Chương 5 - The Betrayal Inside the House
Dominic nearly killed Anthony in the cemetery.
Emily stopped him.
Not because she trusted Anthony.
Because killing the only man who might know what happened would have been stupid.
“Think,” she snapped.
Dominic’s fist remained twisted in Anthony’s coat.
“Give me one reason.”
“Lily and Grace.”
The names reached him.
His grip loosened.
Anthony staggered backward.
“I didn’t take them.”
Dominic held up Isabella’s ledger.
“Your initials are everywhere.”
Anthony stared.
Then something unexpected happened.
He laughed.
Not because anything was funny.
Because he understood.
“Antonio Ricci.”
Dominic stopped.
“Who?”
“My father.”
Emily looked between them.
Anthony rubbed his throat.
“My legal name is Anthony Michael Russo. My father was Antonio Ricci before Witness Protection changed our surname.”
Dominic stared at him.
“You never told me.”
“I was twelve.”
“Isabella knew?”
“Yes.”
Dominic’s eyes became lethal again.
Anthony raised both hands.
“She came to me seven years ago because she recognized his name in company records.”
“You lied to me.”
“I protected my mother.”
“And Isabella died.”
Anthony flinched.
That landed.
“I thought my father was dead.”
“Was he?”
Anthony’s silence answered.
Emily stepped closer.
“Where are the girls?”
Anthony looked at her.
“If my father is alive, Reed isn’t the wolf.”
“Then who is?”
“The wolf works for him.”
They raced back toward the estate.
Security footage showed a utility truck entering through a service gate at 5:16 a.m.
The driver had valid credentials.
The credentials belonged to a heating contractor who had died three months earlier.
Two men entered the east wing.
They never reached Lily and Grace.
Instead, security video showed Lily leading Grace through a laundry corridor.
“They escaped?” Emily whispered.
Dominic leaned closer.
Another camera showed the girls entering a pantry.
Then nothing.
Dominic ordered the house searched.
Twenty-eight minutes later, Grace sneezed behind a false panel inside the old wine cellar.
Dominic ripped it open.
Two blond heads appeared.
He closed his eyes.
Emily nearly collapsed from relief.
Lily held a kitchen knife.
“I remembered what you said,” she told Emily.
“What did I say?”
“Hide until you say our names.”
Emily knelt.
“You did exactly right.”
Dominic gathered both daughters against him.
Lily looked at Anthony.
“Daddy, why is Uncle Tony crying?”
Everyone turned.
Anthony wiped his face.
“I’m fine, bug.”
Lily frowned.
“You look terrible.”
Even Dominic almost smiled.
The relief lasted four minutes.
Then Dominic’s security chief entered.
“We found one intruder.”
“Alive?”
“Yes.”
The prisoner refused to speak until Dominic entered the basement.
Emily was not invited.
She followed anyway.
The man was about fifty.
Bleeding lip.
Gray hair.
He smiled when he saw Dominic.
“Vale.”
“Where is Reed?”
“Dead.”
Dominic stopped.
“When?”
“Yesterday.”
“Who killed him?”
“You did, technically.”
The man grinned.
Dominic’s expression remained flat.
“Explain.”
“Reed tried to help your girls escape. Ricci discovered it.”
Anthony stepped forward.
“My father.”
The prisoner’s grin vanished.
“So the little rat survived.”
Anthony went pale.
“Where is Antonio?”
“You’ll meet him soon.”
Dominic leaned closer.
“Why my daughters?”
“Because Isabella hid something.”
“We found the ledger.”
The prisoner laughed.
“That?”
Emily felt dread immediately.
“That’s not what they wanted.”
Dominic looked at her.
“What else is there?”
The prisoner smiled.
“The ledger proves Ricci used your company.”
He leaned back.
“But Isabella had something that proves who helped him.”
“Who?”
The prisoner looked toward Emily.
Strangely, directly at Emily.
“A senator. Two judges. A federal prosecutor.”
Emily’s skin prickled.
“And one person who would surprise you.”
“Name.”
“Ask the waitress.”
Silence.
Emily stared.
“I don’t know you.”
“No.”
The man’s smile widened.
“But your mother did.”
Emily stopped breathing.
Dominic looked at her.
“What was your mother’s name?”
“Carol Parker.”
The prisoner laughed softly.
“Carol Bennett Parker.”
Emily felt the floor shift.
Nobody called her mother Bennett.
It had been her maiden name.
“How do you know that?”
“Because Carol kept Isabella’s second file.”
Emily stepped forward.
“You’re lying.”
“Your mother worked nights cleaning offices at Vale Atlantic before you were old enough to remember.”
Emily knew that.
Her mother had cleaned office buildings.
She had never known which ones.
The prisoner continued.
“Isabella needed someone nobody noticed.”
A cleaning woman.
Invisible.
Like a waitress.
Emily’s throat tightened.
“My mother died of cancer.”
“Eventually.”
“What does that mean?”
He said nothing.
Dominic ordered everyone out.
Emily refused.
The prisoner looked at her with something almost like pity.
“Your mother didn’t get sick naturally.”
Emily lunged.
Dominic caught her.
“Emily.”
“He’s lying!”
“Maybe.”
“He’s lying!”
But her voice had broken.
Her mother had developed leukemia quickly.
Aggressively.
Doctors called it bad luck.
Emily had accepted that because sometimes terrible things had no reason.
The prisoner leaned forward.
“Carol hid the evidence. Ricci spent years looking for it.”
“Where?”
“If I knew, I wouldn’t be sitting here.”
Emily stared at him.
Then remembered something.
Her old anatomy notes.
Boxes she had never thrown away.
Her mother had packed them before she died.
Dominic saw her expression.
“What?”
Emily whispered, “My storage unit.”
Twenty minutes later, they reached a storage facility near Cicero.
Unit 314.
The lock had already been cut.
Dominic drew his gun.
Emily’s heart sank.
They entered.
Boxes lay everywhere.
Clothes.
Books.
Her mother’s Christmas decorations.
Then Emily saw her old nursing textbooks.
One had been placed carefully on top.
Gray’s Anatomy.
She opened it.
The center had been hollowed out.
Inside rested a flash drive.
And a letter.
Emily unfolded it with shaking hands.
My darling Emily,
If you ever find this, it means the past finally found you too.
She could barely continue.
Dominic stood beside her.
Emily read the final lines.
Do not give this to the police.
Find Isabella’s husband.
May you like
Tell Dominic Vale that his wife was right.
And tell him the man he calls family is the one who killed her.
