Chapter 6 - The Man Who Asked for Me
Daniel Voss was not what I expected.
I had spent months remembering him as a shadow in my apartment doorway: broad shoulders, gray coat, a voice that made my dead husband's name sound like a bill I had failed to pay. In the interview room at the county detention center, he looked smaller. His knuckles were split. He kept checking the clock above Detective Kim's shoulder.
Anthony sat beside me, his legal pad untouched. Leonardo had wanted to come inside, but I had asked him to wait in the hallway. If Voss had something to tell me, I wanted to hear it without watching him measure every word against the reputation of the Moretti family.
“You wanted me,” I said. “Here I am.”
Voss looked at my stomach. “You're farther along than I thought.”
“Don't talk about my baby.”
He flinched. “Fair enough.”
Kim placed a recorder on the table and explained that the interview was being documented. Voss's lawyer nodded. Nobody offered him immunity or a bargain in exchange for a story. He would have to tell the truth and let the evidence do the rest.
“Richard Romano paid me to visit you after the funeral,” Voss said. “He told me to scare you away from the Morettis. I was supposed to say Matteo owed money.”
“You did say that.”
“I know.”
“You told me I would be responsible for his debts. I was grieving, and I didn't even know I was pregnant yet.”
Voss lowered his eyes. “I knew about the pregnancy.”
My hands went cold. “How?”
“An appointment list. Someone sent it from the clinic. Your name was marked before you had your first confirmed visit there.”
Kim leaned forward. “Who sent the list?”
“I never saw the sender. Romano called it a screening report.”
I remembered Matteo's letter: someone knew about the baby before he did. At the time I had assumed he meant someone had guessed. Now a different possibility took shape, one I hated. My medical information had been moving through hands that had no right to touch it.
Voss shifted in his chair. “Matteo confronted Richard at the Wacker Drive garage. I was there. I wasn't supposed to be, but Richard wanted somebody watching the exit.”
“Was that the day he died?” Kim asked.
Voss nodded.
I pressed my palm against the baby. “Did you hurt my husband?”
“No.” His answer came quickly, then slowed. “I didn't touch him. I saw him leave. I also saw a black SUV pull out behind him. Richard called someone right after.”
“Who?”
“I don't know. But the phone he used wasn't his regular one.”
Kim asked him to describe the vehicle, the time, the driver, everything he could recall. He gave her a partial plate and an unusual dent above the rear wheel. When he finished, I asked the question that had brought me there.
“Why did you insist on speaking to me?”
Voss swallowed. “Because I went back to your apartment after the funeral. I wasn't there to threaten you that time. I wanted to tell you to leave Chicago. But there was a woman outside your building. She took a photograph of you and sent it to someone. I followed her to the clinic.”
“Who was she?”
“I have a picture.”
He slid a folded photocopy across the table. Kim took it first, checked it, and placed it before me.
The woman wore a pale coat and sunglasses. I recognized the narrow scar above her eyebrow. She had stood behind the reception desk at my prenatal appointments, smiling while she handed me forms.
“Her name is Celeste,” I whispered.
Voss nodded. “Celeste Ward. She wasn't just a receptionist.”
After the interview, I found Leonardo standing by a vending machine, holding two untouched cups of coffee. He saw my face and set them down.
“Did he tell you something useful?”
“Yes.”
“Did he tell you what happened to Matteo?”
“Not enough.”
He accepted that without asking for more. We walked outside together into a wind that cut through my coat. I stopped beneath the courthouse awning and finally cried, not because Voss had frightened me, but because the world had grown more complicated again. I had wanted one villain, one explanation, one piece of paper that would tell me why Matteo never came home.
Instead there was a clinic, a secret phone, a black SUV, and a receptionist who had watched me when I thought nobody knew my name.
Leonardo stood beside me until I was ready to move. Then his phone rang. He listened, said nothing, and handed it to Anthony.
“What is it?” I asked.
“Detective Kim's team checked the photograph,” he said. “Celeste Ward resigned from the clinic this morning.”
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“Where did she go?”
His expression tightened. “Nobody knows. But she left a sealed package at the front desk. Addressed to you.”
