Chapter 6 - THE MOTHER WHO COULDN'T COME HOME
Luca did not sleep.
By sunrise, he had ordered every available investigator to locate Isabella, Elena, and the men who had attacked the pier. He also sent Sophie to a secure apartment under Emma's care.
For the first time since Elena's death, he allowed himself to believe she might return.
That hope frightened him.
Hope made people careless.
At nine in the morning, Rachel arrived at the apartment with a laptop and a battered medical file.
“I found the original transfer destination,” she said.
Luca stood immediately.
“Where?”
“An old rehabilitation facility outside Albany. It closed seven years ago, but the property was purchased by a private medical company under a shell corporation.”
“Who owns it?”
Rachel turned the laptop toward him.
A single name appeared on the screen.
MORETTI FAMILY HOLDINGS.
Luca stared.
His father had owned the building.
“Get the car.”
Rachel caught his arm.
“There's more. The facility's records show that a woman matching Elena's description was admitted under the name Jane Miller. She remained there for eleven months.”
“And after that?”
“The file ends.”
Luca's face hardened.
“Someone deleted it.”
“Someone with access to your family's private medical network.”
He looked at Vanessa, who sat under guard near the window.
“Did you know about this?”
She shook her head.
“Salvatore told me the woman in the hospital was dead. I believed him.”
“You drove the car.”
“I know.”
“You watched it burn.”
Vanessa covered her mouth.
“I was twenty-six. Salvatore had evidence that my brother had stolen money from him. He threatened to kill him if I didn't cooperate.”
Luca's expression remained cold.
“So you helped him destroy my family.”
“I thought Elena would survive.”
“You thought?”
Vanessa began to cry.
Luca turned away.
He could understand fear. He had built an empire by using it. But understanding why someone betrayed him did not make the betrayal disappear.
Rachel pointed at the medical file.
“There's a note written by a nurse. It says the patient repeatedly asked for a little girl named Sophie.”
Luca's heart lurched.
“What else?”
“She also asked about a man named Daniel.”
Luca frowned.
“Daniel who?”
Rachel checked the page.
“No surname.”
Vanessa suddenly stood.
“Daniel was Salvatore's private physician.”
Luca turned.
“Where is he now?”
“Dead,” Vanessa replied. “He died in a house fire two years ago.”
Rachel studied the document.
“Then why did the nurse write that someone visited the patient under his name six months after the fire?”
Nobody spoke.
Luca stared at the entry.
The visitor's signature was barely legible.
But it contained a distinctive capital D.
He had seen that handwriting before.
On letters his father had supposedly written himself.
Luca drove to the abandoned facility that afternoon.
The building stood behind a rusted iron fence, surrounded by dead trees and overgrown grass. Inside, the halls smelled of damp plaster and disinfectant.
Rachel found the old patient wing.
At the end of the corridor stood a locked room.
Luca broke the door open.
Inside were a narrow bed, a chair, and a wardrobe filled with women's clothing.
On the wall hung dozens of drawings of a little girl with brown hair.
Every drawing carried the same name.
SOPHIE.
Beneath the final picture was a sentence written in shaky handwriting.
Tell Luca the truth before the twins find each other.
Rachel stared at the words.
“Twins?”
Luca searched the room.
Inside the wardrobe, he discovered a metal box containing a stack of letters. The earliest was dated three years earlier. The latest had been written only six weeks ago.
He opened the newest envelope.
Luca,
If you have found this room, then Isabella has finally stopped protecting the wrong people.
I am alive, but I cannot come home yet.
Someone has been using my identity to access your accounts, your security systems, and your daughter's medical records. The person doing it knows your habits because they helped create them.
Do not trust Vincent Bell. Do not trust Isabella. And do not believe the story about your brother.
The letter ended abruptly.
Luca turned it over.
A second message had been written beneath the signature.
The woman you buried was not a stranger. She was someone who loved you.
Rachel swallowed.
“Who could that be?”
Luca didn't answer.
He searched the box and found a small silver pendant. Inside was a miniature photograph of Elena holding a newborn baby.
The child had a distinctive crescent-shaped birthmark beneath the left ear.
Luca had seen the same mark on Sophie.
But Sophie was six years old, and the photograph was three years old.
The dates made no sense.
Unless the baby in the photograph wasn't Sophie.
A noise sounded behind them.
Luca turned.
Emma stood in the doorway, pale and breathless.
“Mr. Moretti, we need to leave. Someone has been following me.”
“Where's Sophie?”
Emma's face crumpled.
“I thought she was with your security team.”
Luca's phone rang.
A video appeared.
Sophie sat in a dark room, crying beside a woman whose face was hidden.
A voice spoke from behind the camera.
“You have twenty-four hours to bring me the black ledger.”
The screen went black.
Then a final message appeared.
May you like
IF YOU WANT YOUR DAUGHTER BACK, ASK YOUR WIFE WHICH CHILD SHE REALLY SAVED.
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