Chapter 9 - JUSTICE AT DAWNThe sun was just beginning to burn through the gray morning fog over the Queensboro Bridge when I pulled up outside the small, unassuming diner on 45th Street.
The sign above the door read: VASQUEZ FAMILY DINER — CLOSED.
Through the front glass window, I could see a lone figure sitting at one of the corner booths, head bowed into his hands, surrounded by empty chairs and silent counters. A grieving father who didn't yet know that the monster who took his daughter was already facing a lifetime behind bars, and that the debt hanging over his head had just vanished into thin air.
I didn't go inside. It wasn't my place to offer comfort. Some tragedies are too large for words, and some apologies are an insult to the dead.
Instead, I reached into my coat pocket and pulled out a plain, sealed envelope. Inside was a cashier's check covering the forty-two thousand dollars of back payments, stamped PAID IN FULL — BALANCE ZERO, along with an additional hundred thousand dollars in bearer bonds to help him pack up, leave Queens, and start over somewhere far away where the shadows of the syndicate couldn't reach him.
I walked up to the front glass door, tucked the envelope securely under the steel handle so it wouldn't blow away in the morning breeze, and stepped back.
May you like
Bruno walked up beside me, sitting down neatly on the pavement, his amber eyes fixed on the door. For the first time in three days, the heavy, sorrowful slump in the dog's shoulders was gone. He looked alert, calm, and at peace.
"Come on, old friend," I whispered, turning back toward the Maybach. "Let's go home."
