Chapter 8 - The Night Sadi Became the Ghost Again
They reached the Costa house before midnight.
Mateo was gone.
Blood marked the library floor.
Not enough to prove death.
Enough to terrify Sadi.
Roman found a memory card beneath the desk.
One video.
Luca Costa appeared on screen.
He was younger than Roman.
Smiling at first.
Then serious.
“If Roman sees this, Victor knows.”
Roman leaned closer.
Luca described discovering an internal conspiracy.
Victor was involved.
But Victor wasn't the leader.
Someone else had access to Costa accounts.
Someone Luca trusted completely.
The video corrupted before the name.
Sadi recovered fragments.
One frame showed Luca handing documents to a woman.
Roman recognized her.
His mother, Elena Costa.
Sadi looked at him.
Roman said nothing.
Elena had supposedly retired to Italy after Luca died.
Roman called her.
Disconnected.
Marcus checked travel records.
Elena had returned to the United States six months ago.
Without telling Roman.
Sadi felt the pattern tightening.
“Where would she go?”
Roman knew.
A family chapel outside the city.
They drove there.
Elena was waiting.
She looked at Roman as though she'd expected him for years.
“You finally found Luca's recording.”
Roman's voice broke slightly.
“Did you kill him?”
“No.”
“Did you know Victor was alive?”
“Yes.”
Roman recoiled.
Elena explained that Victor and Luca had both discovered Arturo's hidden reserve.
Victor wanted it.
Luca wanted to expose it.
Elena tried to protect both sons by making Victor believe Luca's evidence had died with him.
She failed.
“Who killed Luca?”
Elena looked at Sadi.
“Arturo Vega.”
Sadi frowned.
“Mateo said—”
“Mateo was lied to.”
“By whom?”
Elena whispered, “Your father.”
Sadi froze.
“My father died when I was fourteen.”
“No.”
The word landed softly.
Devastatingly.
“Your father changed his name.”
Sadi stepped backward.
Elena continued.
“He became Arturo Vega.”
Everything inside Sadi went silent.
Impossible.
Yet memories rearranged themselves.
Her father's absence.
Arturo knowing details he shouldn't.
His obsession with her abilities.
Calling her family.
Forcing her to use Vega.
Sadi's knees weakened.
Roman caught her.
She didn't pull away.
Elena produced an envelope.
DNA records.
Photographs.
Proof.
Arturo Vega was Sadi's father.
And Mateo's.
Sadi stared at the papers.
“Where is he?”
Elena's expression changed.
“Arturo?”
“Yes.”
“He's alive.”
Roman's eyes hardened.
Elena nodded.
“And Victor has spent six years trying to find him.”
Sadi suddenly understood the entire machine.
She wasn't bait for Roman.
She was bait for Arturo.
Victor had placed Arturo's daughter inside Roman's company and created enough danger to force the Ghost back into existence.
Once Sadi became visible, Arturo would emerge.
“Mateo knew?”
“Recently.”
Sadi's grief became anger.
Everyone had been protecting her with lies.
Roman squeezed her hand once.
Not to restrain.
To remind her she wasn't alone.
Her phone vibrated.
A banking notification.
The three hundred million had moved.
But not to Victor.
Sadi stared.
“That's impossible.”
“What?”
“I redirected it.”
“When?”
“At Warehouse 17.”
Roman looked impressed.
“Where?”
“A dormant federal evidence account.”
Marcus laughed.
Victor had received nothing.
Sadi had beaten him.
Her phone vibrated again.
UNKNOWN:
VERY CLEVER, GHOST.
Then:
BUT MONEY WAS NEVER THE REAL PRIZE.
A photograph arrived.
Mateo tied to a chair.
Beside him stood Arturo Vega.
Older.
Alive.
Looking directly into the camera.
Sadi's father held a handwritten sign.
COME HOME, ISABEL.
Then a second photograph arrived.
This one showed Roman.
May you like
Taken through the chapel window.
A red laser dot rested over his heart.
