Chapter 5 - What Sofia Never Told Her Husband
For the first time in twenty years, I understood helplessness.
Not fear.
I had known fear.
Fear could be controlled.
Helplessness was different.
Helplessness was staring at an empty blanket where your four-year-old son had been sleeping ten minutes earlier.
Elena collapsed beside the window.
“How?”
Marcus was already checking cameras.
“West side coverage went dark for ninety-two seconds.”
“Ninety-two seconds?”
“Yes.”
“Who can disable it?”
He didn't answer.
“Marcus.”
“Me. Two technicians. Security chief.”
“Where's the chief?”
His face changed.
“Downstairs.”
“Bring him.”
The security chief was gone.
His car remained.
His phone remained.
But he had disappeared.
Samuel was still in the study under guard.
Rourke hadn't moved.
Victor stood beside the staircase looking older than I'd ever seen him.
Mateo grabbed my hand.
“Where's Gabe?”
I looked down.
Three children stared at me.
I couldn't lie to them.
“Someone took him.”
Luca began crying.
Nico whispered, “Bad cars?”
“Maybe.”
Mateo squeezed my fingers.
“Get him back.”
Three words.
No dramatic speech.
No pleading.
He simply believed I could.
I crouched.
“I will.”
That promise became the only thing in the world that mattered.
We had one advantage.
The kidnappers wanted Sofia's notebook.
That meant Gabriel was valuable alive.
More importantly, it meant there was something in the notebook we had not yet understood.
I carried it into the library.
Elena came with me.
We examined every page.
Transactions.
Names.
Dates.
Nothing obvious.
Then Elena noticed the binding.
“This page is thicker.”
She touched the inside back cover.
I cut carefully along the seam.
A folded sheet slid out.
Not financial records.
A birth certificate.
Actually, four.
Mateo Carlo Moretti.
Luca James Moretti.
Nicolas Antonio Moretti.
Gabriel Sofia Moretti.
Father:
Alejandro Carlo Moretti.
Mother:
Sofia Elena Moretti.
I stared at the documents.
There was something beneath them.
A handwritten letter.
Not addressed to me.
Addressed to Victor.
I unfolded it.
Victor, if I fail, you must tell Alejandro what Carlo wanted for him. Samuel knows enough to destroy everything, but he is not acting alone. Someone in the family is financing him.
I looked at Victor.
He read over my shoulder.
His face tightened.
“Someone in the family.”
“Who?”
“I don't know.”
Then he stopped.
His eyes moved back to the page.
“What?”
“Sofia underlined family.”
“So?”
“She wouldn't have done that accidentally.”
I thought of the Moretti family.
My father had one brother.
Victor.
But my grandfather had two sons and one daughter.
My aunt Isabella.
Dead for twelve years.
She had one child.
Marco DeLuca.
My cousin.
Marco had grown up around us.
He was three years older than me.
When my father died, Marco expected Victor to put him in charge.
Victor chose me.
Marco left Chicago two years later.
Or so I thought.
“Marco.”
Victor whispered the same name.
Rourke, listening from across the room, went still.
I turned.
“You know him.”
Rourke nodded slowly.
“I never knew his real name.”
“What?”
“He called himself Mark Dell.”
Marcus looked up sharply.
Our missing security chief.
Marcus Dell.
No.
Marcus's surname was Dell.
I turned toward him.
Marcus's face had gone pale.
“My father.”
Silence.
“What?”
“My father's name was Mark Dell.”
Victor stepped forward.
“What was your mother's name?”
“Rebecca.”
“And your grandfather?”
Marcus looked confused.
“Anthony DeLuca.”
Victor closed his eyes.
I understood.
“Marco changed his name.”
Marcus stared at us.
“No.”
“Your father is Marco DeLuca.”
“No. My father died when I was twelve.”
Victor shook his head.
“Apparently not.”
Marcus backed away.
Everything shifted.
Marcus had been in my house for seven years.
He knew every security protocol.
Every camera.
Every entrance.
But his shock looked genuine.
Then his phone buzzed.
A message.
He looked at it.
His face changed.
“What?”
