Chapter 2 - From Apron to Ledger
Maxim didn't offer her a drink, and Bee wouldn't have taken it anyway. She remained standing, her shadow stretching across the room, refusing to give him the satisfaction of seeing her uncomfortable in a space built for kings.
"I don't play games with old women, Bee," Maxim said, his voice dropping into a serious, practical tone that surprised her. "Your mother's facility was bought out by a shell company owned by the Moretti family. They are my chief rivals on the East Side. They didn't buy that nursing home for the real estate. They bought it because they found out I was tracking their financial leaks, and they wanted a knife to hold against my throat."
"And what does that have to do with me?" Bee asked, her brow furrowing. "I'm a waitress. I flip eggs and scrub grease. If you want a hitman, you've got a house full of doors with necks outside."
Maxim leaned back, tapping his fingers against the armrest of his leather chair. "My men know how to shoot, Bee. They know how to break bones and burn warehouses. But they don't know how to look at a crowded room and see who’s lying. They don't know how to look at a ledger and see where a single dollar went missing because they're too busy looking for a target."
He slid an encrypted digital tablet across the desk toward her. The screen was filled with thousands of rows of numbers, shipping manifests, and shell company codes.
"Four nights ago in that diner," Maxim continued, his eyes boring into hers, "my underboss, a man I’ve trusted for ten years, deliberately arranged for me to be isolated at that specific table. The bodyguard who bumped you? He didn't do it by accident. He was trying to start a distraction so a sniper across the street could get a clean angle through the neon sign."
Bee felt a chill trace down her spine. She remembered the broken-nosed bodyguard’s smirk. She remembered the way he had stepped into her path.
"But you didn't react like a victim," Maxim said, a strange note of respect entering his voice. "You didn't scream. You didn't run. You stood in the line of fire, blocked the window with your body without even knowing it, and threatened to end a man who holds the keys to this city. You broke their rhythm. The sniper never took the shot because you confused them."
Bee let out a rough laugh, shaking her head. "So I'm your lucky charm? That’s why I’m here?"
"No," Maxim said, standing up and walking around the desk until he was standing just inches from her. The scent of his expensive cologne mixed with the faint, metallic tang of the city air. "You're here because you see everything. You told me exactly how long you'd been on your feet, exactly what your body felt like, and exactly who bumped you within three seconds of it happening. You have a mind that catalogs detail under extreme pressure. I need an auditor who cannot be bought, cannot be scared, and completely disappears into the background."
He pointed to the tablet. "The Morettis have a mole inside my inner circle. They are siphoning millions from our shipping docks, freezing our liquid assets, and trying to force a vote of no confidence among the five families. If they succeed, my family is liquidated. And your mother’s facility goes dark."
Bee looked at the numbers on the screen. To anyone else, it was an encrypted mess. But to a woman who had spent fifteen years tracking split checks, calculating tip percentages in her head while dealing with screaming cooks, and managing a household budget on less than twenty thousand a year, numbers were just stories waiting to be told.
"If I do this," Bee said, her voice dropping low, "my mother stays in that room. No transfers. No state lists. And she gets the private corner room with the view of the garden."
Maxim extended his hand. His skin was smooth, but his grip was iron. "Deal."
May you like
Bee didn't shake his hand. Instead, she pulled a cheap blue ballpoint pen from her purse, dragged a chair over to the desk, and sat down with a heavy sigh.
"Move your scotch, Rosetti," she muttered, pulling the digital tablet into her lap. "Let's see who's been stealing your lunch money."
