Chapter 9 - THE MORNING AFTER THE STORM
Z
By nine the next morning, Elena's face was on television.
Not a flattering photograph.
Not that there was any flattering photograph of a woman leaving federal court after learning she had inherited close to ninety million dollars from one father while another father was being led away in handcuffs.
The picture had been taken when Elena was looking over her shoulder.
Her bruise was clearly visible.
Behind her, Dante Moretti stood half a step back.
The headline beneath them read:
BELLINI HEIRESS EMERGES AFTER SECRET TRUST SCANDAL.
Elena stared at the television in Dante's study.
“Bellini heiress?”
She sounded offended.
Celeste, sitting on the sofa with a cup of coffee, shrugged.
“Newsrooms like bloodlines.”
“My last name isn't Bellini.”
“They're not especially interested in your preferences.”
Elena looked toward Dante.
“Can I sue television?”
“No.”
“All television?”
“No.”
“Disappointing.”
Dante didn't smile.
That was when Elena realized something was wrong.
He stood at his desk reading a document Luca had handed him ten minutes earlier.
He had read the same page three times.
That wasn't normal.
“What happened?”
Dante raised his eyes.
“Nothing.”
Elena folded her arms.
“You are terrible at lying to me.”
Celeste nearly choked on her coffee.
Dante ignored her.
“Elena.”
“What?”
“You've known me personally for approximately fourteen hours.”
“Long enough to identify your lying face.”
“I don't have a lying face.”
“You absolutely do.”
Celeste raised her hand.
“She does have you there.”
Dante gave his sister a look.
She lowered her hand.
Elena crossed the room.
“What is it?”
Dante hesitated.
Then handed her the page.
It was a system audit.
She understood almost none of it.
“What am I looking at?”
“Your trust account.”
“My trust account has a login page?”
“In simplified terms.”
“Okay.”
“Someone accessed it at 2:12 this morning.”
Elena frowned.
“We were here.”
“Yes.”
“Could Marco do that from jail?”
“No.”
“Adrian?”
“No.”
“Mom?”
“No.”
“Sofia?”
“No.”
Elena looked down again.
“Then who?”
Dante tapped the bottom of the page.
“The access originated inside this estate.”
She looked up.
Silence.
Celeste set down her coffee.
“That's impossible.”
Luca stood beside the door.
“No.”
His voice was grim.
“It means somebody used the internal encrypted network.”
Elena stared around the room.
The house suddenly felt different.
Yesterday it had been dangerous because Marco could enter.
Today it was dangerous because someone had never left.
“Who had access?”
Dante answered.
“Myself. Luca. Celeste. Vincent Orsini. Our general counsel, Samuel Quinn.”
“Vincent is missing.”
“Yes.”
“Samuel?”
“In New York.”
“Can you verify that?”
Luca nodded.
“Board meeting. Hotel security confirms.”
Elena looked at Celeste.
Celeste lifted both hands.
“I was asleep, and before you ask, Luca has already checked my devices.”
Dante's mouth hardened.
Elena looked at Luca.
“What about you?”
Luca didn't react.
“Ask Dante.”
She did.
Dante answered instantly.
“Luca didn't do it.”
“How do you know?”
“Because if Luca wanted to rob me, I'd already be poor.”
Luca almost smiled.
Elena handed back the paper.
“So somebody inside the house used someone else's credentials.”
“Likely.”
“What did they do?”
Dante and Luca exchanged a look.
Elena noticed.
“What?”
Dante pulled another page from the folder.
“They didn't transfer anything.”
“Then what?”
“They searched beneficiary succession rules.”
Elena's stomach tightened.
“Meaning?”
“If you die before your biological status is legally adjudicated, your Caruso interest passes partially to Adrian.”
“I know.”
“If you die after your biological parentage is confirmed—”
“My Bellini inheritance activates.”
“Yes.”
“And who gets it if I die?”
Dante was silent.
Elena felt the answer before he said it.
“Sofia?”
“Half.”
“And the rest?”
“According to Bellini's bloodline trust, if one biological child dies without issue, their share reverts to the surviving children.”
Elena went cold.
“So Sofia would get everything.”
Celeste stood.
“You don't seriously think Sofia—”
“No,” Elena said immediately.
