Chapter 18 - THE WOMAN WHO CAME HOME
Grace repeated the words because Vincent did not answer quickly enough.
"Isabella is gone."
Vincent looked at Sofia.
Sofia's expression changed at the name.
"Who is Isabella?"
Vincent opened his mouth.
No useful version of the answer arrived.
Dominic, still under guard near the cabin door, looked away.
Sofia noticed that too.
"That bad?"
Vincent rubbed a hand across his face.
"She was supposed to become my wife today."
The boat seemed to become very quiet.
Sofia stared at him.
Vincent forced himself not to explain too quickly.
Three years was a long time to be gone.
It was also a long time to believe someone had chosen to leave.
Sofia looked down at the gray blanket around her shoulders.
"Today."
"Yes."
"You were getting married today."
"Engaged officially."
Sofia gave him a tired look.
"That distinction is doing a lot of work for you."
Despite everything, Grace's voice on the phone made a small sound that might have been a laugh.
Vincent did not smile.
"Her name is Isabella Romano."
Sofia's head lifted sharply.
"Romano?"
"Celeste's sister."
Sofia closed her eyes.
"Of course she is."
Vincent frowned.
"You knew Isabella existed?"
"Celeste talked about her constantly."
"Did you ever meet her?"
"No."
Sofia opened her eyes again.
"But Charles knew exactly which loose thread to pull next."
Vincent returned to the call.
"Grace, when did Isabella disappear?"
"About ten minutes ago."
"How?"
"The security-room guard says she asked to use the restroom."
"A female guard went with her."
"The power failed while they were in the corridor."
"When the emergency lights came on, Isabella was gone."
Marco asked, "Any sign of force?"
"No."
"Blood?"
"No."
"Message?"
Grace hesitated.
"One."
"What does it say?"
"It was written on the restroom mirror in lipstick."
"He has Celeste's statement."
Sofia looked at Vincent.
"She left willingly."
Grace continued.
"There is more."
"I can end this if I go alone."
Vincent shut his eyes.
"Everyone in my life has developed the same terrible instinct."
Sofia looked at him.
"Maybe because you make asking permission exhausting."
He stared at her.
She raised one eyebrow.
For one second, he saw the woman from before everything broke.
Then Marco returned to the problem.
"Where would Charles tell Isabella to go?"
Sofia looked at the old service boat around them.
"Somewhere connected to Celeste."
Grace said, "The estate chapel corridor cameras are dead."
Vincent frowned.
"There is no chapel at the estate."
"The old family chapel room," Grace corrected.
"The one your mother turned into storage."
Sofia looked sharply at Vincent.
"The room behind the wine cellar."
Vincent stared at her.
"What room?"
Sofia almost laughed.
"You grew up in that house and still do not know half of it."
Dominic spoke from the doorway.
"I know the room."
Everyone looked at him.
Vincent's patience thinned.
"Naturally."
Dominic continued.
"Anthony used it for private meetings before he built the orchard archive."
"There is a wall safe behind the altar panel."
Sofia nodded.
"Celeste once told me Bellamy kept sealed statements there because he did not trust bank vault logs."
Marco was already calling his deputy.
"Seal the wine cellar and chapel corridor."
Grace answered before the deputy could.
"We cannot."
"Why?"
"The emergency doors dropped when the west power failed."
"We are locked out from the main corridor."
Vincent looked at Marco.
"Service entrance?"
Dominic answered.
"Behind the old barrel rack."
Vincent glared at him.
"You are going to tell me every hidden door you know before this day ends."
Dominic gave a pained half smile.
"I am starting a list."
Sofia stood.
The paramedic immediately objected.
"Mrs. Moretti, you need a hospital."
"I need my shoes."
"You are not going anywhere."
Sofia looked at Vincent.
"Do you still keep spare boots in the security vehicles?"
Vincent stared at her.
"Yes."
"Good."
The paramedic tried again.
"Ma'am."
Sofia's expression softened.
"I promise you can examine me for as many hours as you want after I know an eight-year-old child is not standing inside another trap built for adults."
Grace heard that through the phone.
"Emily is with me."
Sofia went still.
"Emily."
Grace's voice softened.
"She is eight now."
Sofia sat again without meaning to.
"She found the phone."
"Yes."
Sofia covered her mouth.
For the first time since Vincent saw her, tears filled her eyes.
"She was five."
Grace swallowed.
"She remembers the cardboard castle."
Sofia laughed through the tears.
"That terrible thing collapsed four times."
From somewhere near Grace's phone, Emily shouted, "It was structurally creative."
Sofia laughed harder.
Vincent looked away because the sound nearly broke him.
Grace said, "Come home."
Sofia's laughter stopped.
The word home hung between them.
Sofia looked at Vincent.
He did not ask for an answer.
After a moment, she said, "We are coming back to the house."
It was not the same sentence.
Vincent accepted it.
They returned to the estate under police escort.
Sofia rode in an ambulance because the paramedics finally won one argument.
