Chapter 18 - The Choice
By the time Chloe reached the museum loading dock, Gabriel was already there.
Hale had caught him before he reached the parking garage.
Two officers stood nearby.
Guests were pouring out of the building behind them with phones held high.
Reporters were shouting questions from the curb.
The video Luca released had spread in minutes.
Gabriel's name was already trending online.
Chloe could hear fragments from the crowd.
Murder.
Cover-up.
Costello.
Leo Bennett.
She hated hearing her brother's name turned into content before the truth was even clear.
Gabriel looked at Hale.
"I am going to Il Canto."
Hale shook his head.
"No."
"Luca is going there."
"Which is why my people are going there."
"My mother knows where the ledger is."
"Your mother stays with us."
Beatrice immediately signed no.
Hale noticed.
He looked at Chloe.
"I don't need a translation for that one."
Beatrice pointed toward herself.
Then toward Chloe.
Then toward the parking lot.
Hale sighed.
"Mrs. Costello, someone kidnapped you today."
Beatrice read his lips.
She signed.
And I escaped.
Chloe translated.
Hale rubbed his forehead.
"I am beginning to understand your son's blood pressure."
Beatrice smiled sweetly.
Gabriel did not.
"You cannot take her into a scene Luca may have prepared."
Chloe looked at him.
"You don't get to decide for her."
His jaw tightened.
"I know."
The answer came quickly.
Too quickly to be performative.
He turned toward his mother.
His hands moved slowly.
Danger.
Please.
Wait.
Beatrice watched.
She signed back.
You need me.
Gabriel understood need and me.
He looked at Chloe.
"She says we need her."
Chloe nodded.
"Yes."
Beatrice added.
I know the table.
Gabriel recognized table.
"Fine."
Hale stared at him.
"That easy?"
Gabriel looked at his mother.
"Apparently I am learning."
Hale swore under his breath.
"Then she rides with me."
Beatrice considered him.
Then nodded.
Il Canto was dark when they arrived.
The lunch staff had been evacuated after the museum incident.
Marco was still inside with two officers because he refused to leave before checking the wine cellar.
The front windows reflected flashing police lights.
Hale wanted Beatrice to wait outside.
She refused.
They entered through the kitchen.
The familiar room looked strangely small after everything that had happened.
Chloe saw her unfinished coffee from the previous shift still sitting near the employee board.
It felt like evidence from another life.
Marco met them near the dining room doors.
His cheek was swollen from Luca's earlier attack.
"You came back."
Chloe looked at him.
"You too."
"It's my restaurant."
Gabriel raised an eyebrow.
Marco corrected himself.
"Technically yours."
"Tonight you can have it."
Marco almost smiled.
Then he looked at Beatrice.
"Table 7 is untouched."
Beatrice nodded.
They entered the VIP room together.
The table sat exactly as it had the night Chloe first walked in with water glasses.
Polished mahogany.
High-backed chairs.
The same empty place beside Gabriel.
Chloe remembered Beatrice signing for wine.
She remembered Gabriel ordering bread.
She remembered the moment Beatrice's face changed when Chloe answered her.
It seemed impossible that only hours had passed.
Beatrice touched the table.
Her hands moved.
Anthony had this made after our twentieth anniversary.
Chloe translated.
"He said business ruined too many dinners."
"He wanted one table where no one could reach him."
Marco looked around the room.
"In this family, that's ambitious."
Beatrice smiled.
She crouched beside the center support.
Gabriel immediately moved to help.
She waved him away.
He stopped.
Chloe noticed.
Another small lesson.
Beatrice ran her fingers along the wood.
She found a nearly invisible seam.
Then she pointed to the brass token from Chloe's bank box.
Chloe inserted it into a narrow slot.
The center panel clicked.
Gabriel removed it.
Inside was a leather ledger wrapped in oilcloth.
No one breathed.
Rocco lifted it carefully.
"Anthony's original."
Nina, connected through Hale's tablet, leaned toward her camera.
"Show me the first page."
Rocco opened the book.
Rows of handwritten entries filled the paper.
Dates.
Accounts.
Names.
Initials.
Valenti routes.
Luca.
Vincent.
Price.
Rocco turned another page.
Anthony had written notes in the margins.
Gabriel read one aloud.
"Luca believes loyalty is something other people owe him."
Rocco looked at him.
"Accurate."
Hale reached for the ledger.
"This comes with me."
A voice came from the doorway.
"No, it doesn't."
Everyone turned.
Luca stood behind Marco.
One arm locked around Marco's neck.
A handgun rested against Marco's side.
Two of Hale's officers lay in the corridor behind them, alive but stunned.
Chloe's stomach dropped.
Hale reached toward his jacket.
Luca pressed the weapon harder into Marco.
"Don't."
Hale stopped.
Gabriel's face became cold.
"Let him go."
"Give me the ledger."
"You know how this ends."
Luca smiled.
"Do I?"
He looked around the room.
"Half the city just watched a video suggesting you killed your father and a deaf college student."
"Your reputation is finally doing my work for me."
Chloe felt Gabriel react beside her.
Luca continued.
"If you hand me the book, maybe Marco keeps breathing."
"Maybe your mother gets to finish another dinner."
Beatrice's face hardened.
Her hands moved at her side.
Chloe watched without moving her head.
