“He broke his ‘secret promise’ to me twenty years ago—but I refused to let his son spend a lifetime waiting by the window.”
“…hide me. He said you were the only one who wouldn’t sell me out.” I froze. The boy standing before …
“Who is ‘he’?” I asked, my voice dangerously calm despite the roaring in my ears.
“My dad,” the boy choked out, clutching the metallic briefcase to his chest like a shield. “Julian. He told me to find you. He said you owed him.”
Owed him. A bitter laugh scraped the back of my throat. I owed him nothing but two decades of therapy and a hardened heart. But looking at this kid—shivering, soaked to the bone, and terrified—I didn’t see the arrogant man who had blocked his fourteen-year-old sibling. I just saw a boy who was exactly the age I was when my world was shattered.
I quickly ushered him into my private office, locking the heavy mahogany door behind us and drawing the blinds.
“Sit,” I instructed, handing him a towel from my private bathroom. “What’s your name?”
“Leo,” he mumbled, wiping the rain from his face.
“Okay, Leo. Who is looking for you? And what is in the briefcase?”
Before Leo could answer, my private cell phone buzzed on the desk. It was an unknown, encrypted number. A cold sense of dread settled in my stomach. I pressed answer and put it on speaker.
“Did he make it?” a voice demanded.
The sound of that voice—older, strained, but unmistakably Julian’s—made the air leave my lungs.
“He’s here,” I said coldly.
Julian let out a ragged sigh of relief. “Thank God. Listen to me carefully. The people I was in business with… they aren’t the forgiving type. The money is gone. Everything is gone. That briefcase has the only leverage I have left to keep myself out of a shallow grave. Keep Leo hidden. Don’t call the police. I’ll come back for him once I’ve made things right.”