Chapter 6 - The First Monday
The transition from a faded cotton apron to a tailored charcoal blazer was stranger than Emily had anticipated. On Monday morning, the grand dining room of Bellavere was silent, the white tablecloths covered in protective grey linens while the morning sun filtered through the high glass windows, turning the melting snow outside into a brilliant, blinding silver.
Emily sat at the central host stand—the very stand where Vanessa had stood like a gatekeeper six days ago. In front of her lay a stack of twenty-four applications for the new hosting positions she had posted on the local hospitality boards.
The glass front doors clicked open, and Dominic Moretti walked in. He wasn't wearing his evening tuxedo; instead, he wore a heavy woolen overcoat with a dark silk scarf, his hands tucked into his deep pockets. He looked around the empty room with the quiet satisfaction of a landlord reviewing his property.
"Morning, kid," Moretti said, stepping up to the stand. "Or should I call you Director Parker now?"
"Emily is fine, Mr. Moretti," Emily smiled, closing the folder of applications. "Can I help you with something? The kitchen doesn't open for lunch until noon."
"I ain't here for the food, Emily," Moretti said, leaning his heavy forearms against the wood of the stand. "I’m here to give you a piece of advice. In this city, when a girl from the South Side suddenly gets handed the keys to a kingdom like this, people start talking. They look for the angle. They look for the weakness."
Emily’s smile faded slightly, her posture straightening. "There is no angle, Mr. Moretti. Mr. Vance needed someone to run the room with decency, and I accepted the job."
"Julian is a smart man," Moretti said, his old eyes gleaming with a shrewd, paternal warmth. "But he lives in the clouds, Emily. He thinks because he can move money around on a computer screen that the streets don't matter. But the streets always matter. Vanessa Cole had an arrangement with a few of the local valet companies—they were skimming five dollars off every luxury car that parked in the red zone and splitting it with her under the table."
Emily’s brow furrowed. "The valet registry? I reviewed the ledger this morning; the numbers looked standard."
"Because she kept two books, kid," Moretti said, pulling a small, black leather notebook from his inside pocket and sliding it onto the stand. "My boys took this from her apartment before she finished packing her bags for Indiana. It’s got the names of the drivers, the shift managers, and the local cops who were taking a piece of the pie to look the other way."
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Emily looked at the notebook, her stomach twisting slightly at the depth of the corruption Vanessa had managed to weave into the fabric of the restaurant. "Why are you giving this to me, Mr. Moretti? You could use this to control the valet lines yourself."
"Because I like you, kid," the old boss said, turning to walk back toward the door. "And because Julian Vance’s father once helped my brother get out of a tight spot with the federal port authority back in '88. The Vance family paid their debts. Now I’m paying mine. Clean the house, Emily. Don't leave no dirt under the rugs."
