Chapter 8
Vanessa’s gun did not shake.
Mine would have.
That frightened me more than anything.
Ethan’s eyes found mine.
He made a muffled sound behind the tape.
I took one step forward.
Luca said, “Stop.”
Vanessa smiled.
“Listen to him, Mia. For once.”
I stopped.
Not because she told me to.
Because the muzzle pressed harder against Ethan’s skin.
His face tightened.
“Let him go,” I said.
Vanessa laughed softly.
“You sound brave.”
“I’m not.”
“No?”
“No. I’m terrified.”
That seemed to confuse her.
Good.
I kept talking.
“But you wanted me here.”
“Yes.”
“I’m here.”
Luca’s eyes shifted toward me.
A warning.
I ignored it.
“Let Ethan go.”
Vanessa’s smile faded.
“You still think this is a trade.”
“What is it?”
“A correction.”
“For what?”
“For forgetting your place.”
The old words.
Laundry room words.
Pantry words.
Words designed to shrink me.
They felt different now.
Maybe because Luca was there.
Maybe because Ethan was alive.
Maybe because once someone had already done the worst thing you feared, their threats lost some of their magic.
I looked at her.
“My place seems to be wherever your plans fall apart.”
Ethan made a sound that might have been a laugh.
Vanessa’s eyes flashed.
“There she is.”
Luca said quietly, “Mia, don’t.”
Vanessa looked at him.
“Oh, let her. You like this version, don’t you?”
Luca’s face went still.
“What version?”
“The one that argues. The one that bleeds and still looks at you like you hung the moon.”
Heat rose into my face.
Even now.
Even there.
Vanessa saw it.
Her smile sharpened.
“Oh. I was right.”
“About what?” Luca asked.
“You.”
She looked at me.
“And her.”
“This is not about Mia.”
“It became about Mia the first time Sophie asked for her instead of me.”
Her voice cracked.
There it was.
The thing under the money.
Under the plan.
Under the control.
Jealousy.
Not simple jealousy.
Something rotting.
“Sophie is a child,” I said.
“She was supposed to love me.”
“She did.”
Vanessa stared.
I continued.
“She trusted you.”
“That’s not the same thing.”
“No. It’s more important.”
Her mouth tightened.
“You stole that.”
“No. You broke it.”
The gun shifted.
Ethan flinched.
Luca moved half an inch.
Vanessa snapped the weapon toward him.
“Don’t.”
He froze.
Her attention had left Ethan for one second.
I saw Luca see it.
We both knew.
Not enough.
Not yet.
Vanessa breathed hard.
“You think I wanted this?”
“Yes,” Luca said.
She stared at him.
“You think I wanted four years to end in a warehouse?”
“You made choices.”
“For you.”
“No.”
“For us.”
“There was no us after you hurt Sophie.”
Vanessa’s eyes filled.
“You were never going to marry me.”
“I considered it.”
“That’s not enough.”
“It should have been.”
She laughed bitterly.
“Do you know what my father said? He said you would never choose me unless I became necessary.”
Luca’s eyes narrowed.
“Angelo knew?”
“Knew?”
She laughed again.
“He built half of it.”
My stomach dropped.
“Built what?” I asked.
“The strategy.”
Luca’s face hardened.
“Your father said he didn’t know.”
“My father lies before breakfast.”
“About Cross?”
Vanessa’s smile faded.
“Cross was his dog before he became mine.”
“Who killed him?”
For the first time, Vanessa looked afraid.
“Not me.”
“Who?”
She looked toward the dark catwalk above us.
That was all the warning we got.
A shot exploded from above.
Vanessa screamed.
The gun flew from her hand.
Blood appeared across her shoulder.
Luca moved.
Fast.
He kicked the gun away and pulled Ethan’s chair backward.
Officers rushed the room.
I dropped beside my brother.
“Ethan.”
I tore the tape from his mouth.
He gasped.
“Mia.”
“I’m here.”
“You look terrible.”
I almost laughed and cried at the same time.
“You too.”
“Thanks.”
Then another shot cracked.
An officer went down.
“Shooter above!” someone yelled.
Luca threw himself over Ethan and me.
Bullets hit metal nearby.
Sparks jumped.
Vanessa crawled toward her gun.
I saw her.
So did Luca.
“Vanessa, don’t!”
She reached anyway.
A tactical officer kicked the weapon farther away.
“Hands out!”
Vanessa collapsed, one hand gripping her bleeding shoulder.
Up above, footsteps ran along the catwalk.
Marco and two officers chased.
Luca stayed with us.
His body shielded mine.
I could feel his heartbeat against my shoulder.
Fast.
Human.
Terrified.
“Are you hit?” he asked.
“No.”
“Ethan?”
“I’m okay,” Ethan said.
