I Hid Vito's Ledger Now Chicago Wants Me novel · Chapter 1 of 3
Chapter 1: Blue Hour
At closing, Lucia cuts open the coat lining and pulls out the folded copy of the records as three of Vito's men walk into her shop and lock the door.
The blue hour is the only time I get to myself in this shop.
Taylor Street goes quiet.
The bakery across the road shuts its lights off one row at a time.
I lock the front door and flip the sign.
Then I turn to the coat.
It has been hanging on the end rack for three weeks.
It is a charcoal wool overcoat my dad made in his own shop before everything went sideways.
I walk past it every morning.
Tonight I take it down.
I lay it across the cutting table.
The lining is loose at the hem, stitched with a thread that doesn't match.
My dad's work.
He never did anything sloppy except this.
I slide the scissors in and open the seam.
The paper is folded twice, tight enough that it has gone soft at the creases.
I pull it out and flatten it under the lamp.
Columns. Dates. Names I know from the neighborhood.
Amounts in my father's small blocky hand, and beside them a second column in different ink.
What Vito took off the top.
My phone says 5:44.
Outside, the light is going that deep gray that makes the whole street look underwater.
I have had this paper for six weeks and I still don't know what to do with it.
Dad is asleep in the flat upstairs.
He sleeps a lot now.
Since spring, his hands shake when he tries to hold a pencil.
Three men come up the sidewalk.
I fold the paper and slide it under the cutting mat.
They don't knock.
The first one tries the handle, finds it locked, and looks in at me through the glass like I'm the one who's out of line.
The second one is bigger.
The third one is young and keeps his hands in his pockets.
I know the first one's face.
He was at the shop in April, standing on the sidewalk while two other men went up the stairs to my dad.
I put the scissors down.
I open the door because a locked door only works until it doesn't.
"Sorry," I say. "We're closed."
The first one walks past me.
The big one follows.
The young one stays on the sidewalk for a second and then comes in too.
He turns the deadbolt behind him.
"Lucia Morelli," the first one says. "You look just like your father's pictures."
"I don't know what that means."
"It means I've seen your father's pictures."
He walks the length of the shop, slow.
He runs a finger along the rack of finished alterations.
"He used to take pictures of everything. Every delivery, every handoff."
My hands are cold.
I put them in my pockets.
"What do you want?"
"An overcoat."
I look at the end rack.
The coat is still there, split open along the hem, the lining hanging like a torn hem.
"That one's damaged."
"That one's the one."
The big one picks it up.
He is not gentle about it.
The hanger snaps off in his hand and he drops it on the floor.
The young one is watching me instead of the coat.
That is the one I should worry about.
"Vito Lazzaro sends his regards," the first one says.
"I don't know him."
"You don't have to. He knows your father."
He crouches by the coat and lifts the torn lining with two fingers.
"Joe Morelli kept records. Little notebooks. You know the ones."
"I don't know anything about notebooks."
"No." He stands up. "That's what we're here to find out."
The big one starts on the racks.
He pulls coats off the bar and lets them fall.
Wool, cashmere, a bridal jacket I spent nine hours on.
They pile up on the floor like dead animals.
"Hey," I say. "Stop."
He doesn't stop.
The young one walks to the register and opens it.
There is forty-one dollars in there.
He takes it and counts it and puts it in his jacket.
"That's my rent," I say.
"That's your problem."
The first one is at the cutting table now.
He runs his hand along the edge, over the mat.
I keep my face very still.
He lifts the mat.
There is nothing under it.
The paper is in my left hand, inside my pocket, folded small.
He looks at the bare table and then at me.
Something in his face changes.
He is not angry. He is interested.
"You're quick," he says.
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"You know exactly what I'm talking about."
The big one has finished with the racks.
He kicks the pile of coats and comes to stand between me and the door.
My father's chair scrapes upstairs.
Every head in the shop turns toward the ceiling.
I hear his footsteps cross the floor, slow and uneven, one hand on the wall.
The bathroom door opens and closes.
The first one smiles at me.
"Your dad's home."
"He's asleep. He's sick."
"He's awake." He nods at the young one. "Go get him."
The young one heads for the stairs.
"Mister," I say. "Mister. He's sixty-one years old and he can't hold a pen."
"Whatever you think he wrote down, he doesn't have it."
The young one stops with his hand on the rail.
The first one looks at me for a long moment.
Then he walks over to the coat on the floor.
He picks it up by the collar and holds it out at arm's length.
The torn lining hangs open in the lamplight.
He is not looking at the coat.
He is looking at me while he holds it.
"Tell me something, Lucia."
He lets it drop.
"Where's the rest of the lining?"
I don't answer.
The young one takes his hand off the rail.
The big one takes a step toward me.
The first one holds up a hand and stops both of them.
He reaches into his jacket.
For one second I think it's a gun, and my whole body goes cold from the neck down.
It's a phone.
He taps the screen twice and holds it up.
On the screen is a photograph of my father's workbench from four years ago.
A stack of notebooks sits on the corner.
"Vito wants the paper," he says. "All of it."
I hear myself say it before I decide to.
"There is no paper."
The first one puts the phone away.
Then he walks to the door and unlocks it.
He holds it open for the other two.
The big one goes out.
The young one goes out and looks back at me once from the sidewalk.
The first one stays in the doorway with his hand on the frame.
"The coat's coming with us," he says. "One way or another."
He points at the pile on the floor.
"Vito wants the coat," he says. "Not the money."
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