Chapter 6 - THE SILVER BRACELET
The River Edge orphanage was a massive, decaying brick building surrounded by overgrown dead vines. It looked like a rotting tooth against the gray Chicago skyline.
Luca parked his SUV a block away. The rain had stopped, leaving a heavy, chilling fog rolling off the nearby river.
“Stay close to me,” Luca whispered, drawing a heavy black handgun from his shoulder holster.
I nodded, clutching the heavy flashlight from the car. I was terrified, but the thought of Leo—Julian—locked in this freezing building pushed the fear down into a cold resolve.
We forced open a rusted side door. The air inside smelled of mildew and old paper.
“We search the basement first,” Luca signaled.
We moved silently down the dark corridors. The silence was oppressive.
Suddenly, a faint, rhythmic sound echoed from the floor above us.
Thump. Thump. Thump.
Like a bouncing ball.
Luca raised his gun, pointing the flashlight beam toward the main staircase.
We climbed the stairs, our footsteps masked by the rotting wood.
The sound was coming from the old headmaster’s office at the end of the hall.
Luca positioned himself by the door frame. He gave me a look that said stay back, then kicked the heavy oak door open.
He swept the room with his gun and flashlight.
“Clear,” he called out, lowering his weapon slightly.
I stepped into the room.
It was empty.
But in the center of the dusty floor, an old tennis ball was still rolling, eventually coming to a stop against the leg of a heavy desk.
Someone had just been here.
I walked over to the desk. Resting on top of the rotting wood was an object that made my breath catch.
It was Vanessa’s thick, braided silver bracelet.
The same one she was wearing in the Polaroid photograph.
“Luca,” I said softly, picking it up.
It was heavy. Much heavier than normal jewelry. I turned it over.
There was a tiny clasp on the inside. I pressed it.
The bracelet sprang open, revealing a hidden compartment. Inside was a small, rolled-up piece of parchment.
Luca came up beside me, shining the light on the paper as I unrolled it.
It was a legal document. A syndicate contract.
Custody of the minor, Julian Moretti, transfers to Vanessa Bellini upon the death of Luca Moretti. The trust fund, valued at $400 million, will be controlled by the guardian.
“She didn’t just want to marry you,” I whispered, horrified. “She wanted you dead. The engagement was just to get close enough to secure the legal claim.”
“If Daniel had killed me in the mausoleum tonight, she would have inherited everything by sunrise,” Luca said, his voice deadly quiet.
Suddenly, the heavy oak door slammed shut behind us.
The lock clicked with a loud, final echo.
“Well, well,” a voice came from the intercom speaker on the wall.
It was Daniel.
“You figured out the acronym, Emma. Your father taught you well. Too bad you didn’t inherit his survival instincts.”
Luca threw his shoulder against the heavy oak door. It didn’t budge. The wood was reinforced with steel.
“Daniel,” Luca growled. “Where is my son?”
“He’s safe, Boss,” Daniel laughed through the static. “Vanessa is taking him to the airstrip right now. They’re leaving the country. And since you didn’t show up to the Bellini estate with the money, I get the pleasure of tying up the loose ends.”
I heard the sound of liquid splashing against the outside of the door.
Gasoline.
“You’re going to burn us alive?” Luca yelled, stepping back from the door.
“It’s poetry, really,” Daniel mocked. “The great Luca Moretti, dying in a fire. The commission will think it was a tragic accident while investigating a property. Goodbye, Boss.”
A match struck.
Flames instantly roared under the gap in the door, chewing through the dry wood and spreading rapidly across the carpet.
The room began filling with thick, black smoke.
“Luca!” I coughed, backing away from the heat.
Luca didn’t panic. He looked around the office. The windows were boarded up with heavy iron grates. The door was a wall of fire.
He looked at the heavy desk in the center of the room.
“Help me push this!” Luca yelled over the roar of the fire.
We threw our combined weight against the massive oak desk, pushing it toward the boarded-up window.
“Climb up!” he ordered.
I scrambled onto the desk. Luca jumped up beside me. He aimed his gun at the hinges of the iron grate and fired four rapid shots.
The metal splintered, but the grate didn’t fall.
The fire was climbing the walls. My lungs burned with every breath.
Luca grabbed the heavy iron grate with his bare hands. He roared, his muscles straining against the damaged metal.
With a deafening crack, the grate tore free from the brick wall.
He threw it aside and kicked the glass window out.
“Go!” he shouted, grabbing me by the waist and hoisting me out the window.
We fell onto the wet grass outside just as the office above us flashed over into an inferno.
We lay on the ground, coughing violently, staring up at the burning building.
Luca sat up, his face covered in soot, his eyes blazing with a terrifying resolve.
“He said the airstrip,” Luca coughed, pulling me to my feet. “We have less than an hour.”
As we ran back to the SUV, I looked down at my hand.
I was still holding Vanessa’s silver bracelet.
But as the streetlights caught the metal, I noticed something I hadn’t seen in the dark office.
Engraved on the inside of the bracelet, next to the hidden clasp, were the numbers 7-1-4.
May you like
My father’s workshop code.
“Luca,” I said, stopping at the car door. “Vanessa didn’t just wear this bracelet. My father made it for her.”