“You’re bleeding.”
“Head cut. I think.”
Luca looked at me.
“You disobeyed me.”
I stared at him.
“Now?”
His mouth almost moved.
“Later.”
“Good.”
A scream echoed from the far side of the warehouse.
Then silence.
Marco’s voice came over the radio.
“Shooter down.”
Luca’s expression changed.
“Identity?”
A pause.
Then Marco answered.
“You need to see this.”
I hated that sentence now.
Ten minutes later, paramedics worked on Ethan and Vanessa while police secured the building.
I sat on a crate with a blanket around my shoulders.
Luca stood beside me.
Marco approached.
His face was grim.
“Shooter’s alive.”
“Who?”
“Paul Rennick.”
The former security contractor.
My stomach tightened.
“Vanessa paid him,” I said.
Marco nodded.
“Maybe. But he had a phone.”
Luca’s eyes narrowed.
“And?”
“Last call connected fourteen minutes before the shooting.”
“To who?”
Marco looked at him.
“Angelo Bellini.”
Luca went perfectly still.
I felt something cold settle inside me.
Vanessa had said her father built the strategy.
Angelo had arrived with warnings.
Then someone tried to kill him.
Or had they?
I remembered his bleeding arm.
A wound we never saw happen.
“What if he cut himself?” I whispered.
Luca looked at me.
Marco did too.
I continued.
“He said one of your men attacked him. We believed him because there was blood.”
Marco’s face hardened.
“No camera coverage in that hall during the outage.”
“Convenient,” I said.
Luca took out his phone.
He called the mansion.
No answer.
He called again.
Still nothing.
His face changed.
“Sophie.”
Every thought disappeared.
He called one of the guards assigned to the suite.
No answer.
Another.
Nothing.
Then his phone rang.
Unknown number.
He answered.
“Where is she?”
A man laughed softly.
Not Angelo.
Someone else.
Then Sophie’s voice came through.
“Daddy?”
Luca stopped breathing.
“Sophie.”
“I’m okay.”
“Where are you?”
“I don’t know.”
A man took the phone.
“Mr. Moretti.”
Luca’s face became stone.
“What do you want?”
“Now we can finally discuss the trust.”
Luca’s eyes closed.
I stood.
The man continued.
“Bring the original Arden documents to Bellini Tower by sunrise.”
“And if I don’t?”
“You’ll miss more than movie night.”
The line went dead.
Luca lowered the phone.
For one second, he looked shattered.
Then he looked at me.
And I realized the worst part.
Angelo had never been trapped in Luca’s house with us.
We had been trapped in the house with Angelo.
An officer cut the ropes around Ethan’s wrists while the paramedic checked his pupils. I knelt beside him and rubbed circulation back into his hands.
“You came,” he said.
“Of course I came.”
“You were not supposed to come.”
I stared at him. “You are literally tied to a chair in a warehouse and you’re criticizing my judgment?”
“Runs in the family.”
His attempt at a grin made my chest ache.
Luca crouched on Ethan’s other side. “Can you tell me who brought you here?”
Ethan looked at him. “Two men. One called the other Rennick. Vanessa arrived later.”
“Did you hear Angelo’s name?”
Ethan’s expression changed. “Yeah.”
Luca leaned closer.
“One of them said, ‘The old man wants Sophie moved before sunrise.’ I thought they meant somebody else.”
The cold feeling returned. “Did they say where?”
“Tower. Something about a tower.”
Bellini Tower.
Luca and I looked at each other.
Before either of us could speak, Vanessa groaned from the stretcher. Her eyes opened. She looked directly at Luca.
“My father will take her,” she whispered.
Luca crossed the room. “Take who?”
Vanessa smiled weakly. “You know who.”
“Sophie?”
Her eyes filled with something that might have been regret. “I was supposed to become her guardian. He never intended to let me keep her.”
My stomach turned.
“What did he intend?” Luca asked.
Vanessa’s voice fell almost too low to hear. “Control the trust until there was nobody left to challenge him.”
Then the call from the mansion came, proving we were already behind.
The paramedic tried to move me toward the ambulance, but I refused until Ethan was standing on his own. He rolled his eyes at me, then winced because even that hurt his forehead. “I’m fine.”
I almost laughed at the phrase. “Apparently that sentence is banned in the Moretti household now.”
Luca, overhearing us, said, “Correct.”
Ethan looked at him. “You always this bossy?”
“Yes,” I answered for Luca.
May you like
That earned the smallest smile from all three of us, but it vanished when Marco’s phone rang again. The tower call had already begun.
For one second I watched Luca check Ethan’s bandage himself, careful and awkward, as if protecting people came naturally to him but comforting them did not. Ethan noticed too. He gave me a look that said he had questions. I silently promised him answers later.