He handed it to me.
A photograph of Gabriel.
Alive.
Sitting in a chair.
Holding his dinosaur.
Behind him was a wall painted industrial green.
Text beneath the photograph:
MIDNIGHT. OLD MORETTI PRINTING PLANT. NOTEBOOK FOR THE BOY. ALEJANDRO COMES ALONE.
Victor whispered, “That building belonged to your grandfather.”
I knew it.
Abandoned fifteen years earlier.
Southwest side.
I looked at the clock.
10:48.
Seventy-two minutes.
“I'll go.”
“No,” Elena said.
I looked at her.
“You're not going alone.”
“I am.”
“You don't know what they want.”
“Yes, I do.”
“The notebook.”
“No.”
She stared.
“They want me.”
At 11:56, I entered the old printing plant carrying Sofia's notebook.
Alone, as requested.
At least that was what anyone watching would believe.
I had left Marcus behind because I didn't know whether his connection to Marco made him compromised.
He hated me for it.
I didn't care.
Gabriel mattered more.
Inside, old machinery stood beneath hanging work lights.
I walked forward.
“Gabriel?”
“Dad?”
The word stopped me.
He had never called me that.
I saw him across the floor.
He sat on a wooden chair.
Not tied.
Not hurt.
A man stood behind him.
Tall.
Gray at the temples.
About forty-two.
I recognized pieces of Victor in his face.
Pieces of my grandfather.
Marco DeLuca.
My cousin.
The dead man.
He smiled.
“Hello, Alejandro.”
“Let him go.”
“You haven't seen me in twenty years and that's all you have to say?”
“Let my son go.”
Gabriel looked at me.
“You came.”
“Of course I came.”
Marco smiled.
“Sofia always said you would.”
My blood chilled.
“You spoke to Sofia?”
“Many times.”
“You killed her.”
His expression changed.
“No.”
“Samuel worked for you.”
“Samuel worked for money.”
“Same thing.”
Marco looked toward the notebook.
“Put it down.”
“Gabriel first.”
“He's unharmed.”
“That wasn't the agreement.”
“You aren't in a position to negotiate.”
I looked at Gabriel.
He wasn't crying.
Brave little boy.
Too brave.
“Gabe.”
“Yes?”
“When I tell you, walk toward me.”
Marco laughed.
“You really think it's that simple?”
“No.”
I dropped the notebook.
Marco's eyes followed it.
“Now.”
Gabriel ran.
Marco reached for him.
The lights went out.
Marcus had disobeyed me.
Good.
I heard movement.
Shouting.
Nothing more.
When emergency lights came on, Gabriel was against my chest.
I held him so tightly he squeaked.
“Dad.”
“I've got you.”
Marcus and my security team emerged from side entrances.
Marco was gone.
He knew the building better than we did.
But Gabriel was safe.
That was enough.
For the moment.
Outside, wrapped in my coat, Gabriel told me something.
“The man said he knew Mama.”
“I know.”
“He said Mama gave him something.”
“What?”
“He said she gave him the real notebook.”
I froze.
“What did he say?”
Gabriel repeated it carefully.
“He said, ‘Your father brought me the copy, just like Sofia planned.’”
I stared at him.
The notebook we had carried from St. Catherine's was bait.
Sofia had known someone might eventually come for it.
“Did he say where the real one was?”
Gabriel nodded.
My heart pounded.
“What did he say?”
“He said Mama put it where you never looked.”
“Where?”
Gabriel pointed at me.
“Your wedding ring.”
My hand instinctively touched the ring I still wore five years after Sofia's death.
I removed it.
Inside the band was a tiny engraved number I had never noticed.
428.
Elena saw it.
Her eyes widened.
“April twenty-eighth.”
Our wedding anniversary.
Then Victor whispered, “The cemetery.”
I looked at him.
“Sofia's crypt number is 428.”
And suddenly I knew where my wife had hidden the evidence that could expose everything.
Not beneath St. Catherine's.
Not in a bank.
Not in a safe.
She had hidden it inside the place no grieving husband would ever think to disturb.
May you like
Her own grave.
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