Chapter 5 - RUN
Rocco saw the SUV first.
“Move!”
He grabbed Maeve around the waist and threw both of them behind a parked pickup.
A dark SUV jumped the curb.
Metal screamed.
The bakery’s outdoor sign shattered beneath its front bumper.
Customers screamed inside.
The SUV swerved back into the street.
Maeve hit the pavement hard.
Her phone flew from her hand.
Rocco covered her with his body.
The SUV sped toward the intersection.
“Stay down.”
“I’m fine.”
“Stop saying that.”
Rocco jumped to his feet and ran after the vehicle.
“Rocco!”
He reached the street just as the SUV turned.
He caught only part of the license plate.
7KJ.
Then it vanished.
Nora came running from the bakery.
“Maeve!”
“I’m okay!”
Nora dropped to her knees beside her.
“Did it hit you?”
“No.”
Maeve’s hands were shaking so badly she could barely stand.
Rocco picked up her phone.
The threatening message was still there.
He took screenshots.
Then he called someone.
“Who are you calling?” Maeve asked.
“Police.”
Nora went pale.
“Rocco…”
“No.”
His voice hardened.
“This stopped being about unpaid rent five minutes ago.”
Police arrived twelve minutes later.
Officer Daniel Cole stepped through the bakery door with his notebook already open.
Maeve knew him.
Everyone did.
Bellmere wasn’t big enough for strangers.
Cole had gone to school with her father.
He looked at the ruined sign outside.
“What happened?”
Rocco handed him the phone.
Cole read the message.
His face changed slightly.
Maeve saw it.
“You recognize something?”
“No.”
“You made a face.”
“I read a death threat sent to a sixteen-year-old girl. I’m allowed to make a face.”
Rocco watched him closely.
“The SUV had partial plate 7KJ.”
Cole wrote it down.
“Color?”
“Black. Maybe charcoal.”
“Make?”
“GMC or Chevy.”
Cole nodded.
“I’ll run traffic cameras.”
Rocco said, “There’s one at Oak and Third.”
“I know where the cameras are.”
The two men stared at each other.
Maeve noticed again.
People kept having conversations that were really about something else.
Cole closed his notebook.
“You all should stay somewhere else tonight.”
Nora said, “Where?”
Rocco answered.
“My house.”
Maeve blinked.
“No.”
“Yes.”
“You have got to stop deciding things for me.”
Rocco looked at her.
“Someone just tried to run you over.”
“That doesn’t make you my father.”
The words landed harder than she intended.
Rocco’s expression changed.
Maeve immediately regretted it.
But he only nodded.
“No. It doesn’t.”
Nora touched Maeve’s arm.
“We should go.”
Maeve looked around the bakery.
“What about tomorrow?”
Rocco picked up the eviction notice.
“Tomorrow can wait.”
“No, it can’t.”
“Yes, it can.”
Dominic’s voice came from the doorway.
Everyone turned.
He stood under the broken sign, holding an umbrella.
Cole frowned.
“What are you doing here?”
Dominic looked almost amused.
“I heard there was an accident.”
Rocco moved toward him.
“Funny how fast news travels.”
Dominic held up one hand.
“Careful.”
Maeve stepped forward.
“You sent me that message.”
Dominic looked genuinely puzzled.
“What message?”
She showed him.
He read it.
His expression didn’t change.
Then he looked at Maeve.
“If I wanted to threaten you, sweetheart, I wouldn’t hide behind a phone.”
Rocco’s fists tightened.
Dominic turned toward Nora.
“Eight a.m.”
Officer Cole stepped between them.
“You need to go.”
Dominic smiled.
“Of course.”
He walked back outside.
Then he stopped under the doorway.
“Oh, Maeve?”
She stared at him.
“Ask Rocco why your father called him instead of your mother that night.”
Maeve looked at Rocco.
May you like
Dominic smiled one last time.
“Then ask him why he never answered.”
