Chapter 1 - The Watch That Shouldn’t Exist
“Take that thing off.”
Vanessa Bellini was staring at my wrist.
Not my uniform.
Not the tray of champagne glasses balanced against my hip.
My watch.
The old stainless-steel watch my father had worn every day for twenty-eight years.
“I’m sorry?”
Vanessa leaned closer.
We were standing beside the service entrance of Luca Moretti’s ballroom, where nearly sixty guests were arriving for a charity dinner.
“You heard me.”
Her eyes dropped to the scratched metal band.
“It looks like something you found in a garbage drawer.”
My fingers instinctively covered it.
“It belonged to my father.”
Vanessa smiled.
“That doesn’t make it less ugly.”
Behind her, two florists were arranging white roses beneath a crystal chandelier.
Beyond them, Chicago bankers, attorneys, developers, and men whose names appeared in newspaper stories without ever being directly accused of anything were beginning to fill Luca Moretti’s Gold Coast mansion.
And I was arguing with the woman he planned to marry about a watch worth maybe forty dollars.
“My sleeve covers most of it,” I said.
“Most isn’t all.”
Vanessa held out her hand.
“Give it to me.”
My stomach tightened.
“Why?”
“I’ll have someone put it upstairs.”
“I’d rather keep it.”
Her expression changed.
It was subtle.
But after nine months working in that house, I had learned the difference between Vanessa annoyed and Vanessa angry.
Annoyed Vanessa smiled.
Angry Vanessa became very still.
“Emma.”
My name is Emma Reed.
I was twenty-eight years old, worked catering and housekeeping shifts wherever I could find them, and had spent the previous eighteen months trying to keep my mother from losing the small bungalow my parents had bought when I was six.
My father had died unexpectedly the year before.
Heart attack.
Fifty-nine years old.
He had been changing the oil in my mother’s Buick that morning.
By dinner, he was gone.
The watch was the only thing I had asked for.
Not because it was valuable.
Because it still had a tiny smear of blue paint beside the crown from the summer Dad painted my childhood bedroom.
Because the band had been repaired with the wrong kind of link after he caught it on a loading dock.
Because every time I looked at it, I remembered his hands.
Vanessa knew none of that.
She only knew it was scratched.
And she hated scratched things.
“Give me the watch,” she repeated.
“No, ma’am.”
Her eyebrows lifted.
I had never refused her before.
For several seconds, neither of us spoke.
Then she laughed.
“You people become sentimental about the strangest things.”
You people.
I felt heat climb into my face.
Vanessa stepped closer.
“This dinner is being photographed. Luca has donors here. Politicians. Investors. I will not have staff walking around looking like they came from a bus station.”
I looked down at my black uniform.
It had been professionally pressed that afternoon.
My shoes were polished.
My hair was pinned exactly according to the household manager’s instructions.
There was nothing wrong with how I looked.
Except the watch.
“My father gave it to me.”
“No.”
Her voice softened.
“He left it to you.”
The words landed harder than they should have.
She saw that.
And smiled.
Then she reached for my wrist.
I moved back.
Her smile disappeared.
“Careful.”
One word.
Quiet enough that only I heard it.
Then someone called her name from the ballroom.
Vanessa turned.
Before walking away, she looked at the watch one more time.
“Take it off before dinner.”
She paused.
“Or I’ll take it off for you.”
I stood there for several seconds after she left.
Then I pulled my sleeve lower.
And went back to work.
At seven fifteen, the guests were seated.
Luca Moretti sat at the center of the long table.
I had seen him almost every day for nine months.
He was forty-one.
Dark hair beginning to gray at the temples.
Quiet.
Controlled.
He rarely repeated an instruction.
People around him tended to understand that once was enough.
Vanessa sat beside him wearing an emerald-green gown and a diamond necklace that probably cost more than my mother’s house.
She looked perfect.
She always did.
I poured wine.
Cleared plates.
Answered questions.
And kept my left wrist turned inward.
For almost an hour, nothing happened.
Then Senator Hale asked for sparkling water.
I leaned between two chairs to refill his glass.
My sleeve caught on the edge of the serving tray.
It slid back.
The watch appeared.
Vanessa saw it immediately.
Her eyes hardened.
I fixed my sleeve and continued.
Five minutes later, she called me over.
“Emma.”
“Yes, ma’am?”
“My clutch is upstairs.”
I knew exactly what this was.
Still, I nodded.
“Which room?”
“My dressing room.”
I went upstairs.
The clutch was sitting on the vanity.
I picked it up.
Then I heard the door close behind me.
Vanessa.
She locked it.
My stomach dropped.
“You embarrassed me.”
“I’m sorry?”
“I gave you an instruction.”
“It’s my father’s watch.”
