Chapter 10
Carlo hit the hangar floor first.
Vanessa screamed.
Luca and Matteo were halfway up the stairs.
Victor stood at the railing.
Blood on his shirt.
Carlo didn't move.
Vanessa dropped beside him when an agent cut her restraints.
"Dad!"
Naomi shouted for medics.
Victor raised his gun toward Luca.
Matteo fired first.
The bullet hit Victor's shoulder.
He spun.
Luca tackled him.
They crashed against the metal railing.
Victor was older.
But strong.
Desperate.
He drove a knee into Luca's ribs.
Matteo reached them.
Victor pulled a knife.
I screamed.
Luca caught his wrist.
The blade stopped inches from his throat.
Matteo punched Victor.
Once.
Twice.
The knife dropped.
Federal agents surrounded them.
"Hands!"
Victor laughed.
Even with blood running down his arm.
"You think arresting me ends this?"
Naomi forced him to the floor.
"No."
She cuffed him.
"But it's a pleasant beginning."
Below, medics worked on Carlo.
Pulse.
Weak.
Alive.
Vanessa sobbed beside him.
Adrian was treated for the gunshot wound.
Again.
The man had been shot twice in one night and still looked more offended than dead.
Gabriel was alive too.
Barely.
Agents loaded him onto a stretcher.
As they passed me, his eyes opened.
"Your mother."
I leaned closer.
"What about her?"
Naomi pulled me back.
"Don't."
But Gabriel whispered:
"Ask Luca."
Then they carried him away.
I turned.
Luca stood at the base of the stairs.
He had heard.
His face told me that.
"What did he mean?"
Luca said nothing.
That was answer enough.
My heart began pounding.
"You know my mother?"
He looked toward Daniel.
"Give us a minute."
Everyone moved away.
I folded my arms.
"My mother was Rosa Torres."
"I know."
"How?"
Luca rubbed blood from his lip.
"She worked for my mother."
I stared.
"No."
"Before you were born."
"My mother was a nurse."
"Later."
"What did she do here?"
"Accounting."
I laughed because the alternative was screaming.
"Of course."
Another secret ledger.
Another hidden employee.
"Why didn't you tell me?"
"I didn't know you were her daughter until tonight."
"How did you find out?"
He looked at the chip in my hand.
"When Gabriel said Elena chose you."
"That doesn't explain anything."
"No."
He glanced toward Adrian.
"My mother once told me Rosa was the only person she trusted outside the family."
My throat tightened.
My mother had died when I was nineteen.
She never mentioned the Morettis.
Not once.
I remembered old photographs.
Boxes she never opened.
A silver necklace she wore every day.
A tiny moon.
My stomach dropped.
"The moon."
Luca frowned.
"What?"
"My mother wore a silver moon necklace."
His face changed.
"My mother gave those to three people."
"Who?"
"Mrs. Carter."
"Sophia?"
"Yes."
"And my mother."
He nodded.
Everything shifted.
Elena hadn't chosen me.
Not directly.
She had chosen Rosa.
Mrs. Carter had recognized my name when I applied for the job.
Maybe that was why I was hired so quickly.
Maybe none of this was accidental.
We returned to the estate after sunrise.
Federal agents occupied half the house.
Victor was in custody.
Gabriel under guard at the hospital.
Domenico still missing.
That mattered.
A lot.
Carlo survived surgery.
Vanessa remained under arrest pending charges.
She would face consequences for assaulting me, fraud, conspiracy, and whatever else investigators proved.
She didn't ask Luca to forgive her.
Maybe she finally understood that forgiveness wasn't a legal strategy.
Adrian survived too.
He asked to see his sons.
Matteo refused.
Luca waited six hours.
Then entered the hospital room alone.
I wasn't there.
Later, he told me what happened.
Adrian confessed.
Not everything.
But enough.
He had helped Victor build the network.
He had approved illegal surveillance.
Bribes.
Corporate sabotage.
He had planned Matteo's disappearance.
He had allowed Luca's identity to be used as cover.
He claimed he never intended Matteo to die.
Luca believed that part.
He did not forgive the rest.
