Chapter 6
We reached Coney Island after midnight.
The rain had stopped, leaving the boardwalk slick beneath the neon lights. Most of the storefronts were closed. Metal shutters covered souvenir shops. The amusement rides stood silent against the black sky, enormous skeletons waiting for morning.
Police arrived first.
Sergeant Ruiz made that very clear.
Luca stayed behind the marked cars because she ordered him to. I stayed beside him because she ordered me to.
Neither of us liked it.
“You’re leaning on the wrong leg,” he said.
I stared at the dark storage building across the street.
“I’m trying not to think about my father possibly faking his death.”
“That wasn’t criticism.”
“It sounded like criticism.”
“It was concern.”
“I’m unfamiliar with the accent.”
He looked at me.
Even in the middle of everything, his mouth almost curved.
Then a gunshot cracked from inside the storage building.
The smile vanished.
Police moved instantly.
Ruiz shouted commands.
Officers rushed the entrance.
Luca took one step forward.
I grabbed his sleeve.
“You go over there and she’ll arrest you herself.”
“I can’t stand here.”
“Yes, you can.”
“That’s my brother.”
“And maybe whoever shot at him wants you to walk through the door.”
He looked down at my hand on his sleeve.
Then at me.
“You sound like me.”
“That is deeply upsetting.”
Another gunshot.
My heart slammed against my ribs.
Minutes later, two officers dragged a man from a side exit.
He wore a dark jacket and blood covered one sleeve.
Not Matteo.
Then Ruiz emerged.
She waved paramedics forward.
My stomach dropped.
A stretcher came out.
Matteo lay on it.
Alive.
His face was gray with pain, one hand pressed to his shoulder.
Luca broke the line before anyone could stop him.
“Matteo!”
His brother opened his eyes.
“Still bossy.”
Luca grabbed the stretcher rail.
“You idiot.”
“Also nice to see you.”
Ruiz caught up.
“One minute, then he goes.”
Matteo saw me.
His expression changed.
“Claire Dawson?”
“Yes.”
“I’m sorry.”
I stared at him.
“For what part?”
He closed his eyes briefly.
“Most of it.”
“Great. Very specific.”
Luca said, “Where’s the ledger?”
Matteo opened his eyes.
“Gone.”
“What?”
“The man they arrested wasn’t alone. Bellini sent two people. One got out the back.”
“Did you see who?” Ruiz asked.
“No.”
“What were you doing here?” Luca demanded.
Matteo looked at his brother.
“I received a message from Vanessa. She said Claire’s father left evidence that could destroy the family. She sent the locker number and said if I wanted to protect Dad’s name, I needed to get there first.”
“So you obeyed her?”
“I have spent four years cleaning up Dad’s messes.”
“You filed a petition saying I was mentally impaired.”
Matteo flinched, and not because of the bullet wound.
“I thought you were about to expose everything.”
“I didn’t know anything.”
“I know that now.”
The paramedic interrupted.
“We need to move.”
Matteo gripped Luca’s wrist.
“Don’t trust the board vote.”
Luca frowned.
“What?”
“One of the votes is already bought.”
“Who?”
Matteo’s eyes moved toward Daniel, who stood several feet away.
“Ask your lawyer why he never told you his firm also represents Bellini Capital.”
Everyone turned.
Daniel’s face went white.
Luca released the stretcher.
The paramedics pushed Matteo toward the ambulance.
I looked at Daniel.
He looked horrified.
“That’s not what it sounds like.”
Luca laughed once.
There was no humor in it.
“Tonight, that sentence should be illegal.”
Daniel stepped closer.
“My firm has four hundred attorneys. A separate corporate group handled a Bellini financing two years ago. I disclosed the potential conflict to your general counsel.”
“I am my general counsel’s client.”
“Yes.”
“Did you disclose it to me?”
Daniel hesitated.
“No.”
Luca’s jaw hardened.
“Then Matteo’s question is valid.”
Ruiz cut in.
“This can wait. We have a crime scene and a missing ledger.”
She turned to me.
“Claire, show me the locker.”
The unit was 314.
I knew because my father loved pi and used 314 for everything that didn’t require real security.
The lock had been cut.
Inside sat an old metal desk, two boxes of tax records, and a faded Yankees cap I remembered from childhood.
I picked it up.
For a second, I was sixteen again, annoyed because Dad was making me spend Saturday learning spreadsheets while my friends were at the beach.
