bad?"
"It's private banking."
"So?"
"Small commercial landlords don't usually use it."
My frustration snapped.
"Can someone please explain why my pet store seems to be connected to your family?"
Roman did not answer immediately.
His eyes had gone to the old framed photograph on the wall behind my register.
It showed me at twenty-four, kneeling in a shelter yard beside a muddy brindle mastiff mix and six puppies.
I had forgotten the picture was there.
Roman walked toward it.
"Where was this taken?"
"South Boston Animal Recovery."
"When?"
"Seven years ago."
He stared at the puppies.
One of them was almost entirely black.
A white crescent marked the fur beneath his throat.
Titan had the same mark.
My breath stopped.
I moved closer.
"No."
Roman looked at me.
"What?"
I took the photograph off the wall.
The puppy in my arms had oversized paws, a blunt muzzle, and a white crescent exactly where Titan's harness now covered his chest.
I had called him Ash.
He had been one of thirteen dogs seized from an illegal breeding property outside Worcester.
He had slept under my desk for three weeks because he screamed whenever anyone closed a kennel door.
I looked down at Titan.
"Ash?"
Titan's head lifted.
His ears moved.
My knees went weak.
I whispered it again.
"Ash."
Titan stood.
He walked straight to me.
Then he pushed his enormous head beneath my hand the exact same way a twelve-pound puppy had done seven years ago.
Roman stared at us.
"You know my dog."
I could barely speak.
"I knew him before he was your dog."
Titan leaned against my leg.
A memory opened in my mind so suddenly it hurt.
A woman in a cream coat had come to the rescue one winter morning.
She had not given her real last name.
She had spent two hours sitting on the concrete with Ash until he stopped shaking.
She had adopted him through a private foundation.
I remembered her first name.
Isabella.
I looked at Roman.
"Who gave Titan to you?"
Roman's eyes were fixed on the photograph.
"My sister."
My pulse jumped.
"What was her name?"
He looked at me.
"Isabella."
The store seemed to tilt beneath my feet.
Roman's dead brother had just been mentioned by a traitor.
Now his dead sister had appeared in a photograph on my wall.
And someone had built a fake company six weeks ago to gain remote access to the exact store where her dog had run for safety.
The recognition hit in pieces.
I remembered Ash chewing the corner of my old canvas sneaker.
I remembered sleeping on the rescue office floor because the first thunderstorm after the seizure made him panic.
I remembered discovering that he would eat only if I sat sideways instead of facing him.
Most of all, I remembered the morning Isabella came in.
She had been dressed too well for the rescue.
Cream wool coat.
Black gloves.
Hair pinned neatly at the back of her neck.
I had assumed she was another wealthy visitor looking for a dramatic dog to match an expensive house.
Then she ignored every confident animal in the front kennels and asked about the puppy hiding beneath my desk.
"He's not ready for adoption," I had told her.
She had sat on the floor anyway.
"Then I'm not here to adopt him today."
That answer had made me look at her differently.
She returned the next morning.
And the morning after that.
I had forgotten those visits because she never filled out paperwork under the name Calder.
She had signed everything Isabella Vale.
On the third day, Ash finally crawled out and put one paw on the edge of her shoe.
Isabella did not touch him.
She just smiled.
"That seems pretty clear," she had whispered.
The exact phrase I had used to Roman tonight.
My skin prickled.
"Roman."
He looked at me.
"Your sister used to say that."
"Say what?"
"That seems pretty clear."
His face changed.
"All the time."
"Usually when she had already won an argument."
I looked at Titan.
Maybe some of what felt like instinct tonight was memory layered so deeply I had not recognized it.
Isabella had adopted a frightened puppy because she allowed him to choose.
Years later, Roman had walked into my store and demanded obedience from the same dog.
And Titan had answered by sitting on my foot.
It was almost funny.
Except someone had hurt him before he got there.
I opened the old photo frame and slid the print free.
On the back, I had written the puppy names in faded pen.
ASH - foster.
Beside it was another note in different handwriting.
Moon boy finally chose me.
I showed Roman.
His thumb hovered above the words without touching them.
"Isabella."
"You're sure?"
"Yes."
For several seconds, the dangerous billionaire disappeared.
There was only a brother looking at something his sister had written before she died.
Then his face closed again.
"Who else at the rescue knew she was a Calder?"
"I don't think anyone."
"Did she ever meet you outside the rescue?"
"No."
"Did she contact you after the adoption?"
"Maybe an update email."
"I don't remember."
Roman looked at Mason.
"Recover every message Isabella sent from the Vale account."
Mason nodded.
I stared at the old photograph.
Seven years earlier it had been a sweet memory.
Tonight it looked like evidence.
Then my phone vibrated.
A text from an unknown number appeared on the screen.
YOU SHOULD HAVE LET THEM TAKE THE DOG.
A second message arrived before I could breathe.
May you like
NOW ROMAN KNOWS WHERE YOU ARE.
