Chapter 5 - The Woman Who Was Dead
Salvatore did not allow the envelope to be opened until Carlo’s team examined it.
There were no suspicious devices.
No powder.
No obvious threat.
Inside was a single photograph and a handwritten letter.
The photograph showed Sofia Marin.
Emery’s biological mother.
She was standing beside Vittorio DeLuca.
The image had been taken shortly before Emery’s birth.
Salvatore stared at it for a long time.
Vittorio had told him he never met Sofia.
Another lie.
Or another protection.
The letter was short.
SALVATORE,
IF EMERY HAS THE RING, VITTORIO’S PLAN HAS STARTED.
DO NOT TRUST FRANCESCA.
DO NOT TRUST DANTE.
DO NOT TRUST MARCELLO UNTIL HE TELLS YOU WHAT HAPPENED ON AUGUST 9.
YOUR FATHER TRIED TO SAVE SOFIA.
HE FAILED.
FRANCESCA MADE SURE OF IT.
I CAN PROVE EVERYTHING.
ISABELLA.
Salvatore slowly looked up.
Marcello was standing across the kitchen.
“What happened August ninth?”
Marcello’s face tightened.
Carlo noticed.
“That was not the face of a man who forgot.”
Marcello sat down.
“August ninth was the day Vittorio learned Sofia was in danger.”
Salvatore remained standing.
“You told me her death was an accident.”
“That was the official finding.”
“What was the truth?”
Marcello rubbed his forehead.
“Vittorio never knew.”
Salvatore slammed the letter onto the table.
“Then why does Isabella say you do?”
“Because I was there afterward.”
“After what?”
Marcello looked toward him.
“The crash.”
Salvatore became still.
Marcello began slowly.
Eight years earlier, Vittorio had secretly contacted Sofia Marin.
He told her about the DeLuca family.
He told her that she descended from Alessandro.
Sofia wanted nothing to do with the fortune.
She agreed to meet Vittorio only because she wanted Emery to know her family history one day.
Francesca discovered the meeting.
Nobody knew how.
Several days later, Sofia called Vittorio in panic.
Someone had been following her.
Her apartment had been searched.
She believed whoever entered had been looking for documents proving her ancestry.
Vittorio told her to leave town.
He sent Marcello to meet her.
Marcello reached the highway after the crash.
Sofia’s vehicle had gone through a barrier.
She died at the hospital.
Police concluded she lost control during heavy rain.
Salvatore’s hands tightened.
“Was Francesca there?”
“No.”
“Dante?”
“No.”
“Then how can Isabella accuse her?”
“I don’t know.”
Salvatore stared at Marcello.
“And August ninth?”
“That was the day Sofia called Vittorio.”
“You said she died later.”
“Three days later.”
Salvatore leaned closer.
“What are you leaving out?”
Marcello hesitated.
Carlo answered for him.
“Something important.”
Marcello closed his eyes.
“Vittorio recorded the call.”
Salvatore’s anger surged.
“Where is the recording?”
“Ravenna.”
Salvatore laughed without humor.
“Of course.”
Marcello looked ashamed.
“Your father was terrified after Sofia died.”
“So he hid everything.”
“He tried to protect Emery.”
“By leaving me ignorant?”
“By making sure Francesca never understood how much he knew.”
Salvatore turned away.
He hated secrecy.
He hated discovering that nearly every person around him had been living inside a different version of reality.
Most of all, he hated that Emery had been placed in danger without anyone giving him the truth.
Carlo tapped Isabella’s letter.
“We need to find her.”
Salvatore nodded.
“She approached Emery directly.”
“She approached the gate.”
“That is close enough.”
Carlo traced the license plate.
The vehicle had been rented in New Jersey using the name Isabel Moretti.
The address was false.
The credit card belonged to a shell company.
Marcello recognized the company.
“Moretti Educational Trust.”
Salvatore looked at him.
“Elena Moretti.”
“Alessandro’s wife.”
Someone had maintained an organization under her name for decades.
Carlo discovered a mailing address in New Haven.
They drove there that afternoon.
The location was a small nonprofit office above a bookstore.
No one was inside.
Dust covered the desks.
But a light had been left on in the rear room.
Salvatore noticed a photograph on the wall.
A younger Isabella Marin stood beside Vittorio.
She was unmistakably the woman from Anna’s security footage.
Carlo searched carefully.
A laptop sat on the desk.
It required a password.
Beside it lay another note.
SALVATORE WILL KNOW THE NAME.
Salvatore frowned.
“What name?”
Carlo looked at him.
“Something personal.”
Salvatore tried Emery.
Wrong.
Vittorio.
Wrong.
Alessandro.
Wrong.
Then he remembered the wooden horse.
“What did Grandpa call it, Emery?”
She had once told him.
Salvatore typed CAVALLO.
Wrong.
Then another memory came.
Vittorio had called Emery his little sparrow.
Passerotta.
Salvatore typed PASSEROTTA.
The laptop opened.
Carlo looked impressed.
“Dead men really enjoy puzzles.”
Salvatore ignored him.
Several folders appeared.
Most were encrypted.
One was labeled AUGUST 9.
Salvatore opened it.
A video began.
Isabella appeared on screen.
The recording was three months old.
“If you are watching this, I decided I could not reach you safely.”
She looked exhausted.
“I have spent eight years hiding because the people who killed my sister believed I died too.”
Salvatore’s chest tightened.
“I was supposed to be inside the house the night it burned.”
Isabella continued.
“I escaped through a basement window.”
“The body identified as mine belonged to a woman named Clara Voss.”
“She had been staying with me because she was leaving an abusive marriage.”
“Francesca’s people knew only that two women were inside.”
“They burned the house.”
Salvatore stared at the screen.
