Page 54 of Fall
“About ten minutes ago.”
A check of the time on the car display console shows that it’s after seven. Her flight was scheduled to land about thirty minutes ago. “I’ll phone her. Sheneeds to hear what happened from me.”
“Okay, boss.”
Throwing the gear into reverse, I turn the SUV and speed off.
Boss.
I'm the interim boss now. It's my first day on the job, and I'm walking into a shitstorm.
I’m failing right out of the gate.
Sinking like a fucking stone.
Falling fast.
As I drive, I keep glancing at my phone, waiting forit to pick up enough charge to make some calls. First to Natalia and Vinny. Then to Nonna Romano.
Natalia has to be okay.
I have to find her.
There’s no other option.
My jaw goes tense as the battery icon comes to life at the center of the phone screen. Once I turn this phone on, there’s going to be a reckoning. I have people to answer to. Nonna Romano in particular.
I press the power button on the side and give it a minute to turn on and update with the messages I missed. And there's a hell of a lot of them, chirping one after the other without end. Half are voice messages from Nonna Romano or my men back at the house. Most of the text messages are from Natalia, but the time showing on them are all from well before she was scheduled to arrive at theairstrip.
And one is from Vinny.
Fuck.
I open the message trail and start the painful task of catching up on the messages I miss. But first, I need to phone the numbers of two people who might very well be dead.
The boss hasn't been gone for a day yet, and the worst possible thing happened.
His daughter is missing, or worse.
My Natalia.
It’s a disaster.
And it’s happening on my fucking watch.
