Chapter 4 - The Safe Room
Vincent walked up the narrow wooden stairs to the second floor, his boots heavy against the oak treads. The second floor of Romano’s wasn't a standard apartment; it was a reinforced bunker disguised as a private office. The walls were lined with bullet-resistant steel plates beneath the mahogany paneling, and the door was a solid three-inch slab of reinforced iron.
When he entered, he found Sophia sitting on the oversized leather sofa. Marco had found a oversized wool sweater belonging to one of the guards, which swallowed her tiny frame completely. She was sipping a mug of hot cocoa, her face still pale but her breathing more regular.
The pink backpack lay open on the desk, its contents spread out under the green banker's lamp.
"How is she?" Vincent asked, closing the heavy door behind him.
"She's tough, Boss," Marco said, standing near the desk. "Didn't cry once after she got the cocoa. But you need to see this."
Vincent walked over to the desk, picking up the digital recorder. He pressed the play button.
A man's voice, frantic and terrified, filled the room. It was Hector Martinez. "They're using the infrastructure funds to build the black-site facility outside Joliet. It's not a government project, Maria. It's private. The politicians are selling the land to a firm called Vanguard Systems. They're laundering the money through the port authority. If anyone finds out, they'll kill us all."
Then came a woman's voice—Maria's. "We take the records, Hector. We give them to the man in the restaurant. He's the only one who doesn't answer to the mayor."
The recording ended with a sharp, sudden crash, followed by the sound of a child screaming.
Vincent looked down at Sophia. She was staring at her mug, her small shoulders trembling slightly at the memory of her mother's voice.
"Your mother was a brave woman, Sophia," Vincent said, his voice softer than Marco had ever heard it.
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"She said you were a protector," Sophia whispered, looking up at him. "She said you were bad to bad people, but good to people who couldn't fight."
Vincent turned his back to the child, looking out the reinforced window at the rainy street below. "She was wrong about me, kid. I'm just a man who hates being told what to do in his own house."