It wasn't loyalty.
Not yet.
It was instinct.
Sofia had spent most of her life imprisoned by Marco.
She didn't strike Elena as someone who would kill for another prison made of money.
Dante's eyes remained on her.
“You've known Sofia for less than a day.”
“And I've known you for fourteen hours, remember?”
His mouth twitched.
“Fair.”
Elena continued.
“Who else benefits?”
Luca answered.
“A trustee could temporarily control the interest if both beneficiaries became unavailable.”
“What trustee?”
No one answered.
Elena stared at Dante.
“What trustee?”
He finally said it.
“Vincent Orsini.”
The room went still.
Vincent.
Dante's missing CFO.
The man who had supposedly fled Boston.
The man whose number had been on Celeste's burner phone.
Elena sat slowly.
“So Vincent helped Marco.”
“Likely.”
“And now Marco is arrested.”
“Yes.”
“So Vincent may be trying to finish it himself.”
“Yes.”
Celeste's face tightened.
“He doesn't have the nerve.”
Dante turned toward her.
“You said the same thing about Marco moving against the board.”
“That was different.”
“No.”
Dante's voice hardened.
“We keep making the mistake of assuming people are less ambitious than they are.”
Elena looked at the audit.
“Can Vincent access my money?”
“Not directly.”
“Can he hurt me?”
Dante's expression went still.
“Yes.”
That answer didn't frighten Elena as much as it should have.
Maybe because she was tired of fear.
Maybe because the woman who had cried in the kitchen two nights earlier no longer felt entirely like her.
She stood.
“Then we find him first.”
Dante shook his head.
“No.”
Elena sighed.
“We're doing this again?”
“You are not bait.”
“I didn't say I was bait.”
“You were thinking it.”
“You have no idea what I'm thinking.”
“I've learned.”
Celeste looked between them.
“I am begging both of you to either kiss or argue somewhere else.”
Elena glared.
Dante ignored her.
Luca cleared his throat.
“We may have a lead.”
Everyone turned.
“One of Vincent's corporate cards was used at 6:43 this morning.”
“Where?” Dante asked.
“A pharmacy in Evanston.”
Elena frowned.
“What did he buy?”
“Insulin.”
Celeste blinked.
“Vincent isn't diabetic.”
Luca looked toward Dante.
“No.”
“But his wife is.”
Dante's face changed.
Elena understood.
“He didn't run.”
“No,” Dante said.
“He took his wife.”
Luca nodded.
“And if Vincent is keeping her hidden, she may know why.”
Dante reached for his jacket.
Elena did the same.
“No.”
She looked at him.
He didn't even bother softening it.
“No.”
Elena smiled.
“Then I guess you'll have to fire me again.”
Forty minutes later, they stood outside a modest brick house in Evanston.
No security.
No black SUVs.
No men with weapons.
Just a flowerpot on a porch and a newspaper growing wet beneath a sprinkler.
Luca entered first.
Then stopped.
“Dante.”
Dante pushed past him.
Elena followed.
Inside, the living room was empty.
The kitchen wasn't.
A woman sat at the table.
Late fifties.
Pale.
An insulin pen beside her.
Vincent Orsini's wife.
Marie.
She looked at Dante.
Then at Elena.
And started crying.
“Thank God.”
Dante's voice became controlled.
“Where is Vincent?”
Marie shook her head.
“You don't understand.”
“What?”
“He didn't betray you.”
Dante's eyes hardened.
“The evidence says otherwise.”
“No.”
She reached under the table.
Luca moved.
Marie froze.
“Please. It's just a letter.”
She pulled out an envelope.
Dante opened it.
His face changed.
“What?”
Elena stepped closer.
He handed her the letter.
Only one sentence had been written.
If Dante wants the truth about his father's death, tell him to ask Helena Caruso what happened on October 17, 2001.
Elena stopped breathing.
She looked at Dante.
Then at her mother standing in the photograph on the mantel beside Marie.
A photograph taken twenty-five years ago.
Helena.
Marie.
Vincent.
And Dante's father.
Together.
Smiling.
Dante stared at it.
May you like
When he spoke, his voice was colder than Elena had ever heard it.
“My father died October 17, 2001.”
