Chapter 4 - THE SECRET BENEATH THE ASHES
Elena grabbed the bedside lamp just as the lock clicked.
The door opened three inches before a man's shoulder pushed against it.
She struck him with the lamp.
He cursed, stumbled backward, and fell against the hallway wall.
Elena slammed the door shut and twisted the lock again.
"Mrs. Moretti!" Mrs. Alvarez shouted from somewhere down the corridor. "Open the door!"
Elena froze.
The housekeeper sounded terrified.
Then came another voice.
"Move away from the door!"
A gunshot exploded.
Elena screamed and dropped to the floor, shielding her stomach.
Footsteps thundered past.
A second gunshot followed.
Then silence.
She remained crouched beside the bed until she heard Dante's voice.
"Elena! It's me!"
She opened the door.
Dante stood in the hallway with a pistol in one hand and blood running down his forehead. Marcus was behind him, holding a wounded guard upright.
Dante's eyes immediately dropped to Elena's stomach.
"Are you hurt?"
"No."
He pulled her into his arms before she could object.
For one brief second, she let herself lean against him.
Then she remembered the photograph.
She stepped away.
"Who was that man?"
"We're going to find out."
"Was he here for me?"
Dante didn't answer quickly enough.
Elena's expression hardened.
"Was he here for our daughter?"
"I don't know."
"Then stop telling me what you don't know and start telling me what you do."
Dante looked toward Marcus.
"Get the car ready."
Elena shook her head.
"I'm not going anywhere until you tell me the truth."
He stared at her.
Then, slowly, he lowered his weapon.
"All right."
They went into the bedroom and locked the door.
Dante sat across from her, his injured forehead wrapped in a towel.
"When I was twenty-four, I was engaged to Sofia Bellini. Our families arranged the marriage because it would have united two powerful organizations. I thought I loved her. Maybe I did, in the way a young man can love someone when everyone around him tells him what love is supposed to look like."
Elena listened without interrupting.
"Sofia became pregnant. Six months later, she gave birth to Isabella. But the relationship was already falling apart. Sofia discovered that my father was using the marriage to gain control of her family's shipping business. She wanted out."
"What did you do?"
"I helped her leave."
Elena looked surprised.
"Dante Moretti helped someone walk away from the Moretti family?"
"I wasn't the man I am now."
"That doesn't answer the question."
He looked down at his hands.
"I gave her money and arranged for her to take Isabella somewhere safe. My father discovered what I'd done. He said Sofia had stolen something that belonged to him."
"Your daughter?"
"My daughter was never his to claim."
Dante's voice became colder.
"He sent men to retrieve Sofia. There was an accident on the highway. The car caught fire. Sofia died at the scene. The baby was supposedly taken to the hospital."
"Supposedly?"
"I never saw Isabella's body."
Elena felt a chill.
"What?"
"My father told me the hospital couldn't release her remains. He said the fire had made identification impossible. He arranged the funeral. He told me I had to accept it."
"And you did?"
"I was twenty-five, Elena. My mother was dead. My brother was becoming a stranger. My father controlled everything. I thought if I challenged him, I'd lose everyone else."
Elena stared at him.
"You lost them anyway."
Dante closed his eyes.
"Yes."
A knock sounded.
Marcus entered with a folded document.
"We found something in the laptop. The surveillance records were linked to a private account registered to a woman in Milwaukee."
"Victoria?" Dante asked.
"No. The account was created under the name Sofia Bellini."
Dante stood so quickly that his chair toppled.
"That's impossible."
Marcus handed him the document.
The account had been opened two months earlier. It contained a single bank transfer of two million dollars, sent from an offshore company connected to Dante's father.
Beneath it was a scanned photograph.
Sofia stood outside a hospital, holding a little girl with dark curls.
The child looked about three years old.
On the back, someone had written:
ISABELLA IS ALIVE. KEEP HER AWAY FROM THE MORETTIS.
Dante's hands began to shake.
Elena rose carefully.
"Where was the photograph taken?"
Marcus pointed to the metadata.
"Milwaukee. Six months ago."
Dante looked at him.
"Find Sofia."
"We already tried. The address connected to the account belongs to an abandoned clinic."
"Then find the woman who owns it."
Marcus hesitated.
"There's a complication."
Dante's expression turned dangerous.
"Talk."
"The account wasn't accessed by Sofia. It was accessed by someone using your father's old security credentials."
Dante went still.
His father had been dead for twelve years.
At least, that was what the family had been told.
Elena stared at the screen.
Two brothers, one daughter, a former fiancée, and a dead father who seemed to have left fingerprints on every tragedy.
"How many people in your family are supposed to be dead?" she whispered.
Dante had no answer.
Then Marcus's phone rang.
He listened for several seconds before turning pale.
"Boss, the warehouse from the fire has been sold three times since you demolished it. The current owner started excavating the property yesterday."
"Why?"
"They found human remains beneath the old foundation."
Dante's eyes narrowed.
"How many?"
Marcus swallowed.
"Three sets."
A pause.
"One is identified as Luca Moretti."
Dante gripped the desk.
"And the other two?"
"One belongs to an unidentified woman."
"And the third?"
Marcus looked at Elena.
Then at Dante.
May you like
"The preliminary dental records match your father."
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