Adrian agreed to cooperate with federal investigators.
No immunity.
No private deal.
That was Luca's condition for helping him stay alive.
Matteo agreed to testify too.
Carlo would testify against Domenico.
Sophia turned over Elena's audit files.
Priya decoded the chip.
And that was where the final twist waited.
The chip did not contain the archive.
It contained instructions.
A single page.
Written by Elena.
IF YOU ARE READING THIS, THE WRONG PEOPLE ARE STILL LOOKING IN THE WRONG PLACE.
Below that:
ROSA KNOWS.
My mother.
I stared at the words on Priya's screen.
"She's dead."
Luca stood beside me.
"Did she leave anything?"
"Boxes."
"Where?"
"Storage unit."
We drove there the same afternoon.
A small facility outside the city.
Unit 214.
I hadn't opened it since my mother's funeral.
Inside were clothes.
Books.
Old furniture.
A metal filing cabinet.
And a blue suitcase.
I knew the suitcase.
My mother had carried it when we moved apartments when I was ten.
I opened it.
Photographs.
Elena and Rosa.
Together.
Laughing in a kitchen.
Adrian in the background.
Young Luca.
Young Matteo.
My mother had known them all.
Then I found a letter.
Mia.
My name.
I sat on the floor.
Luca stayed several feet away.
I opened it.
My dearest Mia,
If you ever find this, I am sorry that my silence became your burden.
Tears blurred the page.
I continued.
Years before you were born, I worked for Elena Moretti. I helped her uncover payments hidden inside the family companies.
I looked at Luca.
He said nothing.
Your father wanted me to stop.
I froze.
My father?
I barely remembered him.
He left when I was five.
Or that's what my mother told me.
The letter continued.
Your father was not the man I told you he was.
My hand shook.
His name was Gabriel Voss.
I stopped breathing.
"No."
Luca crouched in front of me.
"Mia."
"No."
I stood too fast.
The room tilted.
"Gabriel is my father?"
Luca looked stunned too.
"I didn't know."
I kept reading.
Gabriel and I were young. I believed he worked in security. By the time I learned what he had become, I was pregnant.
My chest hurt.
I had spent my life believing my father was a mechanic named Luis Torres who abandoned us.
A lie.
Another ghost.
I read.
Elena helped me leave him. She gave me money, a new address, and the Torres surname from my grandmother's family.
I looked at Luca.
"My mother hid me."
"To protect you."
The final lines were worse.
Gabriel eventually learned that I had copied part of his archive. I told him I destroyed it.
I did not.
The archive is yours now.
Do not give it to a Moretti.
Luca saw the sentence.
His face changed.
I kept reading.
Not because they are all bad.
Because power makes good people explain bad choices.
My mother had known.
She had seen this family clearly.
At the bottom was a number.
A bank box.
Not Moretti.
Not Bellini.
Mine.
The next morning, Naomi Reed accompanied me to the bank.
Luca did not.
I asked him not to.
He respected that.
Inside the box was a hard drive.
Three notebooks.
And one photograph.
Gabriel holding me as a baby.
He looked happy.
That hurt more than if he'd looked evil.
Naomi took the drive into federal evidence.
The files opened cases across four states.
Judges resigned.
Executives were arrested.
Two former police officials were charged.
Accounts were frozen.
Domenico was found eleven days later in Montreal.
He tried to flee on a private aircraft.
He did not make it past the gate.
Victor was indicted.
Gabriel survived and was charged too.
Adrian entered a cooperation agreement without immunity from prosecution.
Carlo recovered.
Vanessa pleaded not guilty at first.
Then changed her plea months later after Carlo testified.
She sent me one letter.
I never opened it.
Matteo stayed in Chicago.
Not because he trusted his family.
Because he wanted to learn who they were without lies between them.
He and Luca fought constantly.
Then had breakfast together the next morning.
Brothers.
Messy.
Angry.
Alive.
Mrs. Carter retired.
For three weeks.
Then returned because, according to her, "none of you know how to run a house."
She was right.
Sophia became one of the government's key witnesses.
Priya kept billing Luca at a rate that made even him complain.
And me?
I quit.
