Page 38 of Beauty and the Boss

Dante smiles his goodbye as Maria shows Paolo out.

I rise from the couch and pick up the bag. Dante and I lock eyes.

“Time to get ready,” I say.

Nineteen

MICHAEL

I drive to the warehouse alone. Cecelia wanted to accompany me, insisting repeatedly that she would wait quietly in the car while I made the ransom drop, but Dante and I convinced her to stay at home. Another instance of us being in agreement. Knowing how headstrong Cece can be, we both knew there was no way she could sit idly by a warehouse knowing Micah was trapped inside, and either she or Micah could end up getting hurt. This situation is bad enough without putting Cece at risk too.

As I left there were more tears. She begged me to be careful, to bring our son home, then she kissed me and held me like I was going off to war. In a way I am, and this is a war I’m going to win.

I check the time on my phone. It’s just gone eleven o’clock and I should be there in about twenty minutes. Nice and early to suss things out. Keep things calm. I’ve had so much coffee I feel jittery, so I smoke as I drive, virtually alone on the road, thinking again about why this is happening. Who’s using Micah to get to me? Who knows he is my son? Who wants to both torture me and extort money from me? I shake my head; it just doesn’t make any sense. The kidnappers won’t know that Dante’s forked out for the ransom, so they’ll believe that I’ve stumped up the cash, but if they know this much about my life, they should also know I haven’t got two million spare just like that. Dante’s wealth is on a whole different level to mine; my assets aren’t liquid. Or were they expecting me to commit a crime to get it and end up back inside? I take a deep drag on my cigarette then exhale steadily, turning all the questions over in my mind, looking underneath them, moving them about, but I still can’t figure out the answers. I guess I’ll get them soon enough, one way or another.

I spy the industrial district up ahead and make a left at its entrance, following the curved road into its center. I know the numbering system for these warehouses, so I’ve got a good idea where warehouse 11 is. As the low buildings come into view within their separate compounds, some of them abandoned and boarded up, the road narrows, creating alleyways between the rows of warehouses. I turn off my headlights, not wanting to announce my presence. Soon I pass number 3, then 5 and then I stop the car, looking ahead to where 11 will be. Although most of the warehouses are accessible via the rat-run of alleyways, this one looks like a dead end, a tall brick wall with coiled barbed wire creating a barricade. I wonder whether the kidnappers have chosen it for that reason, to be able to see my car approach before I see them, to box me in. I put the car into reverse and drive back out of the alleyway, parking behind one of the standalone garages in the compound opposite.

It’s now eleven thirty-five. I put my phone in my jacket pocket and take the holdall from the trunk, then I make my way back to warehouse 11 on foot, keeping close to the buildings and shrouded in shadows.

Adrenaline causes my breath to shorten, my heart to hammer painfully as I get nearer to where my boy is being held. I try not to think about my own father who was gunned down by armed polizia in a warehouse meeting gone wrong, which Anthony Ricci was the cause of. Are things about to go full circle? Am I about to be gunned down by someone who wants revenge because I killed Ricci? Is that all that Micah will ever know or remember about me? I force myself to harness my focus back to the present. Thinking about the past or future is too dangerous right now and if I lose focus, things might go sideways.

Instead of going past the front of the warehouses, I circle round the back until I reach the rear of number 9. Despite not being double height structures, they’ve all got an iron staircase that doubles back on itself, like a fire escape staircase, leading up to a single solid metal door. All the other warehouses are in complete darkness, but I can see a thin strip of light around the door of number 11. There are no windows on the sides that I can see, and the only other entrance looks to be the rear mechanical shutter door, which is pulled right down to the floor. There were no instructions on the ransom note about where to drop the money—do they expect me to just knock and exchange pleasantries? “Hi, how are you, here’s your two million euros, can I have my son back now please?”

I look around the compound and see no sign of any other activity. It’s deserted, abandoned-looking in places, no people, no vehicles. How did the kidnappers get here? Maybe in a car and they’ve driven it inside. I need to be prepared in case they’re planning to drive it straight out again, possibly with Micah inside. Take the money and my son to fuck knows where. That thought only induces more panic, so I try to calm my racing pulse and again survey my surroundings, get my bearings. The high brick wall with the barbed wire stretches this side too, weeds growing through the cracked concrete in front of it. The only way in and out is the way I came. I think I know what I’m going to do.

