Chapter 6 - The Man Everyone Wanted Me To Fear
"Stop the car."
Nico's command went out over the radio before Mateo's SUV reached the gate.
No answer came back.
"Mateo."
Static filled the library.
Vittorio stood in the doorway looking almost regretful.
I trusted that expression even less than his smile.
"He cannot have gone far," Vittorio said.
Nico ignored him.
"Gate one, close."
A guard's voice answered.
"Closing."
On the security monitor mounted behind the bookcase, the iron gate began sliding across the driveway.
Mateo's SUV accelerated.
My pulse jumped.
"What is he doing?"
The gate was nearly shut when Mateo swerved onto the lawn.
He drove through a line of winter shrubs, bounced over a stone border, and disappeared onto the service road beyond the property.
Leo stared at the screen.
"Uncle Mateo ran away."
Nobody corrected him.
Nico lowered the radio.
His face had become unreadable.
"Track the vehicle."
The guard beside the monitor shook his head.
"Transponder went offline thirty seconds ago."
Vittorio sighed.
"Nico."
"Do not."
"You cannot ignore what is in front of you."
"I am looking at what is in front of me very carefully."
Nico turned.
"Including you."
Vittorio's expression cooled.
"I came because my grandnephew was attacked."
"You came before I called you."
Silence.
I saw it land.
Vittorio recovered quickly.
"Your security people contacted the family."
"Which one?"
"Excuse me?"
"Which security person contacted you?"
Vittorio's eyes narrowed.
"I do not memorize the names of every guard who calls me."
Nico stepped closer.
"You memorize everything."
"This is paranoia."
"Perhaps."
Nico's voice stayed soft.
"Paranoia kept Leo alive before Emma had to do it for me."
Vittorio looked at me with new dislike.
"A stranger has been in your life for less than a day, and already she is sitting inside family conversations."
"A stranger took glass meant for my son."
Nico's eyes hardened.
"Family buried his living mother."
Vittorio's face went white.
For the first time, his reaction did not look rehearsed.
"What did you say?"
Nico watched him.
"Bianca is alive."
Vittorio took one step backward.
His hand found the doorframe.
"Impossible."
"You sound certain."
"I saw the body."
"So did Mateo."
Nico's gaze dropped to the silver cufflinks.
"Apparently both of you saw what someone wanted you to see."
Vittorio covered shock with anger.
"If this is some game -"
"It is not."
Leo spoke from beside me.
Everyone turned.
He looked at Vittorio.
"I saw Mama."
Vittorio's face softened.
"Leo, sometimes videos can be made to -"
"She knew my room."
The boy's voice rose.
"She knew my window."
"Leo."
"She said your name."
Vittorio became very still.
The room shifted.
Children were supposed to be background noise in adult conspiracies.
Leo had just become evidence.
Vittorio looked at Nico.
"What exactly did she say?"
"Enough."
"If Bianca is alive, I want to help find her."
"Then leave."
Vittorio stared.
"What?"
"My estate."
Nico pointed toward the hall.
"Leave it."
"You cannot be serious."
"I have never been more serious."
Vittorio's voice dropped.
"You would throw family out for the word of a woman who vanished four years ago and a waitress you met last night?"
The insult hit exactly where he intended.
Nico moved before I could react.
I caught his forearm.
He looked at my hand.
Then at me.
"Don't," I said.
Vittorio smiled faintly.
That smile made me understand the trap.
He wanted Nico angry.
He wanted me embarrassed.
He wanted everyone in the room reacting instead of thinking.
I let go of Nico and turned toward Vittorio.
"You're right about one thing."
His eyebrows lifted.
"I am a waitress."
I smiled.
"Which means I know exactly when a customer is trying to start a scene so he does not have to pay the bill."
Vittorio's smile disappeared.
"And right now, you look very interested in making noise instead of answering why your cufflinks carry the mark of the pawn shop that received my stolen ring."
Nico looked at me sharply.
Vittorio looked down at his wrists.
"These are decades old."
"Then you have had a long time to think of a better explanation."
The older man's face hardened.
Nico stepped between us.
"Leave."
Vittorio held his gaze.
"You will regret humiliating me in front of staff."
"Get in line."
Vittorio walked out.
Four of his own men followed.
The front doors closed behind them.
I exhaled.
"That went well."
Nico looked at me.
"You should not provoke Vittorio."
"You were about to hit him."
"That is different."
"Because you're special?"
"Because I know what he does to people who embarrass him."
"And I know what happens when bullies discover nobody ever answers back."
He stared at me for several seconds.
"You are going to shorten my life."
"You should eat more vegetables."
Leo laughed.
The sound broke the tension like sunlight through a locked room.
Nico looked at his son.
"You are encouraging her."
"Yes."
"Traitor."
Leo grinned.
Then the security radio crackled.
"Vehicle at north gate."
Nico grabbed the handset.
"Identify."
"No plate."
The guard paused.
"Driver is injured."
Every muscle in Nico's body tightened.
"Description?"
"Female."
Another pause.
"Dark hair."
My heart slammed.
"Chloe?"
Nico looked at the monitor.
A battered sedan had stopped outside the iron gate.
