Chapter 23 - Broken Things Can Still SingVale stood on the ruined stage beneath a collapsed chandelier.
“Vivian,” he said. “You always were Anthony’s cleverest mistake.”
Lorenzo stepped forward.
Vale smiled.
“There he is. The weapon everyone spent thirty years sharpening.”
Vivian searched the room.
As a child, she had taken piano lessons there.
One piano remained beneath a tarp.
Broken things can still sing.
She lifted the fallboard.
Inside, taped beneath the keys, was a tiny microcassette.
Vale raised a pistol.
“Give it to me.”
Lorenzo moved between them.
Vale laughed.
“Still doing that? Throwing yourself in front of bullets as though redemption is a performance?”
“No.”
Lorenzo’s voice was calm.
“It’s a habit now.”
Vale confessed because he believed they would not leave alive.
He had manipulated Isabella’s death.
He had exposed Anthony’s route to Carlo.
He had helped Pike bury Daniel Mercer.
He had engineered the financial terms of Lorenzo and Vivian’s marriage.
And years later, when he realized Vivian was pregnant, he gave Adrian enough information to reach her.
Vivian’s face went white.
“You tried to kill Lucia.”
“I tried to preserve an arrangement.”
Lorenzo moved.
Vivian caught his hand.
One touch.
He stopped.
Vale smiled.
“See? She still controls you.”
Lorenzo looked at Vivian.
“No.”
Then at Vale.
“She reminds me I control myself.”
Sirens approached.
Vale’s confidence vanished.
Vivian had activated her phone before entering.
Everything had streamed to Mara and Matteo.
Vale fired toward the cassette.
Lorenzo shoved Vivian down.
The bullet struck the piano.
Police stormed the building.
Vale was arrested alive.
But the microcassette had shattered.
Their best evidence was gone.
Or so Vale believed.
Vivian reached into her coat.
She had removed the real tape before stepping onto the stage.
The cassette Vale destroyed was empty.
Lorenzo stared at her.
“When did you switch it?”
“While you were being dramatic.”
“I was standing between you and a gun.”
“Exactly. Very distracting.”
For the first time in days, Lorenzo laughed.
Then Matteo called.
May you like
Judge Pike had disappeared.
And he had taken Salvatore with him.
