Chapter 3 - THE POISONED GLASS WAS MEANT TO MAKE GRACE LOOK GUILTY
Grace did not go home until four in the morning.
Dominic offered a car.
She refused.
Then discovered the police still had her handbag while finishing evidence documentation.
Dominic offered again.
This time Grace accepted because pride became less useful when the city was cold and her mother was waiting.
Not Dominic’s limousine.
A plain black sedan.
No armed man sitting beside her.
Just a driver.
That distinction mattered.
Grace reached her apartment at 4:37.
Her mother was awake on the couch.
Of course.
Celia wore a knitted blue cap over the hair treatment had taken.
She looked smaller every week.
Grace hated noticing.
“You said work.”
Celia whispered.
Grace set down her coat.
“It got complicated.”
“Police complicated?”
Grace stopped.
“How do you know?”
“The local news.”
Perfect.
A phone on the coffee table displayed a headline.
DELUCA CHARITY GALA INTERRUPTED BY MEDICAL EMERGENCY, ALTERCATION
No names yet.
Thank God.
Grace sat beside her mother and told the edited version.
Not mafia.
Not poison at first.
She started with a woman trying to hit an older woman.
Celia stared.
“And you grabbed her?”
“Yes.”
“Grace.”
“I know.”
“I raised you better.”
Grace blinked.
“Excuse me?”
“You should have accidentally spilled the champagne on her dress first.”
Grace laughed.
A real laugh.
Then cried.
Celia held her.
Eventually Grace told her about the tablet.
The video.
Todd.
The missing supervisor.
Not every detail.
Enough.
Her mother looked frightened.
“Quit.”
Grace nodded.
“I probably don’t have a job anyway.”
“Good.”
“We can figure out money.”
Grace looked around the apartment.
Rent due in nine days.
Hospital bill folded in her apron.
Medication appeal denied.
“Sure.”
Celia’s expression sharpened.
“Don’t look at me like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like I’m an invoice.”
Grace closed her eyes.
“I don’t.”
“You do when you’re scared.”
The truth hurt.
“I’m sorry.”
“Stop apologizing.”
Apparently everyone in Grace’s life had developed an opinion about apologies.
They slept until ten.
At ten-thirty, someone knocked.
Grace looked through the peephole.
Dominic DeLuca stood in the hallway.
She nearly dropped the coffee in her hand.
Celia called from the couch:
“Who is it?”
“Nobody.”
Dominic heard.
His eyebrow lifted.
Grace opened the door halfway.
“What are you doing here?”
“Checking whether you’re safe.”
“I am.”
He looked at the door chain.
Then at the cracked hallway window near the stairwell.
Grace knew exactly what he was thinking.
“No.”
“I haven’t said anything.”
“You’re about to say my apartment isn’t secure.”
“It isn’t.”
“I survived before yesterday.”
“Yesterday nobody connected your face to an attempted poisoning.”
Grace went still.
“What?”
Dominic held up his phone.
A photo from the gala.
Grace standing between Victoria and Margaret.
Her name already circulating online.
MYSTERY WAITRESS IN DELUCA DRAMA
Some posts called her a hero.
Others accused her of poisoning Margaret after creating a distraction.
There it was.
Exactly what she feared.
Dominic said:
“Thomas Vane hasn’t been found.”
“Todd Brennan hasn’t either.”
“Until they are, whoever arranged this may think you can identify them.”
“I can’t identify Vane.”
“You saw Brennan hand you the glass.”
“I already told police.”
“Yes.”
“That does not mean everyone involved knows what you saw.”
Grace tightened her grip on the door.
“What do you want?”
“Temporary hotel.”
“No.”
“Independent security.”
“No.”
“Grace.”
“Mr. DeLuca.”
He stopped.
Celia shouted:
“Let the man in. The neighbors are listening.”
Grace closed her eyes.
Dominic almost smiled.
She removed the chain.
He entered.
The billionaire mafia boss looked profoundly out of place beside a secondhand lamp and a laundry basket.
Celia studied him.
“So you’re Dominic.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Your mother okay?”
His expression softened immediately.
“Improving.”
“Good.”
She pointed to a chair.
“Sit.”
Dominic sat.
Grace stared.
Apparently Celia Miller ranked above organized crime in the household hierarchy.
Dominic explained the threat carefully.
He did not say:
You’re moving.
He said:
“We can arrange a hotel under your name with a security firm that does not report to me, if that makes you more comfortable.”
Grace noticed.
Choice.
“Who pays?”
“I do.”
“No.”
“Then call it witness expense.”
“I’m not your witness.”
