Chapter 6: Inside the Moretti Building
I called my mother's overnight nurse from the cab and confirmed the medication situation was covered through the weekend.
Then I put the phone in my pocket and looked out at Chicago moving past in the rain.
Adrian sat across from me, not speaking.
He'd given me the address.
He hadn't pushed.
"If Foss finds out what we're doing tonight," I said, "what does he do?"
"He applies pressure where it hurts most."
"My mother."
"Her care facility.
Her insurance.
Her doctors." Adrian's voice didn't soften it.
"He's done it before.
The man in Seattle — the one who relocated after the Hargrove acquisition — his daughter lost her job at a hospital six weeks after he refused to cooperate.
Foss doesn't threaten directly.
He adjusts circumstances."
"He's been doing this for thirty years and no one has stopped him."
"No one has had the right documents."
The cab stopped outside a narrow office building on the north side.
Twelve stories, older construction, no visible security cameras on the exterior.
Adrian paid cash.
Inside, the lobby was unstaffed at this hour.
Adrian used a key card at the elevator.
Eighth floor.
A corridor of unmarked doors and fluorescent light.
"My father bought this building in 1987," Adrian said, unlocking the third door on the left.
"Before Foss.
It's the one property that was never folded into the Group's legal structure.
Foss has tried twice to have it transferred.
My father refused both times without knowing why he was refusing.
Some instinct."
The room was floor-to-ceiling filing cabinets.
Bankers boxes stacked along the far wall.
The smell of old paper and cold air.
"What am I looking for?" I said.
"Hargrove Capital.
Employee files.
Specifically anything related to the compliance department, 2001 through 2004."
We worked in silence.
Adrian took the cabinets on the left.
I started on the bankers boxes.
The labels were inconsistent — some by year, some by company name, some by a numbering system I didn't recognize.
Forty minutes in, I found a box labeled *HCap — Personnel — Restricted.*
"Adrian."
He was beside me in seconds.
Inside: manila folders, each tabbed with a name.
I flipped through them.
Accountants, analysts, managers.
And then — *Ellison, M.
— Compliance Director.*
Adrian took the folder carefully.
Opened it.
Inside was a standard employment record.
Performance reviews.
A termination notice dated March 2003 — *voluntary resignation.* And beneath that, a sealed envelope with no label.
Adrian held it for a moment.
"Open it," I said.
He did.
Inside was a single handwritten note.
The handwriting was small and precise.
*If you're reading this, something went wrong.
The full record is with Carol.
She knows what to do with it.
— M.E.*
We looked at each other.
"My mother has the full record," I said.
"She's been holding it for twenty years."
"In a care facility.
In a room with a combination lockbox on the closet shelf that she told me held her jewelry."
Adrian was already moving toward the door.
My phone rang.
Not a text this time.
An actual call.
Unknown number.
I answered it.
Silence for two seconds.
Then a woman's voice.
Older.
Careful.
"Emily.
Don't go to the care facility tonight." A pause.
May you like
"He already has someone there."
The line went de@d.
