Chapter 3 - THE CIPHER IN THE BRASS
The ballroom erupted into screaming chaos.
Women dropped crystal flutes onto the marble.
Men in tuxedos shoved each other toward the heavy arched exits.
Richard Whitmore did not run toward the door.
He reached inside his dinner jacket with his right hand.
Marcus saw the movement first.
"Boss, down!" Marcus roared.
A gunshot cracked like a whip through the acoustic hall.
The bullet pulverized the gilded plaster pillar inches from Elena’s head.
Plaster dust showered her hair.
Elena stumbled backward, her breath stolen.
Before she touched the floor, an arm of iron wrapped around her waist.
Dante hauled her behind the massive marble fireplace.
His chest was hard against her shoulder.
His pulse hammered like a war drum.
He drew a matte-black automatic from beneath his suit.
He fired two suppressed rounds into the crowd.
Richard Whitmore cursed, clutching his bleeding shoulder as two bodyguards dragged him through the service pantry.
"Lock the exterior gates!" Dante barked into his radio.
"Contain the perimeter!"
Marcus’s voice answered over the gunfire:
"The north gate was compromised from the inside, Mr. Moretti!"
"A black van just cleared the avenue!"
"The Whitmores are running for the lake road!"
Dante turned to Elena.
His hands gripped her shoulders.
His thumbs brushed the dust from her cheekbones with unexpected gentleness.
"Are you hit?" he asked.
"No," she gasped, her hands shaking against his lapels.
"Your mother," Dante said. "Where is she right now?"
"Saint Jude’s," Elena stammered. "Room 412."
"Marcus," Dante ordered without looking away from Elena’s eyes.
"Send team three to Saint Jude’s."
"Secure Clara Morales."
"Move her to the vault suite at the Lake Forest compound immediately."
Elena’s knees almost buckled under the weight of his words.
He was protecting her mother.
A mafia boss whose world was burning was thinking of an old woman on dialysis.
"Why?" Elena whispered.
"Because your mother was Lorenzo’s head nurse at Cook County seven years ago," Dante said.
His voice was thick with suppressed emotion.
"The night Lorenzo died."
"Or the night they told me he died."
He pulled Elena toward the private corridor behind the fireplace.
They moved quickly through the dark, wood-paneled halls of the private wing.
The estate had fallen into an eerie, violent quiet.
Dante led her into his private study.
The scent of pipe tobacco, leather, and rain filled the room.
On the mahogany desk sat the small music box Elena had repaired three weeks earlier.
Its polished rosewood casing caught the faint moonlight from the terrace.
Dante picked up the box.
He looked at Elena.
"You fixed this," Dante said.
"Yes," Elena said, her voice trembling. "The escapement gear was jammed."
"Mrs. Alvarez said it was an antique."
"It belonged to my brother," Dante said softly.
He turned the delicate key on the bottom three times.
The cylinder turned.
A fragile, tinny waltz began to play.
Notes of Chopin.
Elena tilted her head.
Her ear caught a mechanical rhythm beneath the melody.
"Wait," Elena said, stepping closer to his hands.
"Stop turning it."
Dante looked at her.
"What is it?"
"The teeth on the brass comb," Elena said, pointing a slender finger at the mechanism.
"They aren't tuned to standard intervals."
"Every fourth tooth has been filed flat."
Dante stared at the tiny brass pins.
"A cipher," Dante whispered.
"Lorenzo loved cryptography."
"He built this box when he was seventeen."
Elena reached into her apron pocket and pulled out her brass seam ripper.
Her hands, usually so steady with sewing, shook as she approached the desk.
She wedged the thin steel point beneath the false floor of the rosewood casing.
A tiny spring popped.
The bottom panel slid aside.
Inside lay a micro-cassette tape and a tarnished silver key stamped with a serial number:
LOCKER 74 - UNION STATION.
Suddenly, the French doors leading to the terrace shattered in a violent hail of automatic rifle fire.
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The mahogany desk was chewed into flying splinters.
A laser sight painted a crimson dot across Dante’s chest.
