Chapter 4 - Blood Does Not Mean Loyalty
Massimo Moretti had taught Lorenzo how to fire a pistol when he was thirteen.
He had taught Mateo how to cheat at cards when they were fourteen.
When Lorenzo's father died, Massimo stood beside the twins at the funeral and promised no Moretti would ever face the world alone.
For nearly twenty years, Lorenzo had believed him.
Now Lorenzo sat across from Mrs. Carbone in a locked warehouse and wondered whether his uncle had been lying for all of them.
Carbone looked older than she had the day before.
Her elegant gray hair hung loose.
Her expensive coat was stained with snow and road salt.
She had stopped demanding a lawyer once Antonio placed the photograph of Lydia on the table.
"The witness goes with him," Lorenzo read.
Carbone looked away.
"Who wrote it?"
Silence.
Lorenzo leaned forward.
"Who ordered Mateo's death?"
"I don't know."
Antonio stood against the wall.
Lorenzo waited.
He had learned years earlier that silence frightened guilty people more effectively than shouting.
Carbone finally spoke.
"I was supposed to change the assignments."
"You did."
"That was all."
"You gave someone access."
"I gave them a time."
"You disabled security."
"No."
"Who did?"
"I don't know."
"Who paid you?"
Carbone's mouth tightened.
Lorenzo placed the financial records in front of her.
"We already know about the money."
Her eyes flicked downward.
"You took fifty thousand before Mateo's ambush."
"No."
"The account did."
"I didn't know what that payment was for."
"Then tell me what you thought it was."
Carbone's hands shook.
"A favor."
"What favor?"
"Information."
Lorenzo's voice lowered.
"What information?"
"Your schedule."
The room seemed to lose oxygen.
Antonio looked down.
Lorenzo remained motionless.
"Whose schedule?"
Carbone closed her eyes.
"Yours."
Two years of guilt exploded behind Lorenzo's ribs.
Mateo had been shot because the attackers expected Lorenzo.
He had always known that.
But hearing the information had been sold from inside his own home made it real in a new way.
"Who wanted it?"
"I never met him."
"Then why were you calling Massimo?"
Carbone looked up sharply.
Lorenzo saw it.
Fear.
Not surprise.
Fear.
"Answer."
"He helped me."
"With what?"
"Leaving."
"Why?"
"Because he knew what had happened."
Lorenzo's voice became quiet.
"Did my uncle order the attack?"
"No."
Too fast.
Lorenzo stood.
Carbone recoiled.
"Did he order it?"
"I don't know!"
"Did Massimo pay you?"
"I don't know!"
"Did he know Mateo would be hit instead of me?"
Tears appeared in her eyes.
"I don't know!"
Lorenzo slammed both hands onto the table.
"Then tell me what you do know."
Carbone broke.
The story came out unevenly.
Years earlier, she had accumulated gambling debts through her son.
Someone offered money for harmless information.
Travel schedules.
Guests.
Security changes.
She accepted.
The requests became more specific.
Then dangerous.
By the time she realized what she had helped create, she was trapped.
"Who contacted you?"
"A man named Russo."
"First name?"
"Daniel."
Antonio shifted.
Lorenzo knew Daniel Russo.
Everyone did.
Massimo's longtime attorney.
A discreet man who had worked around the family for fifteen years.
"Where is Russo?"
Carbone shook her head.
"I don't know."
"Does Massimo know?"
"He always knows."
Lorenzo stared.
There it was.
Not proof.
But enough.
When Lorenzo returned to the estate, Lydia was waiting in the front hall.
"You shouldn't be awake."
"It's eight in the evening."
"You were injured."
"So were you."
He frowned.
"I wasn't."
"You look like you've been punched internally."
Despite everything, the line nearly made him smile.
Not quite.
She followed him toward his study.
"What happened?"
"Carbone talked."
"And?"
"You don't need to know."
Lydia stopped.
Lorenzo walked three more steps before realizing she was no longer behind him.
He turned.
"What?"
"You really think you can do that?"
"Do what?"
"Use me when I have information, lock me under guard when I'm in danger, then tell me I don't need to know what connects to people trying to kill me?"
He stared.
Lydia crossed her arms.
"No."
"Lydia—"
"No. I'm involved whether either of us likes it."
Lorenzo's instinct was to order her upstairs.
His second instinct was to acknowledge she was right.