Then I saw the dried peppermint candy stuck in the brim.
My breath caught.
“Dad was here.”
Luca stood at the doorway.
“Recently?”
“I don’t know.”
Ruiz pointed her flashlight toward the desk.
“Blood.”
A dark smear crossed one drawer handle.
Fresh enough to shine.
I froze.
“Matteo?”
“No,” Ruiz said. “He was shot near the entrance. This is farther inside.”
She opened the drawer carefully.
Empty.
Then an officer called from the back wall.
“Sergeant, you need to see this.”
Behind a stack of boxes was a narrow maintenance door.
It opened into an alley.
On the floor lay a broken pair of eyeglasses.
I knew them.
I knew them instantly.
My father had worn the same black rectangular frames for years.
My hands started shaking.
“No.”
Emily, who had stayed with officers at her apartment, had sent me an old family photo earlier. I pulled it up on the temporary phone and showed Ruiz.
The glasses matched.
Luca went very still.
“Claire…”
“My father is alive.”
The words felt impossible.
But the evidence kept becoming more impossible than the last thing.
Ruiz bagged the glasses.
A detective found a disposable phone beneath the desk.
Its battery was almost dead.
One saved draft message remained on the screen.
TO CLAIRE.
My pulse roared in my ears.
Ruiz photographed it, then let me read without touching.
Kiddo, if you found this, I failed to leave quietly. I am sorry for what your mother had to tell you. She believed you would be safer if the world believed I was dead. For four years I have been gathering what Bellini buried and what Raffaele allowed. Tonight I planned to give it to Matteo because I still believed he could be pulled back from his father’s shadow. If I am wrong, trust Luca only after he tells you about Harbor 9.
I looked up.
Luca’s face had lost all color.
“What is Harbor 9?”
He didn’t answer.
My anger returned instantly.
“No more secrets.”
“Claire—”
“No. My father just came back from the dead through a draft text and he says I should trust you only after you tell me something. So tell me.”
Ruiz watched him.
Daniel watched him.
Even the officers nearby seemed to wait.
Luca rubbed one hand over his face.
“Harbor 9 was a construction project in New Jersey.”
“What happened?”
“My father used a Bellini labor contractor.”
“And?”
“There was an accident.”
“How many people?”
“Three workers died.”
My stomach turned.
“Was it covered up?”
He looked at me.
“Yes.”
“By your father?”
“Yes.”
“And you?”
Silence.
I stopped breathing.
Luca’s voice broke slightly.
“I signed the settlement agreements.”
I stared at him.
“You knew?”
“I knew the site had safety violations. I was twenty-nine. My father told me the families had been compensated and the company would collapse if regulators connected the contractor to organized bribery. I signed confidentiality settlements.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“I knew enough to know it was wrong.”
The honesty hurt worse than denial.
“Did people go to jail?”
“No.”
“Did you report it later?”
“No.”
I looked away.
Something inside me closed.
Luca did not try to defend himself.
“My father found Harbor 9 while tracing the payments,” I said.
“Yes.”
“He knew your family buried deaths.”
“Yes.”
“And you want me to believe you’re different.”
Luca’s face was rigid.
“I want you to believe the truth, even when it makes me look like someone you should hate.”
I swallowed hard.
“That’s convenient now.”
“I know.”
Before either of us could say more, Ruiz’s radio crackled.
An officer outside had found a security camera facing the alley.
The footage was grainy but clear enough.
At 11:52 p.m., a gray van pulled behind the storage building.
Two men forced a third man toward it.
Older.
Gray hair.
Thin build.
Even through the bad image, I recognized the way he walked.
My father.
Alive.
Then a woman stepped from the passenger side.
Long coat.
Dark hair.
Vanessa Bellini.
She opened the van door herself.
The final frame caught her face as she looked directly toward the camera.
Ruiz whispered, “We have probable cause.”
Luca’s voice became cold.
“For kidnapping?”
Ruiz nodded.
“And if your father is alive, Claire, we’re going to find him.”
My phone buzzed.
A new text.
This time, no unknown threat.
A video file.
I opened it.
My father sat tied to a chair in a dim room.
Blood marked his forehead.
Vanessa stood behind him.
She looked into the camera.
“Claire,” she said, calm as if inviting me to dinner, “bring Luca to the old Bellini hotel on Forty-Eighth Street before two a.m.”
May you like
She smiled.
“Or this time, your father really does die.”
