Chapter 5 - THE TRAITOR INSIDE THE HOUSE
Nobody slept.
Dante gathered every employee in the ballroom at two in the morning.
Twenty-three people stood beneath the chandeliers.
Security guards.
Housekeepers.
Kitchen staff.
Drivers.
Arthur.
Marco.
Sarah watched from the staircase.
Mia and Bella were locked inside Dante's bedroom with two guards he had personally known since childhood.
"Someone entered my daughters' room tonight," Dante said.
Silence.
"Whoever did it had access to the private floor."
Nobody moved.
Dante placed the photograph on a table.
"I'll ask once."
Still nothing.
Marco began checking security records.
The cameras had gone dark for exactly ninety-three seconds.
Arthur approached Sarah.
"You should sit."
"I'm fine."
"You aren't."
Sarah looked at him.
"Neither are you."
Arthur's expression changed.
"You knew my mother."
He didn't answer.
"You recognized the song."
"Yes."
"How?"
Arthur looked toward Dante.
Then back at Sarah.
"Elena worked here."
Sarah's breath caught.
"When?"
"Before you were born."
"You lied."
"I withheld something."
"That's a fancy word for lying."
Arthur accepted the accusation.
"Your mother was Isabella's closest friend."
"You said they were sisters."
"They called themselves sisters."
Sarah stared at him.
"Why did she leave?"
"Because she discovered she was pregnant."
Sarah frowned.
"With me."
"Yes."
"Who was my father?"
Arthur's silence answered before his words did.
"I don't know."
Sarah stepped closer.
"You do."
"Sarah—"
"Tell me."
A crash interrupted them.
One guard collapsed.
Another reached for his throat.
Poison.
Chaos exploded.
Dante shouted for the girls.
Sarah ran upstairs.
She reached the bedroom first.
The door was open.
Mia stood crying beside the bed.
Bella was gone.
"No."
Dante arrived.
His face transformed.
"Mia, where is your sister?"
The child pointed toward the service corridor.
"Blue lady."
Dante ran.
Sarah followed.
They reached the underground garage.
A black sedan was moving toward the exit.
Dante drew his weapon.
"Stop!"
The sedan accelerated.
Sarah saw Bella through the rear window.
Dante couldn't shoot.
Then another vehicle slammed sideways into the sedan.
Marco.
Metal screamed.
The sedan spun.
Dante tore open the rear door and pulled Bella out.
Sarah grabbed the child.
Marco dragged the driver from the wreck.
Dante ripped off the man's mask.
Arthur gasped behind them.
"Samuel?"
The estate's night security chief.
Dante grabbed him.
"Who paid you?"
Samuel laughed through blood.
"You still don't understand."
Dante hit him.
"Who?"
"Victor isn't your problem."
"Then who is?"
Samuel looked directly toward Arthur.
Dante followed his gaze.
Arthur stood frozen.
"No," Sarah whispered.
Samuel laughed again.
"The old man knows."
Dante released Samuel.
"Arthur?"
Arthur's shoulders sank.
"I hoped this day would never come."
Dante stared at the man who had practically raised him.
"What did you do?"
"Not here."
"Now."
Arthur looked at Mia and Bella.
"Your daughters shouldn't hear it."
They returned upstairs.
Samuel was secured.
The children stayed with Sarah while Dante and Arthur entered the study.
Sarah wasn't invited.
She went anyway.
Dante didn't object.
Arthur stood before the fireplace.
"Thirty-three years ago," he began, "your father ordered me to kill Elena Marino."
Sarah stopped breathing.
Dante stared.
"What?"
"She had seen something she wasn't supposed to see."
"What?"
"Your father murdering a federal informant."
Sarah's voice shook.
"And you killed her?"
"No."
Arthur looked at Sarah.
"I helped her disappear."
Sarah gripped the chair.
"Then years later she returned to Chicago. Isabella had married you by then. Elena believed the Moretti family had changed."
"Had it?"
Arthur looked at Dante.
"You had."
Dante's jaw tightened.
"But Victor hadn't," Arthur continued. "Victor inherited your father's worst instincts. Isabella discovered it."
Sarah whispered, "And my mother helped her."
"Yes."
"Then Mom died of cancer."
Arthur's expression became strange.
"That's what you were told."
Sarah felt cold.
"What does that mean?"
Arthur reached into his jacket.
Dante's guards immediately raised their weapons.
Arthur slowly removed an old photograph.
It showed Elena outside a hospital.
The date stamped in the corner was seventeen years ago.
Sarah had been eleven.
Two years after Elena supposedly died.
Sarah stared.
"No."
"Your mother survived."
"No."
"She entered witness protection."
Sarah's knees nearly gave out.
"She's alive?"
"I don't know."
"Why didn't she take us?"
"Because Victor knew she had children."
Sarah's eyes filled.
"So she abandoned us?"
"She protected you."
"Don't call that protection."
Arthur lowered his head.
"Perhaps it wasn't."
Dante spoke.
"Who is Sarah's father?"
Arthur looked at him.
"I truly don't know."
A phone vibrated.
Not Dante's.
Sarah's.
A text from Toby's number.
One photograph.
Toby tied to a chair.
Beside him stood Victor Moretti.
Older, gray-haired, smiling.
Below it:
BRING THE GIRL.
Then another message arrived.
Sarah opened it.
Her heart stopped.
It was an audio file.
She pressed play.
A woman's voice spoke.
Older now.
But unmistakable.
"Sarah?"
Sarah dropped the phone.
Her mother's voice continued.
"If you're hearing this, sweetheart, I'm sorry."
Sarah covered her mouth.
"I never wanted you inside the Moretti house."
A pause.
Then Elena said the words that changed everything.
May you like
"But if Dante Moretti is beside you, tell him Isabella's killer has been living under his roof for twenty-seven years."
Every eye turned toward Arthur.
