Part 2 — The Man Behind the Name
Part 2 — The Man Behind the Name
Sheree woke to the harsh glare of winter sunlight stabbing through the gap in her blinds.
For one confused second, she had no idea where she was.
Then she tasted copper and old coffee in her mouth.
Her knees ached.
Her neck was stiff.
And the memory came rushing back.
The alley.
The blood.
The stranger.
Sheree sat upright.
Her heart hammered against her ribs.
She listened.
Silence.
The radiator wasn’t hissing anymore.
There was no sound of breathing from the living room.
No shifting weight.
No footsteps.
Nothing.
She slid off the bed and grabbed the heaviest thing within reach—a wooden clothes hanger.
It was a pathetic weapon.
But it was better than nothing.
She quietly unlocked her bedroom door.
The hinges gave a tiny squeak.
Sheree froze.
Nothing.
She pushed the door open.
The apartment was empty.
The fleece blanket had been folded into a neat, perfect square and placed on the arm of the couch.
The plastic garbage bag containing his ruined, blood-soaked clothes was gone.
She moved toward the kitchen.
Stopped.
Stared.
The floor was spotless.
Completely clean.
No blood.
No muddy footprints.
Nothing.
The only evidence that a man had nearly died in her apartment was the faint lingering smell of antiseptic and damp wool.
Sheree lowered the hanger.
Relief washed through her.
Then something else.
Something she refused to name.
Disappointment.
“Good,” she whispered.
She turned toward the coffee maker.
“Good riddance.”
She reached for her favorite mug.
Then stopped.
Sitting on the Formica countertop beside her stack of overdue electric bills was a thick bundle of hundred-dollar bills.
Sheree stared.
She didn’t touch it.
The bills were held together by a plain white paper band.
Ten thousand dollars.
Maybe more.
Her stomach tightened.
She looked beneath the money.
A small cream-colored card sat on the counter.
It was entirely blank except for a single phone number embossed in black ink.
Sheree slowly backed away.
Men who left ten thousand dollars on a kitchen counter in the Southside weren’t normal men.
They weren’t tourists who had been mugged.
They weren’t businessmen.
They were men who expected problems to disappear when they made a phone call.
She walked quickly to the window.
The storm had broken.
The city was buried beneath a thick layer of pristine white snow.
The street was silent and unplowed.
But directly across from her building sat a black SUV with heavily tinted windows.
The engine was running.
Sheree’s breath caught.
The driver’s window rolled down an inch.
A plume of cigarette smoke drifted into the freezing morning air.
Someone was inside.
Watching her building.
Sheree yanked the blinds shut.
She leaned against the wall, her mind racing.
The money.
The card.
The stranger.
The SUV.
None of it made sense.
She grabbed her phone with trembling fingers and opened the local news app.
The first headline made her blood run cold.
SYNDICATE WARS ESCALATE — MASSACRE AT THE DOCKS
Sheree stared at the screen.
She tapped the article.
A power struggle had erupted inside the city’s largest organized-crime family.
A betrayal.
A shootout.
Six men dead.
The newly appointed head of the family had been ambushed.
Authorities weren’t sure whether he had survived the night.
Sheree scrolled.
Then stopped breathing.
There was a photograph attached to the article.
A man in a perfectly tailored black suit.
Dark hair slicked neatly away from his forehead.
Expression cold.
Eyes almost black.
It was him.
The man from her kitchen.
The caption beneath the photograph read:
LUCA CALVINO, PRESUMED HEAD OF THE CALVINO SYNDICATE.
Sheree’s phone nearly slipped from her hand.
She looked slowly from the screen to the money.
Then to the blank card.
Then toward the couch where a mafia boss had slept only hours earlier.
She had not saved a random victim of the city’s violence.
She had saved the architect of it.
She had stitched up a monster.
Given him vodka.
Threatened him with his own stitches.
And told him not to steal her television.
“Oh, God.”
A sharp knock exploded against the apartment door.
Sheree jumped.
Her phone nearly flew from her hand.
Another knock.
Harder this time.
She stared at the door.
The deadbolt was locked.
The chain was on.
“Miss Murphy?”
The voice came from the hallway.
It wasn’t Luca’s.
This voice was brisk.
Professional.
Impatient.
“Detective James Brody, Chicago PD. Open up, please.”
Sheree’s eyes went straight to the money.
Then to the blank business card.
She was supposed to be invisible.
She was supposed to go to work, pay her bills, and survive.
Instead, the city’s apex predator had slept on her couch.
And now the police were at her door.
The nightmare was just beginning.
“Miss Murphy,” Brody called again.
“I know you’re in there.”
Sheree’s heart slammed against her ribs.
She grabbed the money and the card.
Her eyes darted around the apartment.
Where could she hide them?
The flower canister.
She hurried to the kitchen, shoved the cash and card beneath the canister’s removable tray, then poured a mound of cheap white flour over everything.
She snapped the lid shut.
Wiped her palms against her jeans.
