Chapter 5 - THE LOCKED STUDY
No one tried to soften what Adeline had just admitted.
There was no way to soften it.
She had entered Enzo Marchetti's home under a false purpose.
She had watched his family.
She had searched for connections to her missing brother.
And now she stood in his study accusing his family of possibly helping bury the truth.
Victor Ashford looked delighted.
Camilla looked vindicated.
Antonio looked wounded.
Enzo looked at nothing but Adeline.
“How much of my house have you searched?”
Adeline did not lie this time.
“Three rooms.”
“Which rooms?”
“The downstairs records closet.”
“The old breakfast room.”
“And the west office used by household staff.”
“Did you enter this study before tonight?”
“No.”
“Did you try?”
“Yes.”
Victor laughed.
“There is your innocent maid.”
Enzo turned his head.
“Victor.”
The older man's smile remained.
“What?”
“One more interruption and you leave.”
“This concerns my daughter.”
“No.”
Enzo looked at Camilla.
“Her engagement ended in the corridor.”
He looked back at Victor.
“What happens now concerns my house.”
Victor's smile finally disappeared.
Camilla stepped closer to Adeline.
“So you admit you lied your way in.”
“Yes.”
“You admit you searched private rooms.”
“Yes.”
“And you expect everyone to believe you happened to see me tampering with a drink?”
Adeline looked at her.
“I don't care what everyone believes.”
Camilla's eyes narrowed.
“You should.”
“No.”
Adeline glanced toward the ballroom.
“I spent years caring what people with money believed about my father.”
She looked back at Camilla.
“It did not bring him back.”
Camilla took another step.
Enzo moved between them again.
The gesture made Camilla furious.
“She admitted she came here to spy on you.”
“I heard her.”
“And you are still protecting her?”
“I am preventing you from touching her again.”
Camilla's voice dropped.
“You are making a mistake you cannot undo.”
Enzo's expression did not change.
“So did you.”
A knock sounded at the study door.
Matteo opened it before anyone answered.
A gray-haired woman in a laboratory coat stood beside him with a hard case in one hand.
“This is Dr. Nina Serrano,” Matteo said.
“She has done private toxicology work for us before.”
Victor gave Enzo a disgusted look.
“Private toxicology.”
Enzo ignored him.
Dr. Serrano placed the case on a side table.
“I can perform a preliminary screen here.”
She pointed toward the evidence bag containing the champagne flute.
“I will need a clean room and twenty minutes.”
Enzo gestured toward the attached conference room.
“Use that.”
“And the medication?”
Antonio handed her the silver pill case.
Dr. Serrano accepted it carefully.
“I will test both.”
She disappeared into the adjacent room with Matteo.
Victor looked at his watch.
“I am leaving with my daughter.”
Enzo nodded.
“You are free to go.”
Camilla looked surprised.
Victor was not.
He had known Enzo long enough to understand that easy exits were rarely easy.
“You will return her belongings tomorrow,” Victor said.
“Anything that belongs to her will be packed.”
“The emerald set from your mother?”
Enzo's face changed.
“My mother's jewelry belongs to the Marchetti family.”
“You gave it to Camilla.”
“I loaned it to my fiancee for tonight.”
Victor's expression sharpened at the past tense.
“Your lawyers can discuss it with mine.”
“They will.”
Victor turned toward the door.
Camilla did not move.
She stared at the ring on the console where Enzo had placed it beside the riding crop.
“You really mean it.”
Enzo looked at her.
“Yes.”
For the first time, the cruelty left her face.
What replaced it was disbelief.
“You were going to marry me.”
“I was.”
“I chose the flowers.”
“Yes.”
“My dress is finished.”
Enzo said nothing.
Camilla's eyes shone, but no tears fell.
“My mother wore that church veil.”
Victor's voice hardened.
“Camilla.”
She ignored him.
“You told me we were building something permanent.”
Enzo's expression remained controlled.
“I believed that.”
“Until a servant embarrassed me.”