For exactly one day.
Luca found me in the kitchen the next morning.
I was making coffee.
He leaned against the doorway.
"I thought you resigned."
"I did."
"Then why are you here?"
"Mrs. Carter called."
"Of course she did."
I poured coffee.
"My mother said not to give the archive to a Moretti."
"You didn't."
"No."
"Good."
He looked at my shoulder.
The cut had healed.
A thin scar remained.
"Does it hurt?"
"Not anymore."
Silence.
Then he said:
"I owe you more than an apology."
"You don't owe me anything."
"I do."
"For what Vanessa did?"
"For not seeing what was happening sooner."
I looked at him.
"You noticed the pantry door."
His mouth almost smiled.
"It was hard not to. It was missing."
I laughed.
For the first time in weeks, the sound felt normal.
Then his expression changed.
"Mia."
"Yes?"
"I knew your mother."
I stared.
"You said you only knew she worked here."
"I remembered something after we found the letter."
"What?"
"When I was sixteen, I overheard Mom and Rosa arguing in the study."
My stomach tightened.
"About what?"
"You."
"Me?"
"Rosa said she was leaving Chicago because Gabriel had found out she had a daughter."
I went still.
Luca continued.
"My mother told her she would protect both of you."
He looked down.
"I didn't know who the daughter was."
I swallowed.
"What else?"
"Rosa said something I've remembered for years."
"What?"
He looked at me.
"She said, 'If Mia ever comes back here, don't let this family turn her into collateral.'"
The kitchen became silent.
My mother had imagined this.
Feared it.
Maybe predicted it.
I folded my arms.
"How am I doing?"
"At avoiding becoming collateral?"
"Yes."
Luca considered.
"Terribly."
I laughed again.
Then the front door opened.
Matteo entered carrying a newspaper.
"You're both going to want to see this."
He dropped it on the counter.
Headline:
MORETTI NETWORK INVESTIGATION EXPANDS OVERSEAS
Below it was a smaller story.
Authorities were searching for one unidentified financier connected to Victor Halden's network.
Code name:
ORPHEUS.
Luca looked at Matteo.
"Who is Orpheus?"
Matteo's face was serious.
"I thought it was Victor."
"It isn't?"
"No."
He opened one of Elena's decoded files.
A payment record appeared.
ORPHEUS — 40M — CONTINUITY FUND.
Date:
Three days after Victor's arrest.
My stomach dropped.
"Someone is still operating the network."
Matteo nodded.
Luca looked at me.
Then at the newspaper.
I already knew what he was going to say.
"No."
He frowned.
"I didn't say anything."
"You were going to tell me to stay out of it."
"I was."
"Don't."
Matteo grinned.
"She's learning."
Luca looked tired.
"Apparently nobody in this house listens."
Mrs. Carter called from the hallway.
"I do."
Luca turned.
"Really?"
"No."
We all laughed.
It lasted only a second.
Then Daniel entered.
His expression killed it.
"Boss."
Luca straightened.
"What?"
"We received a package."
"From who?"
"No sender."
Daniel placed a small black box on the counter.
Inside was a gold ring.
Black stone.
Letter M.
The same ring Adrian had worn the night everything began.
Under it was a note.
Four words.
YOUR FATHER LIED AGAIN.
Luca stared at it.
Matteo's smile disappeared.
I felt cold.
Daniel handed Luca a second piece of paper.
A photograph.
Taken that morning.
Adrian leaving the federal medical facility.
Not with agents.
With a woman.
The woman's face was partly turned.
But Luca recognized her.
His face went white.
"Who is she?" I asked.
He didn't answer.
Matteo took the photograph.
Then he went pale too.
"No."
I looked between them.
"Who is she?"
Luca finally spoke.
His voice was barely audible.
"Our mother."
I stared at him.
"Elena?"
He nodded.
"But she's dead."
Nobody moved.
Then Matteo turned the photograph over.
A message was written on the back.
In Elena Moretti's handwriting.
THIS TIME, TRUST MIA.
And beneath it:
May you like
FIND ORPHEUS BEFORE HE FINDS YOU.
THE END — FOR NOW