Carlo’s expression became hard.
Isabella continued.
“I could never prove Francesca ordered the fire.”
“But I can prove Dante paid the men who followed Sofia.”
A document appeared on screen.
Wire transfers.
Dates.
Amounts.
Names.
Salvatore leaned closer.
One payment had been made two days before Sofia’s fatal crash.
Another the morning after.
Isabella spoke again.
“Vittorio discovered these payments later.”
“He believed Dante intended only to frighten Sofia.”
“I do not.”
Salvatore looked toward Marcello.
Marcello seemed sick.
The video continued.
“Vittorio found me five years ago.”
“He helped me disappear permanently.”
“He told me Emery had been adopted by his son.”
“He showed me photographs.”
“I wanted to contact her.”
“Vittorio refused.”
Salvatore felt anger.
“He said Emery finally had a father who loved her without caring about blood.”
“He was afraid my appearance would expose her.”
Isabella wiped her eyes.
“I agreed.”
“For five years, I watched from far away.”
“Then Vittorio died.”
“And two weeks later, someone found me.”
Salvatore moved closer to the screen.
“I changed cities four times.”
“The same men kept appearing.”
“I realized Francesca and Dante were searching for whatever Vittorio left behind.”
“I knew eventually they would realize Emery had it.”
“The horse.”
Isabella nodded on screen as though she heard him.
“Vittorio showed me the compartment inside the horse before he sealed it.”
“The ring is not merely symbolic.”
“It contains something.”
Salvatore frowned.
He had examined the ring.
It looked solid.
Isabella continued.
“Turn the black stone counterclockwise.”
Salvatore immediately called Anna.
“Put Emery on.”
Seconds later, Emery’s voice appeared.
“Daddy?”
“Sweetheart, I need you to look at Grandpa’s ring.”
“Okay.”
“See the black stone on top?”
“Yes.”
“Try turning it.”
A pause.
“It’s hard.”
“Use a towel.”
Another pause.
Then Emery gasped.
“It moved.”
Salvatore’s heart accelerated.
“What happened?”
“The top came off.”
“What’s inside?”
“Something tiny.”
“What?”
“A little silver thing.”
Carlo looked at Salvatore.
“A micro-storage device.”
Isabella’s video continued.
“The ring contains the first half of Vittorio’s archive key.”
“The pendant contains the second.”
“Neither is useful alone.”
Salvatore now understood why Francesca needed the ring.
She did not merely want the symbol of succession.
She needed the data inside.
The video continued.
“If Francesca obtains both keys, she can enter Ravenna and destroy the evidence.”
“If you obtain both keys, you can learn what happened to Sofia.”
“And something else.”
Isabella looked frightened even through the recording.
“Something Vittorio refused to tell me until the week before he died.”
Salvatore leaned forward.
She whispered.
“Dante is not who you think he is.”
The video ended.
Carlo stared at the black screen.
“That was inconveniently dramatic.”
Salvatore looked at Marcello.
“What does that mean?”
Marcello shook his head.
“I don’t know.”
Salvatore did not believe him.
Marcello noticed.
“I genuinely do not know.”
Carlo began copying the laptop contents.
A sound came from downstairs.
Footsteps.
More than one person.
Carlo immediately shut the laptop.
Salvatore moved toward the rear door.
Someone tried the main office handle.
A man’s voice called.
“Isabella?”
No one answered.
The door opened.
Two men entered.
Salvatore recognized neither.
Carlo whispered.
“Back stairs.”
They moved quickly.
One of the men saw them.
“Stop.”
Carlo shoved Salvatore through the rear doorway.
They raced down the narrow stairs.
Another man appeared below.
They were trapped.
Marcello stepped backward.
Salvatore looked at the window.
A metal fire escape ran outside.
He smashed the latch with a chair.
Carlo climbed through first.
Marcello followed.
Salvatore was halfway out when one of the men grabbed his coat.
Salvatore drove his elbow backward.
The man lost his grip.
Salvatore dropped onto the fire escape.
They reached the alley.
Carlo’s vehicle stood one block away.
They ran.
A black SUV turned into the alley.
Salvatore stopped.
The rear door opened.
A woman leaned out.
“Get in.”
Salvatore recognized her from the security image.
Isabella Marin.
Carlo grabbed Salvatore’s arm.
“We don’t know her.”
Isabella looked toward the building.
“You know the men coming down those stairs.”
Salvatore heard shouting.
He made the decision.
They climbed inside.
The SUV accelerated.
For several minutes, nobody spoke.
Then Isabella looked at Salvatore.
Her eyes filled when she saw him.
“You look like Alessandro.”
Salvatore stared at her.
“You left a letter at my daughter’s gate.”
“My niece’s gate.”
Salvatore’s expression hardened.
“My daughter.”
Isabella nodded immediately.
“Yes.”
The correction seemed sincere.
Salvatore studied her.
“Tell me who Dante is.”
Isabella looked toward Marcello.
“You really don’t know?”
Marcello shook his head.
Isabella laughed bitterly.
“Then Vittorio took that secret to the grave.”
Salvatore leaned forward.
“Tell me.”
Isabella looked directly at him.
“Dante is not your cousin.”
Salvatore waited.
“He is Francesca’s son.”
The inside of the vehicle became silent.
Marcello whispered.
“That’s impossible.”
Isabella shook her head.
“No.”
Salvatore’s mind moved backward through decades.
Francesca’s preference.
Her protection.
Her constant excuses.
Her insistence that Dante remain inside every DeLuca company.
He felt cold.
“Who is his father?”
Isabella’s expression changed.
“That is the part Vittorio discovered too late.”
Salvatore stared at her.
“Who?”
Isabella answered.
May you like
“Alessandro DeLuca.”
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