Breathed in.
Breathed out.
Then she walked to the door.
She undid the chain but kept the deadbolt locked.
The door opened barely two inches.
Detective James Brody stood in the hallway.
He looked exactly like the Southside felt in February.
Exhausted.
Gray.
And entirely out of patience.
He wore a rumpled tan overcoat over a suit that had given up holding a crease sometime during the previous decade.
His badge hung from a chain around his neck.
A crooked striped tie disappeared beneath his coat.
“Sherie Murphy?”
“Sheree.”
He glanced down at his notepad.
“Sheree Murphy?”
“Yes.”
“Mind if I step inside?”
“Actually, I do mind.”
Brody raised an eyebrow.
Sheree held the door firmly.
“I worked a sixteen-hour trauma shift, Detective. I’ve been asleep for exactly three hours. Whatever this is, it can happen in the hallway.”
For a moment, Brody simply studied her.
He didn’t look angry.
Just mildly inconvenienced.
Then he pulled a small spiral-bound notepad from his coat pocket.
“Fair enough.”
He flipped it open.
“We got an anonymous call about an hour ago.”
Sheree’s stomach tightened.
“Someone spotted a significant amount of blood in the alley behind this building.”
He paused.
“A trail of it leads right up to the back service door.”
Sheree kept her face completely blank.
She dug her fingernails into the meat of her palm.
“I came through the front door.”
Brody looked at her.
“I didn’t ask how you came in.”
Silence.
Sheree realized her mistake.
The detective’s eyes sharpened.
“You volunteered that.”
“I assumed that’s what you were asking.”
“No.”
He closed the notepad.
“I’m asking whether you saw anything unusual when you came home.”
Sheree leaned against the door.
“No.”
“Nothing?”
“Nothing.”
“Not a person?”
“No.”
“Not a car?”
“No.”
“Not a man?”
Sheree’s pulse jumped.
Only for half a second.
But Brody noticed.
She could tell he noticed.
His gaze moved past her shoulder toward the apartment.
“Can I ask why you’re standing in the doorway?”
“Because you’re standing in my doorway.”
One corner of Brody’s mouth twitched.
Not quite a smile.
“You’re a nurse, right?”
Sheree’s blood ran colder.
“Yes.”
“St. Jude’s?”
“Yes.”
“You worked last night?”
“Yes.”
“Sixteen hours?”
“That’s right.”
Brody nodded slowly.
“Then maybe you can tell me something.”
His voice changed.
It became quieter.
More serious.
“How long can a person survive outside in this weather with a deep abdominal or chest wound?”
Sheree’s fingers tightened around the edge of the door.
“Depends on the wound.”
“And hypothermia?”
“Depends on exposure.”
“And if someone was badly injured but somehow made it inside somewhere warm?”
Sheree stared at him.
Brody stared back.
Neither moved.
Then his eyes dropped briefly to the floor.
There was something dark beneath the door.
A tiny smear.
Sheree followed his gaze.
Her stomach dropped.
Blood.
She had missed one spot.
A single dark red fingerprint on the inside edge of the threshold.
Brody slowly looked back up at her.
“Interesting.”
Sheree’s mind raced.
She could deny it.
Say it was old.
Say it belonged to a patient.
Say anything.
But the detective had already seen enough.
Then the sound of an engine growled outside.
Both of them turned.
Through the narrow gap between the curtains, Sheree saw the black SUV still parked across the street.
The passenger door opened.
A man stepped out.
Black suit.
Black gloves.
He looked up directly at her apartment.
Then he touched two fingers to his ear.
Brody noticed him too.
His expression changed instantly.
He reached beneath his coat.
Sheree’s breath caught.
The man outside wasn’t watching Brody.
He was watching her.
And suddenly Sheree understood something.
The police weren’t the only people looking for Luca Calvino.
The people who had tried to kill him were looking for him too.
Brody turned back toward her.
“Miss Murphy.”
“What?”
“Who was in your apartment last night?”
Sheree said nothing.
Brody’s eyes hardened.
“Because whoever you’re protecting isn’t just some injured guy.”
He leaned closer.
“He’s Luca Calvino.”
Sheree’s heart stopped.
Before she could answer, a gunshot cracked somewhere down the street.
The hallway lights flickered.
Brody immediately shoved the door closed.
“Get down!”
Sheree dropped.
Another shot shattered the apartment window.
Glass exploded across the kitchen.
She screamed and covered her head.
Brody drew his weapon.
Outside, tires screamed against the snow.
The black SUV accelerated away.
But before it disappeared around the corner, Sheree saw something that made her blood freeze.
Someone was standing on the opposite sidewalk.
Watching her building.
A tall man in a dark coat.
He wasn’t running.
He wasn’t hiding.
He simply stood there.
Then he raised one hand.
And pointed directly at Sheree’s window.
Her phone vibrated in her pocket.
She pulled it out with shaking fingers.
There was a new message.
No name.
No number.
Just six words:
You should have taken the money.
