Chapter 4 - The Man Dominic Thought Was Dead
Dominic Moretti responded to threats differently than ordinary people.
Ordinary people called the police.
Dominic transformed his estate into a fortress.
Before sunrise, every staff member was re-screened. Deliveries stopped. Vehicles were searched twice. Windows on the private floor were fitted with additional sensors. Two security officers remained outside the children’s rooms around the clock.
Even the flowers disappeared.
I discovered that after walking downstairs and seeing employees carrying roses from the ballroom.
“What's happening?”
Marco didn't look up.
“New security protocol.”
“They're flowers.”
“They're uncontrolled objects.”
I stared at him.
“Are curtains next?”
“If necessary.”
For the first time in two days, I almost laughed.
Then I remembered why he was doing it.
Lily.
The laughter died.
Dominic wanted us to remain upstairs until Julian was found.
I hated it.
I understood it.
But I hated it.
For six years, the Moretti estate had been my workplace.
Suddenly, it felt like a cage.
Lily handled our confinement better than I did.
She and Ethan built a cardboard castle in Dominic's library.
They drew dragons on the walls.
They declared Dominic the “grumpy king.”
He learned about that title when he entered the library during lunch.
“Why am I grumpy?”
Ethan didn't look up from his crayons.
“Because you make this face.”
He pulled his eyebrows together.
Lily copied him.
Dominic stared at both children.
Then at me.
“Do I really look like that?”
I tried very hard not to smile.
“I'm not answering that question.”
His mouth twitched.
It was the first time I had ever seen Dominic Moretti nearly lose a battle to amusement.
Then his phone rang.
Everything changed again.
Marco's voice came through the speaker.
“We found Vescari's car.”
“Where?”
“Yonkers.”
“Julian?”
“Gone.”
Dominic's expression hardened.
“What was inside?”
“A burner phone.”
“And?”
“A photograph.”
Dominic looked at me.
“Of what?”
Marco hesitated.
“Anna and Lily.”
My chest tightened.
“When?”
“Yesterday morning.”
The room went silent.
Yesterday morning.
After we had moved upstairs.
Inside one of the most protected houses in New York.
“That isn't possible,” Dominic said.
“We're checking every angle.”
“Bring me the photograph.”
He ended the call.
I stood slowly.
“Someone took a picture of us inside the estate?”
“We don't know that yet.”
“You heard him.”
“It could have been older.”
But it wasn't.
When Marco arrived twenty minutes later, I knew immediately.
The photograph showed Lily and me beside the third-floor window.
She was holding a stuffed rabbit Ethan had given her.
I was wearing the blue cardigan I had put on yesterday.
Someone had photographed us from outside the estate.
Marco placed an aerial map on the table.
“The angle suggests the northern tree line.”
Dominic looked at it.
“That's seven hundred yards.”
“Long-range lens.”
“How did he get that close?”
“He may not have.”
Marco pointed beyond the property.
“There's a ridge here. Public hiking land.”
Dominic’s eyes darkened.
“Close it.”
“You can't close public land.”
Dominic looked at him.
Marco sighed.
“I'll see what I can do.”
I sat beside the children.
Lily continued coloring, unaware that somewhere beyond the walls a man had been watching her.
Something inside me snapped.
“I want to leave.”
Dominic turned.
“No.”
“This isn't safe.”
“Leaving is less safe.”
“You don't know that.”
“I do.”
“How?”
“Because Julian knows this house. He knows my habits. He knows every property I own.”
“Then why would staying here help?”
“Because I can control this house.”
I laughed bitterly.
“He poisoned Ethan's cake inside this house.”
Dominic went still.
The words hit him exactly where I knew they would.
I regretted them immediately.
But I couldn't take them back.
“I know,” he said.
Quietly.
Too quietly.
I rubbed my forehead.
“I'm sorry.”
“Don't be.”
“I shouldn't have said that.”
“You told the truth.”
He looked toward Ethan.
“I failed.”
“No.”
His eyes met mine.
“You didn't.”
“I built walls around my son and believed walls were enough.”
“Dominic—”
“The security system failed. My people failed. I failed.”
“Lily didn't.”
He looked at her.
“No.”
“She noticed because she wasn't thinking about security. She was thinking about Ethan.”
Dominic's gaze lingered on the children.
“You raised a remarkable little girl.”
The compliment caught me off guard.
I looked down.
“I'm trying.”
“Where's her father?”
The question came gently, but I still stiffened.
“Gone.”
“Gone where?”
“California, last I heard.”
“He left?”
“When Lily was five months old.”
Dominic's jaw tightened.
“He doesn't see her?”
“No.”
“Doesn't call?”
“No.”
“Doesn't send money?”
“Occasionally. When guilt catches up with him.”
Dominic looked almost offended on Lily's behalf.
“He has a daughter like that and chose not to know her?”
I shrugged.
“Some people don't understand what they have until it disappears.”
Something changed in his expression.
“That happens more often than you'd think.”
Later that afternoon, Ethan asked me a question.
“Was my mom scared of Dad?”
I nearly dropped a tray.
“What?”
We were in the kitchen making hot chocolate.
Lily was sitting on the counter sprinkling marshmallows into three cups.
Ethan looked toward the door.
“My mom.”
I had worked at the estate before Ethan’s mother died, but only briefly.
Sofia Moretti had been beautiful, quiet, and rarely seen by staff.
She died when Ethan was two.
An accident, I had been told.
