The Woman Who Refused the Car
Chapter 04 - The Woman Who Refused the Car
Dominic sent three cars after Megan.
She refused all of them.
The first stopped beside the bus shelter at Roswell Road while the rain turned the curb into a gray stream. Megan stood with Ollie asleep against her chest under the yellow blanket, her work bag at her feet, her chin lifted against the cold.
The driver rolled down the window.
“Miss Foster, Mr. Mason sent me.”
“No, thank you.”
“He said you’re in danger.”
“Then he can send the danger an email.”
The driver looked uncomfortable. “Ma’am—”
“I said no.”
She boarded the bus.
The second car waited outside her apartment building, a tired brick structure with peeling paint, a broken lobby buzzer, and a hallway that smelled faintly of cabbage and damp carpet. Megan walked past the car without turning her head.
The third car arrived with Nancy inside.
That one almost worked.
Megan stood in the doorway of her apartment holding Ollie on one hip while Nancy waited in the hall with a covered dish and eyes red from crying.
“I made chicken and rice,” Nancy said.
“I’m not hungry.”
“It’s not for you. It’s for the baby.”
Megan hesitated.
Nancy stepped closer. “Please, sweetheart.”
That word nearly broke through.
Megan took the dish.
But she did not open the door wider.
“I can’t go back there.”
“I know.”
“No, Nancy. You don’t. You work for him. You all do. Even when he’s kind, it’s still his kindness. His house. His rules. His danger. His men deciding when I can walk through a door.”
Nancy looked down.
“I should have told you about Ryan.”
Megan’s fingers tightened around the dish.
“Then why didn’t you?”
The older woman swallowed. “Because I signed the papers.”
The hallway seemed to tilt.
“What papers?”
Nancy looked over her shoulder.
There was no one there.
That frightened Megan more than if there had been.
“The internal witness statement after the warehouse fire,” Nancy said softly. “I was the staff liaison that week. Enzo asked me to verify that no family member had been notified of safety concerns before the incident.”
“You verified that?”
“I was told it was routine.”
“My husband is dead.”
“I know.”
“No, you don’t get to say that like we both lost the same thing.”
Nancy flinched.
Megan hated that she noticed.
Nancy reached into her purse and pulled out a folded envelope, old enough that the edges had softened.
“I kept a copy.”
Megan stared at it.
“Why?”
“Because Ryan came to the house two days before he died.”
The dish nearly slipped from Megan’s hand.
“He what?”
Nancy nodded, tears now moving freely. “He asked for Dominic. He said he had proof someone inside the company was stealing through ghost vendors. I told him Dominic was unavailable.”
“Was he?”
Nancy closed her eyes. “He was recovering from a procedure. Enzo said no one could see him.”
Megan could hear Ollie breathing against her shoulder. Small, steady breaths. The only sound in the hallway that still made sense.
“Did Ryan leave anything?”
Nancy held out the envelope.
“He left this.”
Megan did not take it.
Because she knew, somehow, that paper could rearrange the dead.
“What is it?”
“I don’t know. It was sealed. Enzo saw it before I could give it to Dominic. He told me Ryan was unstable. Later, after the fire, he said opening it would only hurt everyone.”
“And you believed him?”
Nancy’s face crumpled. “I wanted to.”
There are betrayals that arrive with knives.
Others arrive wearing familiar shoes, holding chicken and rice in a covered dish.
Megan set the dish on the hallway table.
“Leave.”
“Megan—”
“Leave the envelope.”
Nancy placed it gently beside the dish.
Then she walked away.
Megan waited until the elevator doors closed before she shut and locked all three locks.
Her apartment had two rooms, one lamp with a crooked shade, a secondhand crib, and a kitchen table that wobbled unless a folded bill envelope was tucked beneath one leg. It was warm because she had paid the gas instead of the phone bill that month.
She set Ollie on the bed. He slept with his stuffed cloth lion under one arm, the yellow blanket twisted around his feet.
Then Megan opened the envelope.
Inside was a flash drive.
A handwritten note.
And a photograph.
The photograph showed Ryan standing in front of a warehouse loading bay beside a man Megan recognized immediately from television charity galas and newspaper clippings.
Dominic Mason.
Only Ryan had told her he never met Dominic.
On the back of the photograph were four words in Ryan’s handwriting.
IF I DIE, ASK HIM.
Megan stopped breathing.
Her phone vibrated on the table.
Unknown number.
She answered without speaking.
Dominic Mason’s voice came through, controlled but strained.
“Megan.”
She looked at the photograph.
“You knew my husband.”
A pause.
“No.”
“You’re in a picture with him.”
Silence.
This time the silence sounded real.
Dominic said, “Send it to me.”
“Tell me the truth.”
“I don’t remember meeting him.”
“Convenient.”
“Megan—”
“No. You don’t get to use that voice with me after your house swallowed my husband and tried to swallow me.”
“I received a threat against Ollie.”
Her body went cold.
“What?”
“That’s why I sent the cars.”
Megan rushed to the bedroom doorway and looked at her son.
He was still sleeping.
Dominic continued, “You don’t have to trust me. But you need to leave the apartment.”
She backed toward the window.
On the street below, a black sedan idled at the curb.
Not Dominic’s.
She knew because the man leaning beside it wore a black onyx pinky ring.
Enzo Bellaro looked up at her window and smiled.
Megan whispered into the phone, “He’s here.”
Dominic’s voice changed completely.
May you like
“Do exactly as I say.”
But someone knocked softly on her apartment door before he could finish.
