Chapter 7 - Make Them Listen
I stared at the screen.
“She can’t just say that.”
“She just did,” Rosa said.
Outside, the officer spoke into his radio.
Lorenzo leaned against the counter, breathing through clenched teeth.
“She’s buying time.”
“She’s telling them I’m dangerous.”
“Nora.”
“What if they believe her?”
He looked at Emma.
Then at me.
“Then we give them someone else to listen to.”
He pointed to the wall phone by the kitchen desk.
Dead.
My phone still had no signal, but near the high window one bar flickered into view.
I climbed onto a low bench and called 911 again.
The dispatcher answered.
I gave my name before she finished speaking.
“I called earlier. Nora Bell. I’m inside the Duca house. The woman at the gate is lying.”
“Are you with a child?”
“Yes. My daughter. Emma. She’s three.”
“Is anyone injured?”
“Lorenzo Duca. He’s been shot.”
“Can he speak?”
I held the phone to his ear.
“This is Lorenzo Duca,” he said. “Nora Bell is helping me. My sister and Marco DeSantis are responsible for the attack.”
His voice weakened.
He forced the next words out.
“Do not send her back to them.”
The dispatcher told us to stay on the line.
I watched the gate monitor.
An officer turned toward Vittoria.
Her expression barely changed.
Then she stepped away to make a call.
A second later, the kitchen door handle moved.
Rosa pointed toward the bakery passage.
We hurried through.
Lorenzo stumbled.
I caught his shirt and nearly fell with him.
Emma began repeating the words from the stairs.
“One step. One step.”
We reached the loading entrance.
Rosa unlocked a metal cover and pulled the shutter release.
Nothing happened.
She pulled harder.
The chain above us rattled, then jammed.
Lorenzo looked up.
“They pinned it.”
From my phone, the dispatcher asked where we were.
“South loading entrance,” I whispered. “The shutter won’t open.”
“We have officers moving toward you.”
Then glass shattered behind us.
Emma screamed.
I dropped over her as something struck the brick wall.
For a heartbeat, every sound disappeared.
Then Lorenzo crawled between us and the open passage.
His empty hands shook.
“Stay down,” he said.
May you like
A shadow moved through the kitchen.
Marco had stopped asking us to open doors.