“You are a witness to the assault and the service chain.”
“That’s police business.”
“Yes.”
He paused.
“And I owe you.”
Grace’s face hardened.
“For helping your mother?”
“Yes.”
“No.”
“What?”
“I didn’t do it for money.”
“I know.”
“Then don’t turn it into a transaction now.”
Dominic became quiet.
Celia looked between them as though watching tennis.
Finally he said:
“Fair.”
Grace was surprised.
“Fair?”
“I can pay the hotel directly because increased risk comes from my event.”
“You can accept or decline.”
“If you decline, Marco can give you a list of independent firms you can hire yourself.”
Better.
Grace looked toward her mother.
Celia said:
“I like the hotel.”
Traitor.
Grace agreed to two nights.
No mansion.
No DeLuca property.
No hidden debt.
Dominic stood to leave.
Then Celia coughed.
Not ordinary.
Deep.
Painful.
Grace immediately moved toward her.
“You okay?”
Celia waved her off.
“Fine.”
Dominic saw the hospital bracelet on the table.
Grace saw him see it.
No.
She stepped between his gaze and the bill.
“Don’t.”
He stopped.
“I wasn’t—”
“Yes, you were.”
His mouth closed.
Celia looked annoyed.
“Grace.”
“No.”
Grace turned back to Dominic.
“My mother’s treatment is not part of what happened yesterday.”
“Understood.”
He left.
Grace hated how relieved she felt that he listened.
That afternoon, Detective Ruiz called.
Todd Brennan had been found.
Alive.
At a motel outside Joliet.
He had tried paying cash.
The motel clerk recognized his photograph after police circulated it internally.
Todd requested an attorney before answering questions.
That changed twelve hours later when police showed him footage of Thomas Vane handing him the pill.
Todd’s story arrived through formal channels.
He did not know the drug was dangerous.
Or claimed he didn’t.
Vane told him Margaret DeLuca needed medication discreetly because she was embarrassed about taking pills publicly.
Todd had worked high-end events long enough to see wealthy guests make strange requests.
Vane paid him $500.
“Why not put the pill in yourself?”
Detective Ruiz asked.
Vane told Todd he needed to leave the service corridor before security saw him.
Todd crushed the tablet into the sparkling water.
Then gave the glass to Grace.
“Why Grace?”
Todd hesitated.
Then admitted the second part.
Vane specifically requested:
Give it to the waitress who caused the scene.
Grace sat inside the hotel room reading Ruiz’s summary.
Her stomach turned.
She had been chosen.
Not randomly.
After she grabbed Victoria.
That meant the framing plan came together fast.
Unless—
Grace called Ruiz.
“What if the original plan was somebody else?”
“What?”
“What if Margaret was already supposed to get the pill.”
“And after I stopped Victoria, they just changed who carried it?”
Ruiz became quiet.
“That possibility is being examined.”
The police later determined Vane entered the event two hours before Grace ever touched Victoria.
He had a forged catering credential.
So yes.
The poisoning plan existed first.
Framing Grace came later.
Opportunity.
The gala confrontation gave them a broke temporary waitress publicly connected to Margaret.
Perfect.
Except the pill acted faster than expected.
Margaret collapsed before Grace could disappear into the catering staff.
And Dominic’s security team found the residue.
Todd then panicked and ran.
By evening, police located Thomas Vane’s abandoned car near O’Hare.
Inside were disposable gloves, the forged catering pass, and a burner phone.
No Vane.
But the burner contained three useful texts.
One from an unregistered number:
M will be at Table 4 after 8:30.
Another:
Use water, not champagne. She barely drinks.
And the final message, sent nine minutes after Grace stopped Victoria:
Change delivery. Use the waitress. She already has motive.
Grace read that line twice.
Then a third time.
Somebody at the gala watched what happened in real time.
Somebody who knew the poisoning plan.
Somebody who knew Grace looked vulnerable.
And somebody who had enough authority to change the plan within minutes.
Police traced the burner’s contact through encrypted routing, but metadata revealed one device had connected briefly to the gala hotel’s executive Wi-Fi.
Only donors, senior event staff, and VIP advisers had that password.
Dominic asked his security team for the access list.
Forty-three devices.
Victoria’s phone was one.
Her father’s was another.
So was the phone belonging to Reed? no — wrong story. Need new character.
So was the phone belonging to Leonard Hale, chief financial officer of the DeLuca Family Foundation.
Dominic stared at the name.
May you like
Margaret’s closest financial adviser for nearly twelve years.
And the man who had been sitting only fifteen feet from her when she collapsed.
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