Chapter 6 - WHAT EMMETT REMEMBERED
Z
Carmine shut down three roads before midnight.
Not literally.
New Orleans still moved.
Cars still crossed the city.
Streetcars still rang their bells.
But every driver, dockworker, warehouse manager, restaurant supplier, and bookmaker who owed the Orsini family a favor received the same description.
Emmett Fontaine.
Fifty-eight.
Gray hair.
Difficulty breathing.
Possibly confused.
Missing from a care facility.
Find the car.
Do not approach it.
Call Benny Santino.
Nell sat in Carmine’s office gripping the arms of a chair.
She had not cried.
Carmine wished she would.
Tears were easier than the silence consuming her.
“This happened because of me.”
“No.”
“I went back into the bakery.”
“I took you.”
“I brought out the book.”
“I told you to.”
“I walked into your dining room and showed Bellarose we had it.”
“That was my decision.”
Nell looked at him.
“Why do you keep doing that?”
“Doing what?”
“Taking responsibility.”
Carmine frowned.
“Because it’s mine.”
That answer hurt her in a place she had spent years protecting.
Her entire life had taught her that powerful people avoided responsibility.
Bellarose.
Her mother.
Lawyers.
Inspectors.
Employers.
Everyone who could make consequences disappear usually did.
Carmine did the opposite.
It frightened her.
The telephone rang.
Benny answered.
He listened.
Then looked at Carmine.
“Found the vehicle.”
Nell stood.
“Where?”
“Abandoned near Algiers Point.”
“And my father?”
“Not inside.”
Her knees nearly failed.
Carmine caught her elbow.
She pulled away immediately.
Not because she disliked his touch.
Because she liked it too much.
“Where do we go?”
Benny unfolded a map.
“Car was found here.”
He pointed.
“One witness saw an older man moved into a second vehicle.”
“Description?”
“Black Lincoln.”
Carmine looked at Nell.
“Bellarose owns six.”
Benny nodded.
“Seven.”
“Seven?”
“Bought another last month.”
Nell stared at the map.
Algiers Point.
Something bothered her.
Her father had talked about it once.
Years earlier.
Before the stroke.
Before his memory fragmented.
A kitchen.
No.
A warehouse.
She closed her eyes.
Emmett used to deliver baked goods personally every Thursday.
One account was across the river.
An old private club.
“What is near there?” she asked.
Benny listed streets.
Nell shook her head.
“Businesses.”
“Bars. Warehouses. River properties.”
“Clubs?”
Benny looked closer.
“One old social club. Closed fifteen years ago.”
Nell’s eyes opened.
“What name?”
“St. Gabriel Society.”
She knew it.
“My father delivered bread there.”
Carmine was already moving.
The St. Gabriel Society building had boarded windows and a rusted iron gate.
A chain secured the front entrance.
Fresh tire tracks marked the gravel beside it.
Benny looked at Nell.
“You stay in the car.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
“No.”
Carmine opened the rear door.
“Nell.”
“My father is inside.”
“We don’t know that.”
“I do.”
“How?”
She pointed toward the second-floor window.
A light had turned on.
Then off.
Three times.
Pause.
Three times.
Emmett had used the same signal when Nell was a child and playing outside after dark.
Three flashes meant come home.
Carmine stared at the window.
Then nodded once.
“You stay behind me.”
They entered through the rear.
No dramatic gunfight waited inside.
No army of Bellarose men.
Only two frightened employees guarding a man they had been told was senile and harmless.
Benny disarmed the first.
Carmine handled the second.
It was over in seconds.
Nell ran upstairs.
“Dad?”
She found Emmett sitting in a chair.
His hands were tied loosely in front.
He looked toward her.
For one terrible moment, his expression was blank.
Then he smiled.
“Nellie.”
She stopped.
He remembered.
Her father had not called her Nellie in four years.
She dropped to her knees.
“Yes.”
His hand touched her cheek.
“You got tall.”
A laugh escaped her with a sob.
“You noticed.”
Emmett looked around.
“Where’s your mother?”
Nell’s face changed.
“Dad…”
“She said she’d come back.”
Carmine entered the room slowly.
Emmett looked at him.
“Who are you?”
“Carmine Orsini.”
Emmett studied his face.
“Anthony’s boy.”
Carmine stopped.
“My father was Anthony.”
“I made his wedding cake.”
