Chapter 6 - Cousin LucaLuca Moretti arrived at the estate at 2:17 p.m. in a navy cashmere coat, driving a silver Aston Martin and smiling like a man coming to lunch.
No one had told him the gates were locked from the inside.
No one had told him Valentina Rossi was missing.
No one had told him a three-year-old girl had pointed at a medical case and cracked open a secret two years old.
From the security room, I watched his car glide up the long drive between bare trees and dirty snow.
He stepped out laughing into his phone.
He was younger than Alessandro by a few years, handsome in a softer way, with thick brown hair and a face made for magazine profiles about philanthropy and real estate. He looked nothing like the kind of man who would drug his own cousin before an ambush.
That was the problem with evil.
It rarely respected the face people expected it to wear.
Nico met him at the front entrance.
The audio feed clicked on.
“Luca.”
“Nico.” Luca smiled. “Why does everyone look like a funeral? Is Sandro having one of his moods?”
Sandro.
The nickname landed strangely.
Almost affectionate.
Nico did not smile.
“Mr. Moretti is waiting.”
Luca glanced around.
“Since when do you call him that when speaking to family?”
“Since today.”
Luca’s smile weakened.
Only slightly.
On the monitor, Alessandro watched without blinking.
Emma had fallen asleep on a narrow couch in the corner, Mr. Rabbit tucked beneath her chin after Alessandro returned him with surprising care. Mrs. Bellini had covered her with a wool blanket.
I sat beside her, one hand resting on her back.
I should have left.
Dr. Mercer had cleared Emma. Nico had offered to drive us home. Alessandro had said he would keep his promise.
But when I imagined returning to my apartment, I saw Valentina’s red nails. I saw the tiny dot behind Emma’s ear. I saw my daughter asleep in a room with one cheap lock and no guards.
So I stayed.
Not because I trusted Alessandro Moretti.
Because I trusted the danger outside less.
Luca was brought not to the office, but to a formal dining room on the main floor. Long table. Crystal chandelier. Silver candlesticks. Portraits of dead Morettis watching from the walls.
Alessandro waited at the head of the table in his wheelchair.
Alone.
No guards visible.
That made me nervous.
Nico stood with us in the security room, arms folded, watching four angles of the dining room.
“Why is he alone?” I asked.
“He isn’t.”
I looked closer.
A reflection in the window.
A shadow near the sideboard.
A slight bulge behind the curtain.
Men everywhere.
Luca entered with his arms open.
“There he is. The ghost in the west wing.”
Alessandro did not answer.
Luca stopped several feet away.
His smile flickered.
“What’s wrong?”
“I received a report.”
Luca sighed dramatically and pulled out a chair.
“If this is about the clinic budget, I told the board we should wait until the second-quarter audit.”
“It was not a financial report.”
“Then?”
“A laboratory report.”
Luca’s hand paused on the chair.
One second.
Then he sat.
“What did Sam find now? Too much caffeine in your blood?”
Alessandro placed a folder on the table.
The sound was soft.
Final.
“Sedatives. Neuromuscular suppressants. Chemical compounds administered to me this morning and two years ago before the river road ambush.”
Luca stared at him.
Then he laughed.
Not convincingly.
“That is insane.”
“Yes.”
“You actually believe someone drugged you before the shooting?”
“I know someone did.”
“Then call the police.”
Alessandro’s face did not change.
Luca spread his hands.
“What? Isn’t that what legitimate businessmen do now?”
“Legitimate businessmen do many things.”
“And what do we do, cousin?”
The word cousin came out too sharp.
Alessandro opened the folder.
“The compound was traced to the clinic.”
Luca leaned back.
“That clinic has hundreds of employees.”
“The supply order used your authorization code.”
Luca’s face emptied.
Only for a moment.
Then outrage rushed in.
“My code? Do you know how many assistants have access to that system? Valentina handles half those orders.”
“Yes.”
“So ask her.”
“I intend to.”
Luca looked toward the door.
“Where is she?”
“Missing.”
This time Luca could not hide it.
His eyes flashed.
Fear.
Anger.
Calculation.
Alessandro saw all of it.
“She escaped during a false fire alarm,” he said. “Someone disabled the west garden camera and exterior sensor.”
Luca stood.
“I don’t like where this conversation is going.”
“Sit down.”
“I am not one of your soldiers.”
“No. You are family.”
The word sounded like a blade.
Luca’s nostrils flared.
“You think I did this?”
“I think Valentina did not have enough power alone.”
“And I did?”
“You chaired the clinic board. You handled security restructuring after my injury. You convinced me to replace half my old guard. You told me pain made me paranoid.”
Luca’s face reddened.
“Because it did.”
Alessandro’s eyes hardened.
“You told me to stop asking why the hospital lost my clothing from the ambush.”
“You were obsessed.”
“You told me the blurred vision was trauma.”
“It was.”
“You told me my memory was unreliable.”
“It was.”
Luca slammed his hand on the table.
“You were broken, Alessandro!”
In the security room, Nico went still.
Luca seemed to realize what he had said.
But instead of retreating, he leaned into it.
“You want the truth? Fine. After the ambush, you were not the same. You sat in that chair and turned this family into a shrine to your pain. Every decision, every business, every conversation had to orbit your ruined spine.”
Alessandro’s voice stayed quiet.
“And so you helped ruin it?”
“No.”
“Then say it.”
Luca froze.
“Say what?”
“Say you did not drug me.”
“I did not drug you.”
“Say you did not know Valentina was dosing me.”
“I did not know Valentina was dosing you.”
“Say you did not authorize the compounds.”
Luca opened his mouth.
Nothing came out.
In the security room, my heart started pounding.
Alessandro leaned forward slightly.
“There it is.”
Luca’s face twisted.
“You don’t understand.”
“I rarely do, when people betray me. Explain.”
Luca looked toward the portraits, toward the dead Morettis on the walls.
“You were going to destroy everything.”
“No.”
“You were tired of the old arrangements. You wanted clean companies, clean books, clean politics. You wanted to turn wolves into accountants.”
“I wanted children in this family to inherit something other than blood.”
Luca laughed bitterly.
“You sound like your father.”
Alessandro flinched.
Tiny.
But real.
Luca saw it and pressed.
“He was weak too.”
The dining room door opened.
Nico stepped in before Alessandro could answer.
Behind him came two guards.
Luca looked around and realized the room had never been private.
His face changed.
“You recorded this.”
“Yes,” Alessandro said.
“You son of a—”
“Careful,” Nico said.
Luca looked at him with contempt.
“You used to serve the family.”
“I still do.”
Alessandro closed the folder.
“Where is Valentina?”
Luca smiled then.
A small, ugly smile.
“She is smarter than you.”
“Where is she?”
“Gone.”
“Where?”
Luca leaned across the table.
“If she has any sense, somewhere your little maid and her brat can’t point fingers.”
My blood went cold.
Nico’s hand moved.
Alessandro raised one finger.
The room stopped.
“What did you say?”
Luca’s smile widened.
There are men who realize too late that cruelty is not strength.
Luca was one of them.
“I said,” he repeated slowly, “your little maid and her brat should have stayed in the basement where hired help belongs.”
Alessandro did not shout.
He did not threaten.
He only looked at Nico.
“Take him downstairs.”
Luca stepped back.
“No.”
Nico moved.
Luca reached into his coat.
The guards drew weapons so fast I barely saw their hands.
But Luca was not reaching for a gun.
He pulled out a phone and pressed one button.
The mansion lights went out.
Every monitor in the security room died.
May you like
Emma woke screaming in the dark.
And somewhere above us, every locked gate in the Moretti estate opened at once.
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