Chapter 6 - LETTERS FOR THE LIVING
Luca did not open his father's letter immediately.
It was evidence, the detective explained, and even though his name was written across the front, he agreed that it should be photographed and inventoried first. I watched him struggle with that instruction over a video call from Rebecca's office. Everything about his upbringing had told him that the Moretti name entitled him to immediate access. For once, he let someone else decide the order.
The cabinet's six envelopes were more important than any confession. They contained copies of emergency-assistance applications, settlement agreements and receipts signed by families who had lived at Blue Door House. Three signatures had obvious discrepancies when compared with earlier documents. Two families had supposedly received money after leaving the state. One receipt bore Tomas Calder's name on a date after his death.
Rebecca arranged for the documents to be reviewed by independent forensic accountants. Nobody announced a total stolen amount. Nobody declared the case solved. The questions were becoming more precise, and I learned that precision was often more useful than outrage.
Lucia asked me to visit her at the temporary apartment she was using while the mansion remained a crime scene. She had chosen a small accessible place near the lake, with wide doorways, windows that opened and a kitchen table big enough for the ledger. Luca had offered to hire round-the-clock caregivers, but she had chosen her own schedule and her own aides after discussing safety with her doctors.
"It's the first quiet place I've lived in years," she told me.
"You're allowed to enjoy that," I said.
"I intend to. But I'd enjoy it more if people would stop telling me when I should sleep."
She had asked Rebecca to bring a copy of the trust documents. Beside them lay a stack of yellow note cards listing residents and former employees she wanted contacted through appropriate channels. She asked whether I would help her draft an invitation to a meeting.
"Not every person will want to revisit the fire," I warned.
"Then we will respect that. The invitation should make clear that attendance is voluntary."
We worked for an hour. She dictated, I typed slowly with my good hand, and she corrected every phrase that made the trust sound like charity bestowed by a generous family rather than assistance workers had a right to receive.
"Don't say we are giving back," she instructed. "Say we are checking what was owed."
I smiled. "Yes, Mrs. Moretti."
"Lucia, please. After everything you've seen, Mrs. Moretti sounds like a costume."
Then her expression softened. "You know, my husband never liked the name Blue Door House. He said it sounded small. He wanted something grand, with our surname in stone above the entrance."
"Why did you keep the blue door?"
"Because when someone knocks in the middle of the night, the most important thing isn't whose name is on the building. It's whether the door opens."
I looked at the bruise fading along my wrist. In the mansion, doors had been mechanisms of obedience: rooms locked, passages concealed, a service gate closed too late. The idea of a door that opened for the frightened felt almost radical.
Our work was interrupted by a call from Detective Morgan. She wanted to speak with Lucia alone about her abduction. I moved to the kitchen and made tea while the detective asked questions. Lucia gave dates, descriptions and exact words, refusing to let anyone paraphrase her answers before she approved them.
When the call ended, she sat quietly for a moment. "They found the man who photographed me. He says Vincent Bellini paid him to create proof that I was alive and unharmed while Vanessa negotiated for the books."
"Does that make you feel safer?"
"A little. But I won't mistake an arrest for an ending."
That afternoon Luca came to the apartment. His face was drawn, and I knew before he spoke that he'd read the letter.
"May I sit?" he asked his mother.
She gestured to the chair opposite her. "Always. But you look as though you're about to confess a murder."
He set down a copy of the handwritten page. "Father wrote that he gave me the statement because I was his son and he knew I wouldn't question him. He said the fire exposed a safety failure he had ignored, and he let the report blame an electrical fault rather than the locked rear exit."
Lucia closed her eyes. "I suspected he lied. I never knew he'd admitted it in writing."
"He wrote the letter years afterward," Luca continued. "He claimed he'd set aside enough money to compensate the families and that Vincent would handle it."
"He didn't ask the families what compensation they needed," Lucia said. "He decided a number would quiet his conscience."
Luca nodded. "There's something worse. He wrote that if the payments failed, I should repair the harm with my own money before worrying about his reputation."
"That sounds like him," Lucia said. "He could recognize wrongdoing without ever giving up control."
I watched her look at the son she'd raised. Her anger and tenderness occupied the same room. It was the first time I'd understood how difficult loving somebody could be when you refused to excuse what they had done.
Luca turned to me. "I want to establish a fund for the affected families immediately. Independent management, no Moretti staff deciding who qualifies."
"You should ask the families what they want first," I said.
"I thought that's what the fund would do."
"Maybe some want money. Some might want records corrected. Some might want the names of people who threatened them. If you decide the answer before they speak, you repeat the pattern."
He paused, then nodded. "You're right."
Lucia let out an amused breath. "She's going to be very inconvenient for you, Luca."
"I hope so," he said.
I looked away, suddenly conscious of the warmth in his voice. It frightened me more than it should have. A wealthy man might praise a housemaid for honesty and still expect her to be available whenever he needed it. I would not let admiration become another set of invisible duties.
Later Rebecca called us with a development. Vincent Bellini's firm had sent a public statement denying wrongdoing. It accused Lucia of being manipulated by a disgruntled employee and described the assault allegations as a domestic misunderstanding. An anonymous account had posted a photograph of me entering the police station, claiming I was trying to extort the Morettis.
Daniel called seconds after I saw it. "Someone posted our apartment building. Sophie, they found us."
My mouth went dry. I told him to stay inside and call the police if anyone approached. Rebecca put us in touch with a lawyer who handled harassment and privacy issues, while Detective Morgan documented the post and requested the platform preserve its source information.
Luca offered to move Daniel and me to one of his properties. I refused. I didn't want my safety dependent on his hospitality, however sincere he was.
"Then choose somewhere yourself," he said. "My legal team can help you apply for emergency assistance without controlling where you go."
I considered the offer, then asked that any financial assistance come through a documented victim-support arrangement that would not require me to remain employed by him. He agreed without argument.
The next morning a package arrived at Rebecca's office, addressed to me. There was no return name. Inside was a photocopy of a blue-painted door and a single sentence in careful handwriting: ASK LUCA WHY HE RECEIVED A PAYMENT THE WEEK AFTER THE FIRE.
Beneath it was a bank reference number and an amount.
Two hundred and fifty thousand dollars.
I stared at the paper until the figures stopped looking real. Luca had just admitted signing a false statement. Now somebody wanted me to believe he'd been paid for it.
I sent the document to Morgan and asked Rebecca not to tell Luca until the investigators verified it.
For the first time, I was afraid that the truth might demand a choice between the people I cared about and the evidence I had promised to follow.
That night I sat with Daniel at our kitchen table and showed him the anonymous message. He didn't tell me to destroy it or pretend it meant nothing. He asked whether I had sent it to the investigator and whether anybody could trace the number to its source. When I told him I'd done both, he nodded and opened his laptop to finish an assignment. There was extraordinary comfort in the ordinary sound of keys clicking beside me.
"What if the money came from the trust?" I asked.
Daniel looked up. "Then the investigator needs to know. It doesn't matter whether you like the person involved."
"I do like him," I admitted, surprised by how difficult those words were.
May you like
"I figured." He gave me a sad little smile. "Just don't mistake liking him for owing him a better version of the facts."
I watched the light move across his textbooks. Our mother had taught us that affection meant telling the truth, even when it made dinner uncomfortable. I wanted to believe I could still live by that lesson, now that the consequences had become more complicated than either of us could have imagined.