“I don’t care if Abraham Lincoln wore it.”
She crossed the room.
“Take it off.”
“No.”
Her eyes narrowed.
Then she grabbed my wrist.
Hard.
“Mrs. Bellini—”
I pulled back.
The old clasp snapped.
The watch fell.
It struck the marble floor.
The crystal shattered.
For one second, I couldn’t breathe.
Vanessa looked down.
“Oh.”
I knelt immediately.
Tiny pieces of glass glittered around the watch face.
“You broke it.”
She sighed.
“Don’t be dramatic.”
I picked it up with shaking fingers.
The second hand had stopped.
My father’s watch had survived loading docks, construction sites, a fall from a fishing boat, and twenty-eight Chicago winters.
It had lasted less than thirty seconds in Vanessa Bellini’s dressing room.
“I’m sorry,” she said.
She didn’t sound sorry.
Then she noticed something.
The back plate had partially separated from the impact.
A thin piece of yellowed paper was visible beneath it.
Vanessa froze.
I saw her face change.
Not curiosity.
Recognition.
That frightened me more than the broken watch.
She bent down.
“What’s that?”
“I don’t know.”
I carefully lifted the loose back.
Inside, folded into a square smaller than a postage stamp, was a piece of paper.
I stared at it.
My father had never told me anything was hidden inside his watch.
Vanessa reached for it.
I closed my hand.
“No.”
“Emma.”
“You just broke the watch.”
Her face went cold.
“Give me the paper.”
“Why?”
“Because it could damage the mechanism.”
“The mechanism is already broken.”
“Give it to me.”
I looked at her.
“Why do you care?”
For the first time, Vanessa had no answer.
Then someone knocked.
“Vanessa?”
Luca’s voice.
Every bit of color disappeared from her face.
She stepped away from me.
“Put it in your pocket.”
“What?”
“Now.”
The handle moved.
Locked.
Luca knocked again.
“Vanessa.”
She crossed the room quickly and opened the door.
Luca stood outside.
His eyes moved from her to me.
Then to the broken watch in my hand.
“What happened?”
“Nothing,” Vanessa said.
At the same moment, I said, “She broke my father’s watch.”
Silence.
Vanessa slowly turned toward me.
Luca looked at the shattered crystal.
“How?”
“It fell.”
Vanessa laughed.
“Emma is understandably emotional.”
Luca looked at me.
“Did it fall?”
I could have lied.
I needed the job.
My mother’s property tax was overdue.
My younger brother had borrowed money for his electrician certification.
And Vanessa had already made it clear that staff could disappear from Luca’s household very easily.
But then I looked at my father’s stopped watch.
“No.”
Vanessa’s jaw tightened.
“She grabbed my wrist,” I said.
“The clasp broke.”
Luca looked at Vanessa.
“Why were you grabbing her wrist?”
“Because she refused to follow the dress standards.”
His eyes dropped to the watch.
“That?”
“Yes.”
Luca held out his hand.
“May I?”
I hesitated.
Then gave it to him.
He turned it over.
And everything changed.
His thumb stopped on the engraving.
I had seen the engraving a thousand times.
Three letters.
M.R.M.
I always assumed they were the initials of the company that had manufactured it.
Luca stared at them.
Then looked at me.
“Where did your father get this?”
“I don’t know.”
“What was his name?”
“Thomas Reed.”
Luca stopped moving.
Behind him, Vanessa closed her eyes.
That was when I knew.
She knew something.
Luca looked back at her.
“You knew her father’s name?”
Vanessa recovered quickly.
“Of course not.”
“Then why did you react?”
“I didn’t.”
He looked at me again.
“What did your father do?”
“He drove trucks.”
“For whom?”
“A lot of companies.”
“Which one in 1998?”
I stared at him.
“I was a baby in 1998.”
Luca nodded.
“Fair.”
He examined the watch again.
Then noticed the loose back plate.
“What’s inside?”
Vanessa answered before I could.
“Nothing.”
Luca’s eyes lifted.
Nobody spoke.
He looked at her.
“How do you know?”
“I saw it fall.”
“No.”
His voice was quiet.
“You said nothing is inside.”
Vanessa folded her arms.
“This is ridiculous.”
Luca turned toward me.
“Emma?”
I opened my fist.
The folded paper rested in my palm.
His expression changed.
Vanessa stepped forward.
“That could be anything.”
Luca didn’t look at her.
“Open it.”
My fingers shook as I unfolded the tiny square.
There were only two lines.
One was a date.
October 17, 1998.
The other was a set of numbers.
Luca stared at them.
Then took the paper.
“What are they?” I asked.
He didn’t answer.
Vanessa did.
“A locker number.”
Everyone looked at her.
She went white.
Luca’s voice became almost gentle.
