Chapter 4 - THE RED RECIPE BOOK
“One of my security badges?”
I stared at Emma.
She nodded carefully, wincing as she moved.
“The crest was silver. There was a narrow gold stripe underneath it.”
Marco, standing behind me, suddenly straightened.
“Our guards don't wear gold stripes.”
I turned.
“What?”
“Security badges have black borders. Foundation employees and authorized contractors use gold.”
Emma closed her eyes.
“That's what I saw.”
The discovery changed the investigation immediately.
The man who attacked her wasn't necessarily one of my guards.
But he possessed identification that could get him through the mansion's service entrance without attracting attention.
“Find every foundation badge issued in the last six months,” I told Marco.
Then I turned back to Emma.
“Did he say anything about the badge?”
She hesitated.
“He noticed me looking at it.”
“And?”
“He covered it with his coat. Then he said, 'You should have stayed out of this, Emma.'”
My blood went cold.
They hadn't merely recognized my family crest.
They knew her name.
They had chosen her specifically.
By nine the following morning, Ben arrived carrying a battered red recipe book.
Its cloth cover was faded, and a yellow ribbon marked a page near the middle.
Emma immediately reached for it.
“That's Mom's.”
Ben nodded.
“Found it behind the cereal boxes.”
I pulled up a chair while Lucia stood quietly beside the window.
Things between my sister and me remained strained.
She had apologized for photographing Helen without permission, but Emma hadn't been ready to discuss it.
I couldn't blame her.
Ben placed the book on Emma's blanket.
“Mom started writing in this when we were little,” he explained. “There's enough food in here to feed half of New York.”
Emma managed a small smile.
“Her meatloaf recipe is terrible.”
“Don't tell her that.”
For a moment, they sounded like any brother and sister arguing over their mother's cooking.
Then Emma opened the book.
The smile disappeared.
“That's strange.”
“What?” I asked.
She pointed to a handwritten recipe for Sunday pot roast.
Beside the ingredients were several numbers.
They weren't measurements.
They were dates.
October 14.
October 18.
November 2.
And beside each date was an amount written in careful, faded handwriting.
$28,000.
$41,500.
$62,000.
Ben frowned.
“That's not grocery money.”
“No,” I said.
Emma turned another page.
More numbers.
More dates.
Beside a recipe for apple pie was a name.
ANNA K.
I recognized it immediately.
Anna Kolov.
Viktor Kolov's younger sister.
She had been twenty-six when she died in the Pier Nine fire.
I remembered her funeral because my father had forbidden anyone from our family to attend.
“That's Kolov's sister,” I said.
Emma looked at me.
“Why would my mother write her name in a cookbook?”
I examined the next page.
Four names appeared in the margins.
Four names belonging to the people who died in the warehouse.
Beside each was a different amount.
I finally understood one thing.
Helen hadn't been recording recipes.
She had been tracking payments.
Ben pushed his wheelchair closer.
“Those numbers aren't random.”
He studied the entries.
“Look at the dates. They're all after the fire.”
I checked.
He was right.
The first entry appeared four days after the warehouse burned.
“These could be compensation payments,” I said.
Emma looked up.
“To the families?”
“Possibly.”
“Then why hide them?”
That was the question.
My father's companies had publicly contributed to the victims' families.
At least, that was what I remembered.
But according to Helen's handwriting, several payments were made privately.
And some had been marked with an X.
Ben pointed at one.
“What does that mean?”
“I don't know.”
He turned the book toward me.
“Four families. Four payments. Three marked received. One crossed out.”
Anna Kolov's name was the one crossed out.
Suddenly, the hatred between my father and Kolov seemed less straightforward than I'd believed.
Perhaps Viktor had spent eighteen years believing his sister's family had been denied compensation deliberately.
Or perhaps somebody had stolen money meant for the dead.
I looked at Lucia.
“Did Samuel ever mention Pier Nine?”
She shook her head.
“Not directly.”
“Think.”
She hesitated.
“Last month, he asked whether I would approve using part of the foundation's emergency reserve for a waterfront redevelopment project.”
My attention sharpened.
“What project?”
“He said it would create housing and medical services for low-income families.”
“Where?”
Lucia looked miserable.
“Near the old shipping district.”
“Pier Nine?”
She nodded.
I stood.
“Did you authorize it?”
“Not yet. Samuel said we could discuss it after the hospital fundraiser.”
For the first time, I understood why old records might suddenly become dangerous.
Pier Nine had been abandoned for eighteen years.
Now somebody wanted to redevelop it.
And Helen Carter possessed records connected to the property.
Marco entered carrying a folder.
“I checked the badge records.”
He placed a photograph on Emma's bed.
A gold-striped identification card.
The photograph showed a broad-shouldered man in his thirties with closely cropped hair.
His name was Caleb Mercer.
“Recognize him?” Marco asked.
Emma's breathing changed.
“Yes.”
She stared at the photograph.
“That's the one who kept checking his watch.”
“Are you certain?”
“He held my arms while the other man hit me.”
Her voice shook.
“I remember his face.”
Ben reached for her hand.
Marco closed the folder.
“Mercer was hired as a temporary foundation courier three weeks ago. His authorization was processed through Samuel Bell's office.”
“Is he still employed?” I asked.
“According to payroll, yes. But nobody's seen him since last night.”
“Who recommended him?”
Marco hesitated.
“That's where it gets interesting.”
He handed me another page.
The recommendation bore Lucia's name.
She went pale.
“I've never met that man.”
I believed her.
But the paperwork was authentic enough to have passed our internal checks.
Someone had been using my sister's identity to create a network of trusted access.
And Emma had paid for it with her blood.
“Freeze the foundation's outside payments,” I told Marco. “Preserve every record. Nobody destroys anything.”
Lucia looked at me.
“What about patients depending on those funds?”
I turned.
“Emergency care continues through a separate verified account. But no more blind signatures.”
She lowered her eyes.
For once, she didn't argue.
That afternoon, Emma asked me to bring the recipe book back.
The doctor had warned her not to exert herself, but she seemed determined.
“There was something else inside,” she said.
“What?”
“A picture.”
Ben frowned.
“I didn't see one.”
“Mom kept it between the Christmas cookie pages.”
We turned carefully through the book.
Near the back, tucked between two pages stuck together by age, was a folded sheet of construction paper.
Emma unfolded it.
A child's drawing.
Blue water.
A gray warehouse.
A yellow door.
Orange flames rising behind three square windows.
Four stick figures stood inside.
One smaller figure stood outside beside a woman in a green coat.
And near the yellow door was a tall man holding something black.
A chain.
My hands went cold.
“Emma, who drew this?”
She stared at the paper.
“I did.”
“How old were you?”
“Eleven.”
“Why did you draw a burning warehouse?”
She rubbed her forehead.
“I don't remember.”
Ben looked confused.
“Emma, you were there?”
She shook her head.
“Mom always said we stayed home that night.”
But her voice lacked conviction.
I took the drawing closer to the window.
The tall man wore a black coat.
On his wrist was a large yellow circle with two black lines.
A watch.
I knew that watch.
My father's gold watch had been on my wrist the night of the Pier Nine fire.
He had given it to me that afternoon.
I remembered standing outside the burning building.
I remembered smoke.
Screaming.
A chain across a service door.
Then I remembered a little girl crying beside an ambulance.
Emma watched my face.
Slowly, the color drained from hers.
“Dominic?”
I couldn't answer.
She pointed to the man beside the yellow door.
May you like
Her voice became a whisper.
“That man in my drawing... I think it's you.”