The driver's door opened.
A woman stumbled out.
Even through grainy video, I recognized the way she held one shoulder higher than the other.
"That's her."
I was already moving.
Nico caught me around the waist.
Pain shot through my back.
"Ow."
He released me instantly.
"You are not going outside."
"She's hurt."
"Which may be real."
I stared at him.
"You think Chloe drove here as bait?"
"I think everything is bait until proven otherwise."
He ordered two guards to bring her through the vehicle trap after a weapons scan.
I waited in the foyer.
Five minutes later, Chloe was carried inside.
Her face was bruised.
One sleeve was dark with blood.
Her left shoe was missing.
The same shoe she had lost at Lumina.
She saw me.
"Emma."
Relief broke across her face.
I went to her.
"What happened?"
"I'm sorry."
"You said that already."
"No."
She grabbed my wrist.
"I am sorry because this started before Lumina."
Nico stepped closer.
"Who are you?"
Chloe looked up at him.
Fear moved through her expression.
Then determination replaced it.
"Clara Bianchi."
Nico stared.
"Bianchi."
She nodded.
"Bianca's half-sister."
Leo made a tiny sound behind us.
Clara saw him.
Her eyes filled immediately.
"Oh God."
Leo hid behind Nico's leg.
Clara covered her mouth.
"He looks like her."
Nico's hand dropped protectively to his son's shoulder.
"You will explain everything."
Clara looked at me.
"Not here."
"Why?" I asked.
"Because whoever is listening already knows I made it through the gate."
Nico's face hardened.
"The house was swept."
"The house does not need a microphone."
Clara's eyes moved toward the security camera in the corner.
"It has people."
Nico looked at the nearest guard.
The man went pale.
Within minutes, we were moved into an underground room beneath the library.
The walls were concrete.
No windows.
No network access.
Nico allowed only me, Leo, Clara, and one doctor inside.
The doctor cleaned Clara's shoulder while she spoke.
"Bianca contacted me seven months ago."
Nico's hands tightened on the table.
"How?"
"A postcard."
"From where?"
"No return address."
Clara looked at him.
"She used a phrase from when we were children, something no one else knew."
"What phrase?"
"Blue birds do not forget winter."
Nico's expression shifted.
"She used to say that to Leo."
Clara nodded.
"The postcard had coordinates hidden in the stamp pattern."
"Coordinates to what?"
"A storage locker in Kenosha."
"What was inside?"
"Photographs, cash, a passport under another name, and the first video."
I leaned forward.
"The one in the red dinosaur?"
"No."
Clara shook her head.
"That was the third."
Nico's eyes narrowed.
"Where are the first two?"
"One is hidden."
"And the other?"
Clara looked at me.
My stomach tightened.
"What?"
"David sold it without knowing."
I stared.
"Sold what?"
"Your grandmother's ring."
The room went silent.
"No."
Clara took a breath.
"The second file is inside the ring."
I laughed once because the alternative was screaming.
"It's a sapphire ring, not a spy movie."
"The sapphire setting unscrews."
"How would you know that?"
Her eyes filled with something like pity.
"Because your grandmother put it there."
I stopped breathing.
"My grandmother died when I was nineteen."
"I know."
"You did not know her."
"Bianca did."
The room seemed to tilt.
Nico looked between us.
"Explain."
Clara's voice softened.
"Emma's grandmother, Eleanor Hayes, kept books for Bell Street Exchange for almost twenty years."
I felt every childhood memory of my grandmother rearrange itself.
"She worked at an insurance office."
"That was the legal company upstairs."
Clara looked at me.
"The pawn business operated below it."
"No."
"Emma -"
"No."
I stood too fast.
"My grandmother packed peanut butter sandwiches in wax paper and watched game shows every afternoon."
"She also kept records Vittorio never wanted anyone to see."
I stared at her.
"You are lying."
"I wish I were."
Nico stepped toward me.
I backed away.
"Do not."
He stopped.
Clara continued carefully.
"Bianca found Eleanor's name in an old ledger before she disappeared."
"Why would Bianca be looking at ledgers?"
Nico answered this time.
"Because Bianca believed Vittorio was stealing from the family."
Clara nodded.
"She found more than theft."
I looked at her.
"What?"
"Payments to police."
"Judges."
"A coroner."
Nico's face went cold.
Clara swallowed.
"And three payments made the week Bianca supposedly died."
"To who?"
"I do not know."
"Why not?"
"The names are coded."
She looked directly at me.
"The key is in Eleanor's ring."
A pounding sounded above us.
Everyone froze.
Then the emergency intercom clicked on.
A guard's voice came through.
"Mr. Valenti."
"Yes?"
"We found Mateo's SUV."
Nico stepped to the speaker.
"Where?"
"Abandoned near Bell Street Exchange."
"Mateo?"
The guard hesitated.
"No sign of him."
"What did you find?"
"Blood in the driver's seat."
Nico went still.
"And one more thing."
The guard's voice dropped.
"The vault at Bell Street was opened eleven minutes ago."
Clara looked at me.
May you like
"If Mateo found the ring first, everyone hunting us is about to hunt him."
