Chapter 1 - REPLACE ME BY TUESDAY
“If you died tomorrow, I would replace you by Tuesday.”
Arthur Costello said it in front of three armed men.
Clara Hughes stopped wiping the spilled scotch from his desk.
For five years, she had kept his secrets, negotiated with his enemies, and answered every call.
Now he was watching her face, waiting for his words to hurt.
They did.
She simply refused to let him see how much.
Rain hammered the windows behind him. The city below looked distant and clean, nothing like the room she stood in.
Four minutes earlier, she had walked into his study carrying a clean shirt.
“The Maroni brothers left through the south gate,” she’d told him. “Their payment cleared. The docks are yours.”
“And the leak?”
“Handled.”
“The commissioner?”
“Expects you at the charity gala in two hours.”
“Cancel it.”
“Arthur, missing tonight could raise questions about the dock agreement.”
His glass struck the desk.
“I said cancel it.”
She reached for the spill. Her fingers brushed his hand.
He recoiled.
“Stop hovering.”
“I’m cleaning up.”
“You think I don’t see the way you look at me?”
The bodyguard nearest the door lowered his eyes.
Clara wished he hadn’t. His embarrassment made it worse.
“I’ve never asked you for anything.”
“You look at me like a stray dog waiting to be fed.”
“Arthur.”
“You’re an employee. A well-paid secretary. Don’t mistake usefulness for importance.”
Three years earlier, he had held her wrist through a fever after a bullet tore through his shoulder.
She had spent four nights in that hospital room.
Four nights had somehow become three years of hope.
“I never loved you,” he said.
Then came Tuesday.
Clara folded the stained handkerchief and placed it beside his glass.
“Understood.”
She turned.
“Where are you going? You haven’t briefed me on tomorrow’s deliveries.”
“The file’s on your desk.”
She walked out.
At the company penthouse four blocks away, she packed jeans, shirts, boots, and a heavy jacket. The jewelry stayed. So did the dresses.
Then she opened the hidden compartment beneath her nightstand.
Several passports.
Eighty thousand dollars in cash.
A photograph of a young man laughing beside a fishing boat.
Clara touched his face.
“I’m sorry I waited so long.”
Her private phone lit up.
The message contained no greeting.
YOUR BROTHER DIDN’T DROWN.
May you like
Beneath it was a photograph of the same boat.
Burning.
