Chapter 9 - The Last Moretti SecretVincent Moretti was gone.
His hospital room was empty.
The guard outside had been drugged.
Security footage showed Vincent leaving in scrubs forty minutes before Hale’s arrest.
Gabriel said nothing during the drive back.
That silence frightened Delaney more than rage would have.
At Blackstone House, Teresa waited in the library.
When told Vincent had disappeared, she closed her eyes.
“He knew.”
Sebastian frowned.
“Knew what?”
Teresa walked toward Antonio’s portrait.
“Vincent always knew where Antonio kept emergency money. He knew every account.”
Gabriel’s expression hardened.
“You still think he's protecting us?”
“No.”
Teresa turned.
“I think he’s protecting Sebastian.”
Everyone went silent.
Sebastian stared at her.
“What?”
Vincent had not stolen Hale’s money.
He had moved it.
Thomas traced the transfer within an hour.
Twenty-eight million dollars had been redirected into an escrow account linked to victims of Hale’s corruption network.
Families who had lost businesses.
Wrongfully convicted defendants.
Widows.
Former officers forced out after refusing bribes.
And one foundation registered twenty years earlier.
The Rachel Ward Trust.
Delaney sat down.
“No.”
Thomas showed her.
The trust contained $2.4 million.
Untouched.
Established three weeks after Rachel’s death.
By Vincent Moretti.
A letter arrived electronically ten minutes later.
For Gabriel.
Vincent had written everything.
He had known Hale killed Antonio.
He had also known Sebastian witnessed enough to become a target.
So Vincent created a lie.
He told Hale Sebastian had fled overseas with evidence.
Then he secretly sent Sebastian away.
Vincent spent eighteen years feeding Hale just enough false information to keep him looking in the wrong places.
Rachel had distrusted Vincent because she caught him destroying financial records.
She never knew he was destroying the records that could lead Hale to Sebastian.
Vincent had accepted her suspicion because explaining would have endangered everyone.
Gabriel finished reading.
His hands shook.
The letter ended:
Your father asked me to keep his sons alive.
I failed him in many ways.
But both of you are standing.
That will have to be enough.
Sebastian turned away.
“Where is he?”
Thomas checked the final transaction.
A ferry ticket.
Block Island.
Teresa smiled sadly.
“Antonio’s cottage.”
They found Vincent there before dawn.
He sat on the porch overlooking the Atlantic.
No weapon.
No luggage.
Just coffee.
Gabriel approached first.
“You drugged my guard.”
“He was annoying.”
“You stole twenty-eight million dollars.”
“I redistributed stolen assets.”
“That is still stealing.”
Vincent shrugged.
“Your father would have appreciated the distinction.”
Gabriel stopped before him.
For a moment, Delaney thought he might hit him.
Instead, Gabriel hugged his uncle.
Vincent froze.
Then his eyes closed.
Sebastian joined them.
Three Moretti men stood beneath a gray Rhode Island sunrise, bound less by blood than by decades of terrible choices made in the name of keeping one another alive.
Teresa cried openly.
Delaney looked toward the ocean.
Rachel should have been there.
That grief remained.
Solving a murder did not return the dead.
Justice did not restore childhood.
Love did not erase twenty years.
But truth could give grief somewhere to rest.
Months followed.
Hale’s arrest triggered investigations across Rhode Island and Massachusetts.
Officials resigned.
Several were indicted.
Cases were reopened.
The Moretti businesses were investigated too.
Gabriel made a decision nobody expected.
He began dismantling every illegal operation associated with his family.
It cost him millions.
It angered allies.
It created enemies.
“You don't have to become somebody else because of me,” Delaney told him.
They stood on Blackstone’s terrace one evening.
“I’m not.”
“Then why?”
Gabriel looked toward the water.
“Because I’m tired of asking whether the men at my gate belong to me or want my mother dead.”
That was an answer she understood.
He reorganized the family holdings around shipping, real estate, hospitality, and construction.
Sebastian stayed.
Not as an underboss.
As an irritating older brother who stole Gabriel’s coffee and delighted in reminding everyone that Gabriel had once cried after losing a Little League game.
Gabriel threatened him approximately twice a day.
Teresa looked ten years younger.
And Delaney?
She went back to the diner.
Gabriel was horrified.
“You have two million dollars in a trust.”
“My mother’s money.”
“It belongs to you.”
“I know.”
“And you're waiting tables.”
“I like the diner.”
“The coffee is terrible.”
“You drink it every morning.”
“Because you're there.”
She looked at him.
He seemed to realize what he had admitted.
Delaney smiled.
“Careful, Moretti.”
“With what?”
“You're becoming romantic.”
“I'll recover.”
She laughed.
Then her landlord called.
The building had been sold.
Delaney looked immediately at Gabriel.
“I didn't.”
“Gabriel.”
“I swear.”
She narrowed her eyes.
“Sebastian?”
“No.”
“Teresa?”
“No.”
“Vincent?”
Gabriel paused.
“Possibly.”
Her phone rang again.
Vincent.
Delaney answered.
“Did you buy my building?”
“No.”
“Vincent.”
“I purchased the corporation that owns your building.”
“That is the same thing with extra paperwork.”
“Technically—”
She hung up.
Gabriel laughed so hard he had to sit down.
Delaney pointed at him.
“Your entire family is insane.”
He pulled her gently between his knees.
“You pretended a stranger was your mother while armed men searched for her.”
“That was different.”
“How?”
“I had an apron.”
Gabriel smiled.
Then his expression softened.
“Stay tonight.”
“At Blackstone?”
“With me.”
She looked at him.
Not a command.
Not protection disguised as control.
A request.
She touched his face.
“I’ll stay.”
He kissed her forehead.
Then Delaney added, “But I work at six.”
His eyes closed.
“Of course you do.”
She smiled.
For the first time in years, tomorrow did not frighten her.
But one question remained.
What would she do with Rachel’s trust?
Three days later, Delaney walked into the diner carrying a folder.
She placed it before the owner.
“What is this?”
“A purchase offer.”
He stared at her.
“You're buying the diner?”
“No.”
She smiled.
“We are.”
And outside the window, Gabriel Moretti stood beside his black car, watching the woman who had changed his family with five minutes of courage.
He thought the story was finally ending.
He was wrong.
Because Delaney had one final promise to keep.
May you like
And it was not to Gabriel.
It was to her mother.