“Why are you asking me?”
“Uncle Victor said Dad couldn't save her.”
My stomach tightened.
“When did he say that?”
“Last Christmas.”
“What exactly did he say?”
Ethan thought.
“He was arguing with Dad.”
“About what?”
“I don't know.”
“And you heard him?”
“I was on the stairs.”
He lowered his voice.
“Uncle Victor said, ‘First Sofia, now everything else. How many people have to disappear before you understand?’”
A cold feeling settled through me.
“What did your dad say?”
“Nothing.”
“Did you ever ask him?”
Ethan shook his head.
“Dad gets sad when I talk about Mom.”
I understood that.
But something about Victor’s words bothered me.
That evening, after the children slept, I found Dominic in his study.
“I need to ask you something.”
He looked up from a stack of security reports.
“What?”
“How did Sofia die?”
Everything in his face closed.
I almost apologized.
Then he said, “Car accident.”
“When?”
“Six years ago.”
The timing hit me.
“Six years?”
His gaze sharpened.
“Yes.”
“The same year Julian supposedly died?”
Dominic stood.
“What are you thinking?”
“I don't know.”
I told him what Ethan had overheard.
Dominic said nothing for a long time.
Then he unlocked a cabinet.
Inside were old files.
He removed one.
“Sofia died three months before Julian.”
He opened the folder.
“Police said she lost control in heavy rain.”
“Was anyone else in the car?”
“No.”
“Was there anything suspicious?”
“I thought there was.”
“What?”
“Her brake line had been damaged.”
My breath caught.
“The investigation concluded road debris caused it.”
“Did you believe that?”
“No.”
“What did Julian say?”
Dominic froze.
Slowly, he looked at me.
“He was the one who convinced me to let it go.”
The room seemed to shrink.
“What exactly did he tell you?”
“That grief was making me paranoid.”
Dominic stared at the old file.
“He said I needed to focus on Ethan.”
I sat.
“What if Sofia wasn't an accident?”
He didn't answer.
“What if Julian was already betraying you?”
Dominic's face hardened.
“And what if stealing money was never the biggest thing he did?”
We searched the file together.
There were photographs of the vehicle.
Insurance records.
Witness statements.
Then I noticed something.
A garage report.
“What's this?”
Dominic took it.
Three days before Sofia's crash, her car had undergone routine service.
Brake inspection included.
No problems reported.
“Who arranged the service?”
I asked.
Dominic read the page.
Then his face changed.
“Victor.”
I stared at him.
“Your uncle?”
“He managed household vehicles back then.”
“Does that mean—”
“No.”
The answer came hard.
“Victor loved Sofia.”
“But someone is using Victor's credentials now.”
Dominic walked toward the window.
“And Victor met Julian.”
Pieces were coming together.
But they didn't fit cleanly.
Not yet.
Then Marco entered without knocking.
“Dominic.”
“What?”
“We found something from the birthday footage.”
He opened his laptop.
One surviving camera had captured Julian walking through the ballroom.
Not toward the kitchen.
Away from it.
And twenty seconds behind him came another man.
Older.
Gray hair.
Elegant tuxedo.
Victor Moretti.
My heartbeat accelerated.
Marco slowed the footage.
Victor turned his head.
He was looking directly at Julian.
Then Victor touched two fingers to his jacket.
Julian nodded.
A signal.
Dominic went pale.
“Play it again.”
Marco did.
Same gesture.
Same nod.
“Maybe they were communicating,” I whispered.
Dominic said nothing.
Marco switched to another angle.
Six minutes later, Victor entered the service corridor.
He emerged four minutes after that.
Without Julian.
My skin prickled.
“Where was Lily?”
I asked.
Marco checked the timestamp.
“With you upstairs.”
“No.”
I remembered.
“I had left her coloring in the staff kitchen.”
Marco froze.
The staff kitchen connected to the corridor.
Lily hadn't wandered far.
She had followed someone.
Victor?
Julian?
I rushed upstairs.
Lily was asleep.
I sat beside her and gently stroked her hair.
“Sweetheart?”
She opened her eyes.
“Mommy?”
“Remember the cake man?”
Her face changed.
“Yes.”
“Was anyone else with him?”
She thought.
“There was Grandpa.”
My heart jumped.
“Grandpa?”
She called older men grandpa sometimes.
“Which grandpa?”
She pointed toward a framed photograph on Ethan's shelf.
Victor.
My chest tightened.
“What was he doing?”
“They were talking.”
“Did Grandpa Victor touch the cake?”
“No.”
“What did he do?”
Lily yawned.
“He said stop.”
I froze.
“Stop?”
She nodded sleepily.
“He said, ‘Julian, don't.’”
My entire body went cold.
Lily knew his name.
Because Victor had spoken it.
I hurried downstairs.
Dominic was still in the study.
“She heard Victor.”
He turned.
“What?”
“She saw them together.”
Dominic's expression darkened.
“But Victor told Julian to stop.”
Silence.
Marco and Dominic exchanged a glance.
“What does that mean?” I asked.
Dominic slowly sat.
“It means Victor wasn't helping Julian poison Ethan.”
“Then why didn't he warn you?”
“That,” Dominic said, “is exactly what I'm going to find out.”
But Victor was gone.
His phone lay abandoned at his Manhattan apartment.
His car was found beneath an overpass.
And on the passenger seat sat another black box.
Inside was Victor Moretti's silver family ring.
May you like
Covered in blood.
---
