Chapter 2 - THE WOMAN WHO KNEW TOO MUCH
Luca didn't move for several seconds.
His daughter was still wrapped around his neck, her small fingers knotted into the collar of his black suit. Emily stood beside the abandoned wardrobe, one hand resting protectively over her stomach. Maria had retreated toward the hallway.
And Vanessa was staring at Luca's phone as though the photograph might leap from the screen and drag her into the darkness.
“Everyone out,” Luca ordered.
Maria hurried away.
Vanessa remained where she was.
“Darling, please. Let me explain before you do something you'll regret.”
Luca's eyes were terrifyingly calm.
“That's the problem, Vanessa. You keep asking me to listen before you've given me one honest sentence.”
He carried Sophie upstairs himself. In her bedroom, he checked her arms, her legs, and the back of her head. He asked whether she felt dizzy or had trouble breathing.
“I'm okay, Daddy,” she whispered. “I just couldn't get the door open.”
“How long were you inside?”
Sophie hesitated.
“Long enough to count to one hundred twenty.”
Luca's throat tightened. Two minutes in a locked cabinet might not sound like much to an adult. To a frightened six-year-old who believed nobody was coming, it could feel endless.
“Did Vanessa put you there because you saw the man?”
Sophie nodded.
“She told me grown-up secrets weren't for little girls.”
“And the man?”
“He told her to make me forget his face.”
Luca sat beside her.
“Did he touch you?”
“No. He smiled at me.” Sophie's lower lip trembled. “Daddy, his smile looked like yours.”
Luca closed his eyes briefly.
Adrian had been younger by four years, reckless and charming, the only person who could make Luca laugh when their father was alive. Their relationship had shattered after a dispute over the family's criminal empire. Then Adrian's boat had exploded during a storm.
Luca had searched the coastline for weeks.
He had buried a coffin containing only personal belongings.
He had mourned his brother while building an empire around the hole Adrian left behind.
Now the dead man had returned to his house.
And somehow, Elena's death was involved.
Luca kissed Sophie's forehead.
“Stay with Rosa tonight. Don't open the door for anyone except me or the security guards I personally assign.”
“Even Vanessa?”
“Especially Vanessa.”
He went downstairs and found Vanessa waiting in the study.
She had removed her engagement ring and placed it on the desk.
“Before you accuse me of murder,” she said, “remember that Elena was my friend.”
Luca stared at her.
“Elena never trusted you.”
“Because she knew I wanted a life with you.”
“You wanted my name, my money, and my protection.”
Vanessa flinched.
“That's unfair.”
“Then tell me what happened to my brother.”
She took a shaky breath.
“Adrian contacted me six months ago. He said he was alive, but that someone was trying to kill him.”
“Who?”
“He wouldn't tell me.”
“And you believed him?”
“He showed me a scar. He knew things nobody else could know. He knew the nickname Elena used for you when you were alone.”
Luca's expression changed.
“What nickname?”
Vanessa swallowed.
“Lucky.”
Elena had called him that only during their first year of marriage, before they stopped pretending that love could protect them from the Moretti family's enemies.
Luca leaned forward.
“Where is he?”
“I don't know.”
“Try again.”
“I swear.”
He watched her carefully. Vanessa was frightened, but fear didn't prove innocence. She had always been an accomplished liar, and he had ignored the warning signs because marrying her seemed easier than spending another year fighting off the women his enemies sent into his life.
“Why was Sophie locked inside that wardrobe?”
Vanessa's eyes filled with tears.
“Adrian told me she had seen something. He said she needed to be kept somewhere safe until he could leave.”
“Inside a locked cabinet?”
“I panicked!”
“You had an entire mansion.”
“I thought you were coming home early. I thought if I could move the wardrobe into storage, nobody would find her until—”
“Until what?”
Vanessa's mouth closed.
Luca rose.
“Finish that sentence, and maybe I'll believe you.”
She stared at the floor.
He understood then that she wasn't telling him everything.
A knock sounded at the study door.
His head of security, Dominic Russo, entered carrying a laptop.
“Boss, we found something in the west corridor footage.”
He turned the screen toward Luca.
At 4:17 p.m., Adrian had entered the mansion through a service entrance. He wore a maintenance uniform and a cap pulled low over his face.
At 4:26, he walked into Luca's office.
At 4:39, he left carrying a slim black folder.
At 4:44, Vanessa entered the corridor.
She wasn't alone.
A second man followed her, his face obscured by a surgical mask.
Dominic paused the video.
“There's something else. The cameras were disabled for eleven minutes after this.”
“By whom?”
Dominic looked uncomfortable.
“Someone using your authorization code.”
Luca's phone vibrated again.
A new message appeared.
Your brother isn't the only person you buried without a body.
Attached was an old photograph of Elena, taken two days before her death.
She was standing beside a hospital bed.
In the bed lay a woman Luca had never seen before.
On the woman's wrist was a hospital bracelet bearing one word:
VITALE.
Luca recognized the name immediately.
The Vitale family had been his father's most dangerous rivals.
He looked up at Dominic.
“Find that hospital. Find the woman. And lock down every exit.”
Then Vanessa whispered something that stopped him cold.
“Elena wasn't supposed to die that night.”
Luca turned slowly.
“What did you just say?”
Vanessa's face crumpled.
“Adrian told me that if you ever learned the truth, the first person you'd kill would be me.”
Luca stepped toward her.
“Then pray he's wrong.”
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And for the first time since Elena's funeral, Luca Moretti wondered whether the woman he had loved had been murdered for a secret that was still alive.
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