Vincent followed in the vehicle behind her.
Dominic was transported separately under guard.
By the time the convoy reached the Moretti gates, dawn had fully broken.
The white roses from the engagement celebration still filled the ballroom.
Sofia saw them through the open doors as paramedics guided her inside.
She stopped.
Vincent stood behind her.
"I can have them removed."
Sofia looked at the arrangements surrounding the photograph of Vincent and Isabella.
"Later."
Her eyes settled on the photograph.
Isabella was beautiful.
Composed.
Her hand rested lightly on Vincent's arm.
Sofia looked at Vincent.
"Did you love her?"
He did not lie.
"I cared about her."
Sofia nodded.
"That was not my question."
Vincent looked at the floor.
"I was trying to learn how."
Sofia absorbed that.
"Fair answer."
Then Emily ran into the ballroom.
Grace called after her.
"Emily, slow down."
Emily did not slow down.
She stopped three feet from Sofia.
For once, the child had nothing to say.
Sofia looked at the faded blue sweater with the repaired elbow.
Her face crumpled.
"You got tall."
Emily nodded.
"You got gray hair."
Grace covered her face with one hand.
Sofia laughed.
"Thank you for easing me back into society."
Emily stepped closer.
"Can I hug you?"
Sofia's smile disappeared into something more fragile.
"Yes."
Emily hugged her carefully.
Sofia closed her eyes and held on.
Vincent watched from across the room.
Grace stood beside him.
"Do not make this about you."
He gave her a sideways look.
"I was not."
"Good."
After a minute, Sofia looked at Grace.
The two women faced each other.
Grace's eyes filled immediately.
"I am sorry."
Sofia shook her head.
"No."
"I should have told him."
"Bellamy threatened your child."
"Daniel still kept looking."
Sofia reached for her hand.
"Daniel had information you did not have."
"He also had fear."
"Yes."
Grace's voice shook.
"And I let mine win."
Sofia squeezed her hand.
"Then help me make sure it does not win again."
Grace nodded.
No forgiveness speech followed.
Neither woman needed one.
Marco entered with news from the old chapel corridor.
The service passage behind the barrel rack had been opened.
Fresh footprints led to the hidden room.
No one had entered yet.
Vincent looked at Sofia.
"You stay here."
Sofia's eyebrows lifted.
Vincent corrected himself.
"I would prefer you stay here."
"Better."
"Will you?"
"No."
Grace almost smiled.
Sofia turned to Emily.
"You stay with your mother."
Emily opened her mouth.
Sofia gave her the same look Grace used.
Emily shut it.
"How do adults learn that face?" she muttered.
Sofia, Vincent, Marco, and two investigators entered the wine cellar.
Dominic remained under guard upstairs.
The barrel rack at the rear had been pulled aside.
Behind it, a narrow stone passage descended six steps.
The hidden chapel room smelled of dust and candle wax.
A wooden altar stood against one wall.
The panel behind it was open.
The wall safe inside had been unlocked.
A single envelope lay on the floor.
ISABELLA was written across it.
Sofia picked it up with gloved hands.
Inside was a flash drive and a note.
Bella, if Charles gives you this, I failed again.
The handwriting was Celeste's.
Isabella had come for the statement exactly as the mirror message said.
She had not come to help Charles.
She had come because she believed the statement could end his leverage over her.
Marco connected the drive to an isolated device.
Celeste appeared on video.
The recording was dated nineteen months earlier.
She sat in a white room at Saint Agnes.
"My name is Celeste Romano."
"I helped Charles Bellamy remove Sofia Moretti from her home on December fourteenth."
Sofia's face remained still.
Celeste continued.
"I was coerced, but I was not innocent."
"I knew the medical claim was false."
"I knew Sofia was afraid."
"I helped anyway because Bellamy had evidence against my sister."
Sofia looked down.
Then Celeste said something nobody expected.
"Charles did not create the plan to silence Sofia."
Vincent's head lifted.
"He expanded it."
"The first person who asked him to stop Sofia from exposing the reserve was Dominic Moretti."
The room went cold.
Sofia closed her eyes.
Vincent stared at the screen.
Celeste continued.
"Dominic did not ask for her to disappear for three years."
"He asked for seventy-two hours."
"He said he needed three days to remove his name from the archive and convince Sofia not to tell Vincent what Anthony had promised him."
Vincent's face changed.
"But once Bellamy had the signed medical authority, Dominic lost control of what he started."
"He could have exposed Bellamy."
"He chose not to because exposing Bellamy would have exposed his own request."
The video ended.
For several seconds, only the faint hum of emergency power filled the chapel room.
Vincent turned toward the passage.
Sofia did not stop him.
They returned to the ballroom.
Dominic sat under guard near the fireplace.
He saw Vincent's face and knew immediately.
"You found Celeste's statement."
Vincent stopped ten feet away.
"You started it."
May you like
Dominic looked down.
That was answer enough.