Carmine had not known.
Emmett smiled weakly.
“He complained there weren’t enough almonds.”
“That sounds like him.”
Nell untied her father’s wrists.
“Dad, why did they bring you here?”
Emmett frowned.
“Who?”
“The men.”
“What men?”
His clarity was already fading.
Nell looked toward Carmine.
Then back to her father.
“Dad, do you remember Conrad?”
Emmett’s entire body stiffened.
That was answer enough.
“Conrad Bellarose.”
Emmett whispered, “Don’t sign it.”
Nell leaned closer.
“Sign what?”
“Don’t sign.”
“Dad, what did he make you sign?”
Emmett’s breathing became fast.
Carmine crouched.
“Mr. Fontaine.”
Emmett looked at him.
“Anthony’s boy.”
“Yes.”
“Your father kept his promises.”
“I try to.”
Emmett grabbed his wrist with surprising strength.
“Then don’t let him have the river.”
Carmine’s eyes sharpened.
“What river?”
“The tunnel.”
Nell looked at Carmine.
“What tunnel?”
Emmett pointed toward the floor.
“Bakery.”
His hand shook.
“Underneath.”
Carmine remembered the basement arches.
They extended beneath adjoining buildings.
“How far does it go?”
Emmett struggled.
“Warehouse.”
“What warehouse?”
“Old river freight.”
Benny appeared at the doorway.
Carmine looked at him.
“Get city property maps from the 1990s.”
Benny nodded and left.
Nell held her father’s hands.
“Dad, Mom left you an envelope.”
Emmett stared at her.
“Lydia?”
“Yes.”
“She took the book.”
“We found the book.”
His eyes filled.
“You found it?”
“Yes.”
“The page.”
“What page?”
Emmett began coughing.
Nell reached for water.
He pushed it away.
“The missing page.”
“What was on it?”
Emmett closed his eyes.
Nell thought he had lost the memory.
Then he whispered.
“Names.”
Carmine leaned closer.
“What names?”
“Everybody.”
A long breath.
“Police.”
Another.
“Council.”
Another.
“Conrad.”
Emmett opened his eyes.
“She copied them.”
“Lydia?”
He nodded.
“She wasn’t helping him.”
Nell stopped breathing.
“What?”
Emmett looked directly at his daughter.
For one brilliant moment, the fog inside him disappeared.
“Your mother was helping me.”
Nell’s face crumpled.
“No.”
“She went with Conrad because she needed proof.”
“Dad…”
“She told you to stay away because he was watching.”
Tears finally came.
Nell shook her head.
“All these years…”
“She loved you.”
Emmett touched her cheek.
“She was trying to keep you alive.”
Then the clarity left.
He looked around the room.
Confused.
“Where are we?”
Nell lowered her head against his hand.
Carmine stood.
His face was hard.
The story had changed.
Lydia Brisco had not betrayed her husband.
She had infiltrated Bellarose’s operation.
The missing page contained names.
And Bellarose had spent two decades trying to destroy every copy.
Benny returned twenty minutes later carrying old municipal maps pulled from a storage archive by a city clerk who owed him a favor.
He spread them across a table.
One underground utility corridor ran beneath the former Fontaine Bakery.
It continued two blocks.
Then turned toward the river.
It ended beneath warehouse property currently owned by one company.
Bellarose Imports.
Carmine looked at the map.
Nell stood beside him.
“Is that what he wants from your docks?”
“No.”
Carmine followed the underground line with one finger.
“He doesn’t want my docks.”
He looked at her.
“He wants me to move whatever has been coming through that tunnel for twenty years.”
Nell wiped her face.
“And the names?”
Carmine folded the map.
“If Lydia copied them, she put them somewhere.”
“Where?”
He looked toward Emmett.
The old baker had fallen asleep.
Carmine thought about the envelope.
Houston.
The accident.
The belongings.
Then he remembered something.
“Bellarose survived the crash.”
“Yes.”
“Lydia didn’t.”
Nell nodded.
“What if the envelope was never meant to reach your father by mail?”
She frowned.
“What do you mean?”
“What if she knew she was being followed?”
Carmine picked up the old accident report.
The envelope had been sealed.
Addressed E.F.
But there was no postage.
No stamp.
Lydia had intended to deliver it herself.
May you like
Nell stared.
Then she whispered, “She was coming home.”