He is stalling.
Gabriel saw the movement.
He did not understand all of it.
But he watched Chloe's eyes.
She nodded slightly.
Luca was waiting for something.
A smell reached Chloe.
Smoke.
Faint.
Then stronger.
Marco smelled it too.
His eyes widened.
"Kitchen."
Luca smiled.
"Very good."
Gabriel took one step forward.
"You set fire to my restaurant?"
"Not yet."
A dull pop sounded beyond the doors.
Then the fire alarm began screaming.
Sprinklers did not activate.
Marco's face changed.
"System was shut down for maintenance."
Luca looked amused.
"Bad timing."
Hale spoke calmly.
"Luca, there are police outside."
"And they'll spend the next several minutes clearing civilians and finding the fire source."
"You won't get out."
"I only need one door."
He looked at the ledger.
"Now."
Rocco held the book tighter.
Gabriel looked at Marco.
Then at Beatrice.
Then at Chloe.
Smoke began leaking beneath the dining room door.
The alarm pulsed.
Beatrice could not hear it.
She saw the flashing lights.
She saw the smoke.
She signed to Gabriel.
Do not give him the book.
Gabriel recognized no and book.
He looked at Chloe.
"She says don't give it to him."
Luca's expression twisted.
"Stop translating."
Chloe looked at him.
"No."
"You have no idea how much trouble you caused by walking into this room."
"I brought risotto."
"You gave her a voice."
Chloe's anger flared.
"She had one."
Luca shouted for the first time.
"You know what I mean."
Beatrice signed.
He hates that we understand each other.
Chloe translated every word.
Luca's face contorted.
"Enough."
He shoved Marco toward the wall and reached for the ledger.
Everything happened at once.
Marco dropped his weight.
Rocco threw the ledger toward Gabriel.
Hale lunged.
Luca fired once into the ceiling.
Plaster fell.
Beatrice ducked.
Chloe pulled her behind the table.
Gabriel caught the ledger.
Luca struck Hale with his shoulder and ran toward him.
Smoke rolled through the open doorway.
Gabriel could have thrown the ledger to an officer.
He could have chased Luca.
He could have protected the evidence everyone had risked their lives to find.
Then a burning piece of ceiling dropped between Chloe and the exit.
Beatrice stumbled.
She disappeared into the smoke.
Gabriel heard Chloe scream his mother's name.
The ledger was in his hands.
Luca was ten feet away.
The exit was behind him.
For one suspended second, Gabriel saw every choice.
Then he threw the ledger onto the table and ran toward his mother.
Luca smiled.
He grabbed the book.
Gabriel did not look back.
He found Beatrice on the floor beside an overturned chair.
Chloe was trying to lift her.
"She hit her knee."
Gabriel crouched.
Beatrice pushed at him.
Ledger.
He understood the sign.
"No."
She hit his shoulder angrily.
He signed back with one hand.
You.
Then he pointed at her.
You.
Beatrice stared.
Gabriel lifted her into his arms.
Chloe stayed beside him.
They moved through the smoke toward the kitchen.
Behind them, Luca disappeared through the service corridor with the ledger.
Rocco and Hale followed but lost him near the alley.
By the time fire crews entered, Luca was gone.
The kitchen fire was contained before it destroyed the building.
The VIP room survived.
Table 7 survived.
The ledger did not.
At least, not in their hands.
Outside, paramedics checked Beatrice's breathing and wrapped her knee.
She refused a stretcher until Chloe signed that arguing would waste time.
Beatrice finally sat.
Gabriel stood beside the ambulance with soot on his tuxedo.
Hale approached.
"He has the original ledger."
Gabriel nodded.
"I know."
"That book may have been the cleanest evidence we had."
"I know."
Hale looked at Beatrice.
Then back at Gabriel.
"You made the right choice."
Gabriel laughed without humor.
"That doesn't make it useful."
Nina arrived from the surveillance van.
"Useful is overrated."
Gabriel looked at her.
"Can you prove the case without it?"
"Some of it."
"Not enough."
"Not yet."
Hale watched Gabriel carefully.
"There is one way."
Gabriel knew before he asked.
"My books."
Hale nodded.
"All of them."
Rocco looked at Gabriel.
"That opens everything."
Vincent had arrived at the curb and heard the sentence.
"Legitimate and otherwise."
Gabriel looked at him.
Vincent continued.
"You hand Hale the Costello records, you don't just bury Luca."
"You bury half the organization."
"Maybe yourself."
Beatrice watched her son's face.
She signed.
Your choice.
Gabriel recognized it.
He looked at Chloe.
She did not translate.
He did not need her to.
Gabriel took out his phone.
He called his attorney.
"Open the archive."
A pause.
"All of it."
Another pause.
"I know what it means."
He looked at his mother.
"Give Detective Hale everything."
Vincent stared at him.
Rocco said nothing.
Hale's expression became serious.
Gabriel ended the call.
"Family before truth kept Luca safe."
He looked at the damaged restaurant behind him.
"I'm done paying for that rule."
A uniformed officer approached Hale.
He whispered something.
Hale's face changed.
"Gabriel."
Gabriel looked at him.
"What?"
Hale held up his phone.
The city prosecutor had seen Luca's video.
A warrant had been issued.
Not for Luca.
May you like
For Gabriel.