“What did you say?”
Vanessa blinked.
“I said it looks like a locker number.”
“No.”
He held up the paper.
“You said it is a locker number.”
“That’s what I meant.”
Luca stared at her for several seconds.
Then he turned toward me.
“Your father ever work at Union Freight?”
The name hit something in my memory.
“My mother might know.”
“Call her.”
“Now?”
“Yes.”
Vanessa laughed.
“We have fifty guests downstairs.”
Luca looked at her.
“They’ll survive.”
I called my mother.
She answered on the fourth ring.
“Emma?”
“Mom, did Dad ever work for Union Freight?”
Silence.
Not normal silence.
The kind where you know someone has stopped breathing.
“Why?”
I looked at Luca.
“Mom?”
“Where did you hear that name?”
Luca’s expression sharpened.
I put the call on speaker.
“My employer asked.”
Another silence.
Then my mother whispered:
“Is your employer Luca Moretti?”
I stared at the phone.
Luca stared at me.
“How do you know that?”
My mother began crying.
Not loudly.
Just one small sound.
The kind she made at my father’s funeral when they closed the casket.
“Mom?”
“Emma, listen to me.”
Her voice changed.
“Whatever Thomas left you, do not give it to anyone.”
Vanessa moved toward the door.
Luca caught it before she could open it.
“Stay.”
She glared at him.
On the phone, my mother continued.
“Your father made me promise.”
“Promise what?”
“That if anyone named Moretti ever asked about October seventeenth, I was supposed to burn the envelope.”
Luca went completely still.
“What envelope?” I asked.
My mother stopped.
Then she whispered:
“Oh, God.”
Luca took one step toward me.
“Mrs. Reed, my name is Luca Moretti.”
My mother made a sound like she had dropped something.
Then the line went dead.
I stared at my phone.
Luca looked at the date again.
October 17, 1998.
His face had lost all warmth.
Vanessa stood near the door, perfectly silent.
Then Luca looked at her.
“You knew about the locker.”
“No.”
“You knew enough to recognize the number.”
“I guessed.”
He walked toward her.
“Why were you trying to take Emma’s watch?”
“I told you why.”
“Because it was ugly?”
“Yes.”
He almost smiled.
But there was nothing amused about it.
Then he turned the watch over once more.
His thumb brushed the initials.
M.R.M.
“What do those letters mean?” I asked.
Luca looked at me.
“They aren’t a manufacturer.”
My chest tightened.
“What are they?”
He didn’t answer immediately.
Instead, he walked to a cabinet beside Vanessa’s vanity.
Opened the bottom drawer.
And removed a black leather box.
Vanessa’s face changed.
“Luca.”
He ignored her.
Inside the box was an old photograph.
He handed it to me.
Five men stood beside a Union Freight truck.
The photograph had been taken decades ago.
One of them was Luca’s father.
I recognized him from portraits downstairs.
Beside him stood a younger Luca.
Maybe thirteen.
And at the far end—
my father.
Thomas Reed.
I nearly dropped the photograph.
“That’s Dad.”
“I know.”
I looked at Luca.
“You knew him?”
“No.”
His eyes stayed on the photograph.
“But my father did.”
He turned it over.
There was handwriting on the back.
One sentence.
IF ANYTHING HAPPENS TO ME, THOMAS HAS THE SECOND KEY.
My skin went cold.
“Second key to what?”
Luca looked toward Vanessa.
She had gone very pale.
Then I realized something else.
She wasn’t looking at the photograph.
She was looking at my pocket.
At the folded paper I had put there.
Luca noticed too.
“Vanessa.”
She lifted her eyes.
“What?”
“You’ve been asking me for three months to demolish the old Union Freight warehouse.”
Nobody moved.
“That has nothing to do with this.”
“Maybe.”
He picked up my father’s broken watch.
“But tomorrow morning, I think Emma and I are going to find out.”
Vanessa’s composure finally cracked.
“No.”
The word came out too quickly.
Luca looked at her.
And I understood, with a chill that ran all the way down my spine, that Vanessa hadn’t broken my father’s watch by accident.
She had been trying to get it off my wrist.
Maybe from the moment she first saw it.
Luca seemed to reach the same conclusion.
He stepped closer to her.
“What’s in that warehouse?”
Vanessa said nothing.
“What’s in locker 317?”
Her lips parted.
Then closed.
I stared at the tiny piece of paper.
I had never told Luca the number aloud.
Neither had my mother.
I looked at him.
Then at Vanessa.
And realized he hadn’t said 317.
She had.
Because Vanessa whispered:
“You can’t open 317 with only one key.”
The room went silent.
Luca slowly turned toward her.
May you like
His voice was barely above a whisper.
“How do you know that?”