“Until I saw what you do when you think no one important will stop you.”
That sentence broke whatever fragile emotion had appeared in her.
Her face hardened completely.
“Then I hope she is worth what this will cost you.”
Adeline almost answered.
Enzo raised one hand slightly without looking at her.
He did not need another fight.
Camilla turned toward the door.
Then she stopped beside the desk.
Her gaze fell on the photograph of Thomas Croft.
She smiled without humor.
“Your father had terrible taste in employees.”
Adeline moved before she could stop herself.
Enzo caught her wrist gently but firmly.
“Don't.”
Camilla watched the gesture.
Something ugly flickered behind her eyes.
Victor took her arm.
“We are done here.”
They left together.
The study door closed.
Adeline pulled her wrist free.
“You should have let me.”
“No.”
“She insulted my father.”
“And if you struck her, she would spend the next week telling every newspaper in Chicago that the unstable maid attacked her.”
Adeline hated that he was right.
Antonio lowered himself into a chair.
“You are both missing the larger problem.”
Enzo looked at him.
“What?”
“Camilla knew Thomas.”
Adeline nodded.
“And she wanted me angry enough to forget that.”
Antonio leaned back.
“Exactly.”
Enzo crossed to a cabinet built into the wall.
He entered a code.
The cabinet opened to reveal old ledgers, folders, and a small safe.
Adeline stared.
“You keep financial records in here?”
“Old ones.”
“From your father's time?”
“Yes.”
Her pulse quickened.
“May I look?”
“No.”
The answer came instantly.
Adeline's face tightened.
Enzo met her gaze.
“You lied to enter my house.”
“I just told you why.”
“That does not create trust.”
“I saved your uncle from a glass Camilla tampered with.”
“If the test confirms that.”
Adeline recoiled.
“You think I made it up.”
“I think you entered my home looking for evidence against my family.”
His voice stayed level.
“I also think Camilla beat you, someone removed a glass, a camera system was disabled, and Judge Price received a call from my systems manager.”
He looked toward the cabinet.
“Those facts do not automatically make every conclusion you want true.”
Adeline crossed her arms.
“At least you admit conclusions can be wrong.”
Enzo's eyes shifted.
She knew exactly what she meant.
Thomas Croft.
The accused accountant.
The disappeared father.
Antonio spoke quietly.
“Open the old audit file.”
Enzo looked at him.
“Why?”
“Because if Thomas was framed, we need to know before someone else decides what we deserve to know.”
Enzo stared at the safe for several seconds.
Then he entered another code.
The safe clicked open.
Inside were six sealed file boxes.
Enzo pulled out one labeled CROFT, THOMAS E. - INTERNAL AUDIT.
Adeline's knees nearly weakened.
She had imagined such a file for years.
Enzo carried it to the desk.
The seal was old but intact.
He cut it with a letter opener.
Inside were bank statements, internal memos, personnel records, and a copy of the accusation that had destroyed Thomas Croft's name.
Adeline stood beside him.
The first page claimed Thomas had redirected $3.8 million through shell corporations.
The second page contained his termination notice.
The third contained a handwritten statement from Enzo's father, Salvatore Marchetti.
Adeline read it twice.
Thomas has betrayed this family and fled.
Do not pursue publicly.
Handle internally.
Her stomach turned.
“Handle internally?”
Enzo's face had become stone.
“In my father's language, that could mean many things.”
“Such as?”
Antonio answered.
“None of them good.”
Adeline looked at Enzo.
“Did your father have him killed?”
“I don't know.”
“That is not good enough.”
“It is the truth.”
She reached for another page.
A transaction sheet listed the companies through which the stolen money had allegedly moved.
Adeline read the names aloud.
“Lakefront Advisory.”
“Bellweather Consulting.”
“North Meridian Holdings.”
Her breath caught.
“What?” Enzo asked.
Adeline pointed at the third name.
“Daniel found this company.”
Enzo leaned closer.
“When?”
“Last year.”
