Chương 5 - THE PRICE OF BETRAYAL
Vincent Calder looked nothing like a dead man.
He was elegant, composed, and smiling.
That frightened Clara more than the gun.
“Put the ledger on the desk,” Vincent said.
Damian did not move.
Vanessa stepped forward.
Her engagement ring was still on her finger.
“Do it, Damian.”
He looked at her.
“Was any of it real?”
For the first time, Vanessa’s confidence faltered.
Then Vincent laughed.
“Wrong question.”
Damian ignored him.
“Vanessa.”
She looked at Damian.
Three years stood between them.
Vacations.
Dinners.
Funerals.
Promises.
“I did care about you,” she said.
“Past tense.”
“You were never going to give me anything.”
“I gave you everything you asked for.”
“No. You gave me access. You never gave me power.”
Clara watched Damian absorb the difference.
Vanessa continued.
“My father spent his life being humiliated by your family. The Sterlings introduced Antonio to half the investors who built his first legitimate companies. Then the Morettis took everything.”
Vincent smiled.
“History depends on who survives to tell it.”
Clara looked at him.
“My father survived long enough to write things down.”
Vincent’s smile disappeared.
“Thomas was stubborn.”
“You killed him.”
“I offered him money.”
“You killed him.”
“He made a choice.”
Clara lunged.
Damian caught her around the waist.
“Clara.”
“Say it!” she screamed.
Vincent tilted his head.
“Your father found financial records he was not supposed to find. He refused to destroy them.”
Clara’s eyes filled with tears.
“He had a daughter.”
“He should have thought about that.”
Damian moved so quickly Vanessa screamed.
He struck Vincent’s gun hand against the doorframe.
The pistol fell.
Clara kicked it beneath a cabinet.
Vanessa grabbed the ledger.
Damian and Vincent crashed into the desk.
Wood splintered.
Clara chased Vanessa into the ballroom.
“Stop!”
Vanessa ran.
Clara caught the back of her dress.
Fabric tore.
Both women fell.
The ledger slid across the floor.
Vanessa struck Clara.
Clara hit back.
Hard.
Vanessa stared at her in disbelief.
Clara wiped blood from her lip.
“I clean bathrooms, remember?”
Vanessa reached for the ledger.
Clara stepped on it.
“Move.”
“No.”
“You think Damian loves you?”
Clara froze.
Vanessa laughed.
“There it is.”
“This has nothing to do with Damian.”
“It has everything to do with him. You think because he looked at you twice, you belong in his world?”
Clara’s anger became strangely calm.
“No.”
She bent and picked up the ledger.
“I think my father died protecting this.”
Vanessa reached inside her dress.
Clara saw metal.
“Damian!”
A gunshot exploded through the ballroom.
Vanessa dropped.
Not wounded.
Disarmed.
Rosa stood at the entrance holding a small pistol.
“I dislike guns,” the seventy-year-old announced. “But I dislike bad manners more.”
Security rushed in behind her.
Vincent was restrained.
Vanessa stared at Damian.
“Please.”
He looked down at the woman he had intended to marry.
“You poured paint over an innocent woman to hide evidence.”
“Damian—”
“You helped the man who killed her father.”
“I didn’t know about that.”
Vincent laughed from the floor.
“She knew enough.”
Vanessa turned on him.
“Shut up!”
And that was when Damian understood something.
Vincent and Vanessa were not partners.
Not really.
They were predators waiting for the other to become weak.
Damian looked at Evan.
“Copy everything in Ledger 17.”
Vanessa went pale.
“You can’t.”
“Watch me.”
By afternoon, attorneys and federal investigators were contacted.
Damian made a decision that shocked Rosa.
He would turn over every legitimate record relevant to Vincent’s fraud.
Even records that embarrassed the Moretti family.
“No more hiding,” Damian said.
Rosa studied her nephew.
“Your father would disagree.”
“My father is dead.”
“And your grandfather?”
“Also dead.”
Damian looked toward Clara.
“I’m tired of dead men deciding what the living are allowed to know.”
Clara said nothing.
But something changed between them.
That evening, Damian found her sitting alone on the hotel roof.
“You should have told me Vincent admitted what happened to your father.”
“You heard him.”
“That wasn’t justice.”
“No.”
She looked across Manhattan.
“But it was the first truth I’ve had in twelve years.”
Damian sat beside her.
“My family created the world that killed him.”
“Vincent killed him.”
“My family helped create Vincent.”
Clara looked at him.
“You’re not responsible for everything your father did.”
“You don’t know everything my father did.”
“No.”
She paused.
“But neither do you.”
Damian looked at her.
Their faces were closer than either had realized.
For one suspended second, Clara thought he might kiss her.
Instead, Damian moved back.
“You work for me.”
Clara’s heart dropped.
“Yes.”
“That needs to change.”
Her face hardened.
“You’re firing me?”
“No.”
For the first time, Damian smiled.
“I’m offering you a job.”
“What kind?”
“Director of historical assets and acquisitions.”
Clara stared.
“I don’t have a degree.”
“You found eleven million dollars of corporate espionage behind a painting.”
“That isn’t exactly a résumé category.”
“It is now.”
Despite herself, she laughed.
Then Damian’s phone rang.
His smile vanished.
Evan was speaking rapidly.
“What?”
Damian stood.
Clara followed.
“What happened?”
Damian lowered the phone.
“Vincent escaped custody during transport.”
Clara went cold.
“How?”
“We don’t know.”
Damian looked toward the street below.
Then his phone buzzed.
A photograph appeared.
Rosa Moretti sitting inside a car.
Unconscious.
May you like
Beneath it was one sentence.
MIDNIGHT. BRING LEDGER 17 OR BURY ANOTHER PERSON YOU LOVE.
