Chapter 2 - THE MAN MY MOTHER CALLED A COWARD
Giovanni did not take the folder.
That was the first reason I stayed long enough to hear him.
We moved to a booth within sight of the diner cameras.
I called Rachel Kim, an attorney I knew from a tenant-rights clinic.
Giovanni waited.
No complaint.
That mattered.
He explained Elias Ward had worked for Moretti Maritime in the late 1990s.
Not as muscle.
Not as a gangster.
A customs-compliance analyst and translator.
Fluent in seven languages.
“He handled overseas manifests,” Giovanni said.
“Then what?”
“He accused senior people of manipulating customs classifications and shell-company invoices.”
“Your people?”
“My father’s company.”
“Same question.”
Giovanni’s expression hardened.
“Yes.”
Elias claimed someone was moving undeclared high-value shipments through ordinary freight.
Then approximately eleven million dollars disappeared from several business accounts.
So did Elias.
Giovanni’s father, Domenico Moretti, declared him the thief.
That became the family story.
“What did my mother say?”
“I never knew she existed.”
That surprised me.
Inside the envelope was a photograph.
My mother, Mara Evans.
Younger.
Standing beside Elias outside a port office.
Giovanni recognized the building.
Then came handwritten pages.
Italian.
Polish.
German.
Russian.
Arabic.
Mandarin.
Spanish.
French.
English.
Nine languages.
Not full documents.
Fragments.
Numbers.
Port codes.
Ordinary sentences that made no sense together.
Giovanni stared at them.
“Your father kept a ledger.”
“Then where is it?”
“We never found it.”
I looked at the nine pages.
Maybe we had.
Then Marcus approached.
“You’re fired.”
I almost laughed.
“For opening an envelope?”
“For abandoning your section.”
“There are four customers.”
“You embarrassed me in front of guests.”
Giovanni looked at him.
Marcus immediately added:
“And don't expect a reference.”
Something about the sentence bothered me.
Not because I needed his reference.
Because he said it with satisfaction.
As if keeping me at Northstar mattered.
Rachel arrived twenty-eight minutes later.
When she asked Marcus for my personnel file, he refused.
Then she asked why he had searched my handbag during my breaks.
Marcus went white.
I looked at her.
“What?”
Rachel held up her phone.
The unknown text had come from another Northstar employee.
She had already contacted him.
Apparently Marcus had been opening my bag for months.
May you like
The folder had not been secret to him.
Only to me.
