I closed my eyes. Thought about Brian's bruised face. About the crew's families living in fear. About how many more people would suffer if I didn't find a way to make this stop.
"Bellini's," I said. "Tonight. What time?"
"Midnight. The restaurant will be closed, but arrangements have been made." A pause. "And Dr. Rothwell? Do come alone. I'd hate for this conversation to be complicated by unnecessary parties."
The line went dead.
I sat in the dark for a long time after, phone still in my hand, screen dark.
Midnight. Five hours away. Enough time to talk myself out of this. Enough time to call my father. Brian. The police.
Enough time to imagine what would happen if I did nothing. If I stayed hidden while the threats escalated, while Kevin grew more desperate, while everyone I cared about became a target.
I couldn't let that happen. Iwouldn'tlet that happen.
At eleven-thirty, I slipped out of my room and headed downstairs.
The hallway was dark. My parents had gone to bed hours ago—my father to his study first, then the master suite. My mother followed with unsteady steps. The house had the heavy silence of a place where everyone was asleep, where nothing unexpected ever happened.
I made it to the front door before a voice stopped me.
"Ms. Rothwell."
I turned. Larsen Cole, the bodyguard my father had hired for me, stood in the shadows by the staircase. He was ex-military. Compact, alert, with the coiled stillness of a man who'd seen combat and never fully left it behind.
"It's nearly midnight," he said.
"I need to go out."
"We were given direct orders to keep you at home." His voice was polite but firm—the tone of a man who'd spent decades protecting people who didn't always want to be protected.
"No." I kept my voice steady. "You were given orders to keep mesafe. Not keep me imprisoned."
Larsen was quiet for a moment. Assessing. I could see him weighing options, calculating risks.
"If you want to keep me safe," I continued, "then take me where I need to go and wait outside." I met his eyes. "I'll either sneak out a window and go alone, or you can come with me and make sure I'm protected. Your choice."
A long pause. Then Larsen sighed—the sigh of a man who recognized a losing battle when he saw one.
"The car will be ready in five minutes."
Bellini's was in Long Island City—a small Italian place that had been there for forty years, serving the same families who'd been coming for generations.
Old Queens money. Not Manhattan flash.
At midnight, the street was quiet. Too empty. The restaurant's windows glowed with warm light, but I couldn't see any movement inside.
One car was parked out front. Black. Immaculate. Richard Lang's.
Larsen pulled the sedan to the curb across the street. I could feel his tension from the back seat—the tense readiness of a man who didn't like anything about this situation.
"I'm going in alone," I said. "Stay here."
"Ms. Rothwell?—"
"If I'm not out in thirty minutes, or if you hear anything that sounds wrong, come in." I met his eyes in the rearview mirror. "But I need to do this myself."
He didn't like it. That much was clear in every line of his body. But he nodded once.