I dart across the gap between the warehouses and stop at the bottom of number 11’s staircase, listening carefully for noises or voices from within. Nothing. I breathe a sigh of relief that there aren’t any screams or cries from Micah, then in the next second I practically hyperventilate in case that means he’s unconscious or dead. The terrible thought sets me back and I have to take a moment to recalibrate. Christ, I need another cigarette. I shift the holdall to my other hand and begin to climb the staircase slowly, taking care not to make a sound, until I reach the narrow metal door at the top. I push against it gently, not expecting it to move, but to my surprise it does.

I feel sick with fear. This rogue move could endanger my son, but I have to know what I’m dealing with. I push the door a fraction more, immediately withdrawing my hand as though the metal’s hot, waiting for someone within to yank the door back, or possibly point the barrel of a gun through the crack. A minute passes, maybe more, and nothing happens. I chance another push and this time I dare to peer inside from my standpoint on the staircase platform. I can make out what looks like a mezzanine level on the other side of the door, horizontal iron bars creating a safety barrier on the two open sides of its small area. There’s a couple of stacks of boxes to the left, and the warehouse roof is maybe six feet above it. Just high enough for me to stand up. I push the door a bit more, this time creating a gap wide enough for me to slip through, but I wait again, just poking my head through. From here I’ve got a good view of most of the warehouse floor through the iron bar barrier, apart from what’s directly below the mezzanine. An LED tripod lamp lights a section of the space below, which is filled with wheeled pallets stacked high with more boxes, creating shadowy edges and corners beyond. And in one of those corners—the furthest right-hand corner at the front of the warehouse—I see Micah.

His vulnerable little body is curled up on a lone pallet, his hands scrunched under his chin. His head rests on his school backpack and there’s a grubby blanket beneath him, one corner pulled up and partially covering his legs. He’s still wearing his school uniform. I feel as though someone has punched their fist through my chest and squeezed my heart, so fierce is my love for him. From my bird’s eye view, I can’t tell if he’s asleep or drugged, but at least he looks alive.

The holdall is feeling heavy, so I place it down on the staircase platform and slowly and cautiously slip through the gap in the door until I’m standing inside the warehouse on the mezzanine. My head grazes the flat ceiling. I strain my ears for any sounds, and I think I can hear indistinct mumbling from directly below, like TV dialogue. I pull out my phone and check the time: eleven forty-five. The kidnappers are expecting me to make the ransom drop in fifteen minutes. Have they left Micah here alone and are coming back at midnight? Do I push the metal door closed in case they do, or try and grab Micah and bring him out this way before they get here? I don’t have a plan, but I feel magnetized towards my son. I have to go to him.

I put my phone back in my pocket, step forward and look down. There’s a vertical ladder attached to the wall directly below the mezzanine, the only access to and from it. All I need to do is slide through the iron bar barrier, climb down the ladder, and cross the warehouse floor, and then I’ll hold Micah in my arms again.

As I crouch on the mezzanine, preparing to duck under the barrier, the mumbling from below becomes louder and clearer, like the TV’s been turned up. A man walks out onto the warehouse floor, his footsteps echoing in the vast space.

The man is stocky with a blonde buzz cut. His appearance, gait, and body language scream military. Or ex-military perhaps. I don’t recognize him.

I twist and fall flat, pressing the length of my body against the dirty iron floor as the man walks towards Micah. I hold my breath knowing that if he so much as touches him, I will kill him. He halts a few steps away from my boy, looks down at him and then turns back.

“Still out for the count,” he calls to someone.

“Best way. Won’t remember a thing,” replies another voice. A voice I do recognize. Red hot lava bubbles within me as Raphael Lombardi comes in view, like a specter. He joins the stocky guy and I clench my teeth together so hard it feels like they might crack. I fucking should have known he was behind this! I think back to his cocky statement: “You might have won this battle, but you won’t win the war.” And then I challenged him to do his worst! More fool me. Well, the war’s not over yet. I wish I’d brought a gun.

Lombardi checks his watch. “Ten minutes until payday. You ready?”

“Born ready,” says Stocky Guy. “You sure he’ll be here?”

“Yes, I’ve told you already,” says Lombardi irritably.

“Watch your fucking tone,” says Stocky Guy, glaring at his accomplice.

Lombardi looks chastened and again I wonder who Stocky Guy is, what he’s got to do with all this. Or is he just some random beefcake happy to kidnap kids for cash? I take my phone out of my pocket, open the voice app, and hit record, laying it on the floor of the mezzanine.

“The grandfather was organizing the money when I left,” says Lombardi. “He’s good for it, believe me. And I convinced Luciano not to involve the cops. They’ll do anything to get this kid back.”

“You’d better be right. Because if you’re not, you’re gonna have to find another way to reimburse me for all my work today.”

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