He hated the second one.
"Come in."
Inside the study, he told her nearly everything.
The payments.
The schedule.
Russo.
Massimo.
Lydia sat very still.
When he finished, she asked, "You think your uncle did it?"
"I think believing that without proof would be dangerous."
"And believing he couldn't because he's family?"
"More dangerous."
She nodded.
Then her eyes lowered.
"My father used to talk about Massimo."
Lorenzo looked at her.
"What did he say?"
"That he smiled when everyone else got nervous."
A strange chill passed through Lorenzo.
That described Massimo perfectly.
"He also said Massimo knew where every dollar in the organization went."
Lorenzo remembered his father trusting Massimo with financial records.
Before he could respond, Mateo's emergency call sounded through the house.
Lorenzo was running before the second chime.
Lydia followed.
They reached Mateo's room together.
He was safe.
His nurse stood beside him holding an envelope.
"What happened?" Lorenzo demanded.
"Nothing. He asked me to call you."
Mateo's gaze went to the envelope.
Lorenzo took it.
No name.
No stamp.
Someone had slipped it beneath Mateo's door.
Inside was a photograph from twenty years earlier.
Lorenzo and Mateo as boys.
Their father stood behind them.
Massimo stood beside him.
On the back:
FAMILY SHOULD STAY QUIET.
Lorenzo's pulse slowed in the dangerous way it always did before violence.
Lydia looked at the picture.
"Someone is inside the house."
Antonio appeared seconds later.
Every guard was accounted for.
Every door locked.
Every employee under observation.
Yet someone had approached Mateo's room unnoticed.
Lorenzo looked toward the surveillance camera above the corridor.
"Show me the feed."
They checked.
Nothing.
At 7:41 p.m., the hallway had been empty.
At 7:42, the envelope appeared.
No person.
No shadow.
No movement.
The footage had been altered.
"Only someone with high-level access can do that," Antonio said.
Lorenzo turned toward him.
"How high?"
Antonio hesitated.
"Yours. Mine. Mateo's old administrative code."
"Anyone else?"
A pause.
"Massimo."
Lydia looked at Lorenzo.
That was when Mateo made a weak sound.
"Lor..."
Lorenzo went to him.
Mateo moved his lips several times.
"Again."
Mateo tried.
"Desk."
"What desk?"
Mateo's eyes shifted toward the old writing desk across the room.
It had belonged to their father.
Lorenzo walked to it.
The drawers contained papers, pens, stationery.
Nothing unusual.
Mateo made another sound.
"Under."
Lorenzo crouched.
His hand traced beneath the center drawer.
Something clicked.
A hidden compartment opened.
Inside was a small black notebook.
Lorenzo's heart stopped.
He recognized his father's handwriting immediately.
The notebook contained names.
Dates.
Transactions.
Amounts.
And near the final pages, a sentence underlined three times.
MASSIMO IS MOVING MONEY AGAIN. VITTORIO DELUCA WAS RIGHT.
Lydia covered her mouth.
Lorenzo kept reading.
If anything happens to me, protect the boys from their uncle.
For several seconds, he could not move.
His father had known.
Lydia's father had known.
Both were dead.
Mateo had been nearly killed.
And Lorenzo had spent years allowing Massimo inside his home.
His businesses.
His life.
Then his phone rang.
Massimo.
Lorenzo stared at the name.
Antonio reached for his weapon.
Lorenzo answered.
"Uncle."
Massimo's familiar voice came through warm and calm.
"Lorenzo. I heard there was trouble at the house."
"You hear everything."
"You know me."
Lorenzo looked at the notebook.
Apparently, he never had.
Massimo continued.
"I'd like to come by."
"When?"
"Now."
Lorenzo met Antonio's gaze.
Then Lydia's.
Then Mateo's.
"Come."
Massimo chuckled softly.
"Good. We need to talk about your new maid."
Lorenzo's hand tightened.
"What about her?"
"Only that you should be very careful."
A pause.
"Women like Lydia DeLuca have a way of bringing dead secrets back to life."
The line went silent.
Lorenzo slowly lowered the phone.
Massimo had called her Lydia DeLuca.
A name she had never used inside the estate.
And at that moment, Lorenzo no longer needed to wonder whether his uncle knew who she was.
May you like
He only needed to discover how many people Massimo planned to kill before the night was over.
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