Chapter 9 - The Last Lie
Grace stared at the phone.
Her mother's voice had sounded frightened.
Not guilty.
Frightened.
“Play it again,” she said.
Richard smiled.
“Why?”
“Because I want to hear the entire recording.”
“It's enough.”
“No. It's not.”
Vincent stepped forward.
“Richard, this ends now.”
Richard laughed.
“Still giving orders?”
He gestured toward the dark corners of the warehouse.
Three men emerged.
Vincent's security team had been separated outside.
Grace understood immediately.
They had walked into another trap.
Tony stood.
“Richard, you promised nobody would get hurt.”
Richard turned toward him.
“I promised you would get your money.”
Tony looked devastated.
Grace understood.
Tony had been paid.
The hospital discharge.
The false affidavit.
The information about the archive.
It had all been Tony.
“Why?” Grace whispered.
Tony's eyes filled with tears.
“My daughter.”
Grace went still.
“What about her?”
“She was diagnosed with a serious heart condition. The treatment was expensive. Richard offered to pay for everything.”
“You could have told me.”
“I was ashamed.”
“You could have asked for help.”
“I didn't want to lose the restaurant.”
Grace shook her head.
“You risked everyone to save one person.”
Tony looked down.
“I know.”
Richard interrupted.
“Enough sentimental nonsense. Sign the document.”
Grace looked at him.
“No.”
Richard's smile disappeared.
“You don't understand what you're refusing.”
“I understand perfectly. You want my signature because the law won't accept your claim without acknowledging the family connection.”
“It's a formality.”
“Then why are you so desperate?”
For the first time, Richard looked uncertain.
Vincent noticed.
“Because the inheritance isn't what he wants,” he said.
Richard turned.
“Shut up.”
Vincent continued.
“He wants control of the company because the original financial records are still hidden somewhere. The trust only gives him money. Control gives him access.”
Grace remembered the old documents.
The shell companies.
The warehouse fire.
The missing millions.
Richard wanted the original accounts.
“What are you looking for?” she asked.
Richard's expression hardened.
“Your mother's evidence.”
Grace looked at the desk.
Then at the old warehouse office.
A small metal box sat beneath the window.
She recognized it from the photograph in the archive.
Her mother had been holding the same box.
“You already have the evidence,” Grace said.
Richard smiled.
“Not all of it.”
“Where is the rest?”
He looked toward Vincent.
“Your father left something in the blue room. A ledger. The original one.”
Vincent went still.
“The study was searched.”
“Not properly.”
Richard stepped closer.
“My father told me where it was hidden.”
Grace frowned.
“You said you barely knew him.”
“I knew enough.”
Vincent studied him.
“You were there the night he died.”
Richard didn't answer.
“You were a child.”
“I was fourteen.”
Grace looked at him.
“You watched your own father arrange a murder?”
Richard's face twisted.
“He told me it was necessary.”
“And you believed him?”
“I believed that family was everything.”
Grace's voice became quiet.
“Then he taught you the wrong lesson.”
Richard raised his hand.
One of his men moved toward Vincent.
But before anyone could react, Tony struck the nearest guard with a metal flashlight.
The man fell.
Vincent moved immediately.
A fight erupted.
Grace ducked behind the desk as the men struggled.
Tony grabbed the document and tore it in half.
Richard shouted.
“You stupid old man!”
Tony turned toward him.
“I should've done this years ago.”
Richard lunged.
Vincent intercepted him.
The two men crashed against a filing cabinet.
A gun fell to the floor.
Grace reached for it, but a second man grabbed her wrist.
She kicked his knee, pulled free, and ran toward the office door.
Outside, headlights flooded the warehouse.
Police vehicles.
Vincent's security chief had called them.
The men dropped their weapons.
Richard was forced to his knees.
But he was laughing.
Grace approached him.
“What is so funny?”
He looked up.
“You think this is over?”
Vincent stepped beside her.
“It's over.”
Richard shook his head.
“You still don't know what your father left behind.”
Grace looked toward the police.
Richard leaned closer.
“Ask Eleanor what happened after the warehouse fire.”
Vincent's expression darkened.
“What are you talking about?”
Richard smiled.
“Your mother didn't disappear because Arthur threatened her.”
He looked directly at Grace.
“She disappeared because she killed someone.”
At the police station, Richard refused to answer further questions.
Tony gave a full statement and admitted his involvement.
He agreed to cooperate with investigators, including the financial fraud investigation.
Grace was furious with him.
But when she learned that his daughter had already been admitted for treatment, she couldn't bring herself to hate him.
Not completely.
Vincent arranged for Tony's daughter to receive treatment through a legitimate medical foundation, with no conditions attached.
Tony cried when he heard.
Grace stood beside him.
“Don't ever do something like that again.”
“I won't.”
“You don't get to make decisions for everyone just because you're scared.”
Tony nodded.
“I know.”
Later that evening, Grace returned to Roselli's.
The restaurant was closed.
The tables were empty.
Her mother's photograph remained beside the register.
Vincent entered quietly.
“Your mother wants to see you.”
Grace looked up.
“Where?”
“At my house.”
She hesitated.
“Why?”
“She says it's time to tell us what happened after the fire.”
Grace stared at him.
Then her phone buzzed.
A message from an unknown number.
It contained a photograph of Eleanor.
She was standing beside a hospital bed.
A man lay beneath the blankets.
The message contained only one sentence.
SHE DIDN'T KILL THE MAN IN THE WAREHOUSE. SHE SAVED HIM.
Grace looked at Vincent.
He read the message.
May you like
Then his face changed.
The man in the photograph was unmistakably Vincent's father.