“He said it received money from the Ashford Foundation.”
Antonio stood despite the strain on his heart.
“After Thomas disappeared?”
“For years.”
Enzo took the page.
The company supposedly used to steal from the Marchettis had later received millions from the Ashfords.
That connection had never appeared in the original investigation.
Adeline looked at him.
“Your father blamed mine for stealing through a company that later became part of Victor Ashford's network.”
Enzo's jaw tightened.
“Maybe.”
“Maybe?”
“We verify before we accuse.”
Adeline laughed bitterly.
“Your father did not give mine that courtesy.”
The words landed.
Enzo did not defend Salvatore.
A soft knock interrupted them.
Dr. Serrano entered.
Her face was serious.
Enzo straightened.
“What did you find?”
“The medication appears normal.”
Antonio exhaled.
“And the champagne?”
Dr. Serrano looked at the glass inside the evidence bag.
“The preliminary screen detected a cardiac medication that should not be in champagne.”
Antonio went still.
Adeline's eyes moved to Camilla's abandoned riding crop on the console.
Dr. Serrano continued.
“In a healthy person, the amount might cause dizziness or a dangerous drop in blood pressure.”
She looked at Antonio.
“In someone with your medical history, combined with your prescribed medication, it could be much more serious.”
Enzo's voice went cold.
“How serious?”
Dr. Serrano hesitated.
“Serious enough that I would not call what happened tonight a prank.”
Antonio sat down again.
Adeline felt Enzo's attention shift toward the door.
He was already thinking about Camilla.
Then Matteo rushed into the study without knocking.
His composure was gone.
“Enzo.”
“What?”
“The old audit cabinet in the records room was opened ten minutes ago.”
Enzo stared at him.
“By whom?”
“We don't know.”
“What was taken?”
Matteo looked at the file box on the desk.
“One ledger.”
“Which ledger?”
Matteo swallowed.
“The black one your father kept off the books.”
Enzo did not immediately send anyone after the stolen ledger.
That surprised Adeline.
Instead, he asked Matteo for a list of every person who had crossed the records-room corridor during the previous hour.
“Why not chase Camilla?” she asked.
“Because she expects that.”
“She may have the ledger.”
“Or she may want us to believe she does.”
Antonio looked at the audit pages spread across the desk.
“Salvatore used to say a stolen object is useful twice.”
Adeline frowned.
“Once for what it contains.”
Enzo finished the thought.
“And once for where people run after it disappears.”
Adeline stared at him.
“Your family has sayings for everything unpleasant.”
“We had a lot of unpleasant things.”
Dr. Serrano sealed the champagne sample for full testing.
Before leaving, she looked at Adeline's wrist.
“You should have that examined properly.”
“I am fine.”
“That sentence is rarely medical evidence.”
Lucia nodded firmly from the doorway.
“I like her.”
Adeline gave both women an exhausted look.
The small exchange almost felt normal.
Then Enzo lifted a transaction sheet from Thomas's file.
A handwritten mark appeared beside North Meridian Holdings.
Three short vertical lines crossed by one diagonal stroke.
Adeline recognized it.
“My father used that symbol.”
“Meaning?”
“Danger.”
Enzo looked at her.
“How do you know?”
“He marked old tax folders with it when something needed attention.”
Antonio leaned closer.
“There is another one.”
On the next page, beside a payment routed to a medical consulting company, the same symbol appeared.
Dr. Serrano stopped at the door.
“What company?”
Enzo read the name.
“Voss Clinical Strategies.”
Everyone looked at her.
She frowned.
“Malcolm Voss owned a consulting company before he became hospital director.”
Adeline felt another piece slide into place.
Thomas had marked Voss years before anyone suspected the champagne glass.
Enzo placed the page beside the toxicology report.
The old and new evidence touched at the edges.
Camilla's attack had not created the conspiracy.
May you like
It had reopened it.
And somewhere outside the study, the person who stole the black ledger now knew they were finally reading the same names Thomas Croft had died trying to understand.
