Chapter 2 - The Name Behind the Gun
Marco reached beneath his jacket.
Luca sat upright despite the doctor’s warning.
Olivia stared at the door.
Three knocks.
A pause.
Three more.
Marco moved first.
He gestured to two guards in the hallway.
One went left.
The other moved toward the stairwell.
Luca looked at Olivia.
“Stay here.”
She almost laughed.
“People keep telling me that today.”
“This time, listen.”
“Why?”
“Because whoever is outside knows where I live.”
Dr. Greene frowned.
“Luca, you are not getting off this table.”
Luca swung his legs down.
“You underestimate my personality.”
“I have treated your personality for twelve years.”
Marco looked through the camera feed beside the door.
Then frowned.
“It’s Tomas.”
Luca went still.
“Open it.”
Marco hesitated.
“Boss—”
“Open it.”
The door unlocked.
A heavyset man in his fifties stumbled inside.
His expensive coat was ripped.
His face was bruised.
One side of his collar was stained dark.
He collapsed before reaching the room.
Marco caught him.
“Tomas.”
The older man looked at Luca.
“They know.”
Luca’s expression hardened.
“Who?”
Tomas shook his head.
“They know about the ledger.”
Olivia had no idea what that meant.
But every person in the room reacted.
Luca stepped closer.
“Where is it?”
“Not with me.”
“Who has it?”
Tomas looked at Olivia.
Fear crossed his face.
Then recognition.
“You.”
Olivia stepped backward.
“I don’t know you.”
Tomas tried to stand.
“You’re Carter’s daughter.”
Her stomach tightened.
“My father?”
Luca turned toward her.
“You said your father was a paramedic.”
“He was.”
Tomas laughed once.
A broken sound.
“No.”
Olivia stared at him.
“What do you mean, no?”
Tomas looked at Luca.
“Ethan Carter wasn’t only a paramedic.”
The room seemed to shrink.
Olivia’s father had been dead four years.
She still had his turnout jacket in a box.
His old radio.
His watch.
His habit of leaving five-dollar bills in random coat pockets so she would “find money when life felt expensive.”
There had been no mysteries about Ethan Carter.
At least, none she knew.
Tomas reached inside his coat.
Marco moved instantly.
“Slow.”
Tomas pulled out a small brass key.
He held it toward Olivia.
“Your father told me if Moretti ever got marked, I was supposed to find you.”
Olivia did not take it.
“Marked?”
Luca lifted the cracked watch.
The black symbol caught the light.
Tomas nodded.
“The circle.”
Olivia looked at Luca.
“What is happening?”
Luca ignored her.
“Who gave you the key?”
“Ethan.”
“When?”
“Four years ago.”
Olivia felt cold.
“Before he died?”
Tomas looked at her.
“Two days before.”
The words landed harder than the gunfire had.
Olivia stepped forward.
“My father died in an ambulance crash.”
Tomas looked away.
“That’s what they told you.”
Silence.
Luca said, “Tomas.”
The older man closed his eyes.
When he opened them, guilt was there.
“Ethan discovered something.”
“What?”
“A network.”
Marco cursed under his breath.
Tomas continued.
“People using legitimate companies to move money, information, judges, cops, union contracts, evidence. Not one family. Not one crew. Something bigger.”
Olivia looked at Luca.
“And my father was involved?”
“No,” Tomas said. “He found it by accident.”
“How?”
“He responded to a warehouse fire in Queens. One of the injured men had documents taped under his shirt.”
Olivia could see her father in the scene.
Running toward danger.
Always toward.
Never away.
“He copied something,” Tomas said. “Names. Account numbers. Dates.”
“And the ledger?” Luca asked.
Tomas nodded.
“That was his name for it.”
Olivia’s voice shook.
“Why didn’t he go to the police?”
Tomas gave her a sad look.
“He did.”
“And?”
“Two days later, he was dead.”
Olivia stopped moving.
Luca’s face changed.
The hard lines around his mouth deepened.
“Which precinct?”
Tomas gave him the number.
Marco immediately took out his phone.
Olivia backed toward the wall.
Memories rearranged themselves violently.
Her father saying he had “a weird week.”
Her father checking the locks twice.
Her father telling Daniel not to answer unknown numbers.
Her father hugging Olivia for longer than normal the night before he died.
She had thought he was tired.
She had thought grief had made every old memory seem meaningful.
Now maybe it had not.
“What does this have to do with Luca?” she asked.
Tomas looked toward the watch.
“Ethan believed one person inside the network had been protecting Moretti.”
Luca’s eyes narrowed.
“Why?”
“Because whoever runs it needed you alive until something changed.”
“What changed?”
Tomas swallowed.
“Your father left proof with someone.”
“Who?”
Tomas looked again at Olivia.
“Her.”
“No.”
Olivia shook her head.
“I have nothing.”
“Maybe not knowingly.”
Marco’s phone rang.
He answered.
His expression changed almost immediately.
“When?”
A pause.
“Keep them there.”
He ended the call.
Luca asked, “What?”
“Daniel Carter’s apartment.”
Olivia straightened.
“What about it?”
“Someone broke in twenty minutes ago.”
Her heart slammed against her ribs.
“Daniel?”
“Missing.”
Olivia grabbed her bag.
“I’m going.”
Luca blocked her path.
“No.”
“That is my brother.”
“Yes.”
“Move.”
“No.”
“You don’t get to tell me—”
Luca stepped closer.
He was injured.
Pale.
Half-dressed.
And still somehow the most commanding person in the room.
“If they took your brother because of something your father hid, running into the street alone will not help him.”
Olivia’s eyes burned.
“What would you do?”
The room went quiet.
Luca understood the question.
If someone had taken Marco.
A sibling.
Family.
What would Luca Moretti do?
His expression softened by one degree.
“I would destroy every door between me and the person I loved.”
“Then move.”
He almost did.
Instead he said, “I’ll take you.”
Marco stepped forward.
“Boss, you can barely stand.”
“I’m standing.”
“Badly.”
“Still counts.”
Olivia wanted to argue.
But she also knew something she hated admitting.
Luca had resources she did not.
Men.
Cars.
Information.
Doors that opened when he arrived.
And people who answered his calls.
Within fifteen minutes, they were moving.
Dr. Greene bandaged Luca beneath a clean shirt and threatened to sedate him if the wound reopened.
Luca ignored him.
Olivia sat beside Luca in another SUV.
Marco rode in front.
Nobody spoke for the first five blocks.
Then Luca said, “Tell me about Daniel.”
She looked at him.
“Why?”
“If someone has him, I need to understand who he is.”
“He’s twenty-five.”
“Work?”
“Architecture firm.”
“Enemies?”
“None.”
“Debts?”
“No.”
“Drugs?”
“No.”
“Gambling?”
“No.”
“Girlfriend?”
“Recently ex.”
“Reason?”
Olivia frowned.
“You interrogate everyone like this?”
“Yes.”
She looked out the window.
“His ex said he was distracted all the time.”
“With what?”
“I don’t know.”
Luca watched her.
“You’re worried that he knew something.”
“I’m worried I didn’t.”
They reached Daniel’s building in Chelsea.
Police were already outside.
Marco made one call.
A detective came over and quietly let them through the side entrance without questions.
Olivia noticed.
She said nothing.
Daniel’s apartment looked like a storm had gone through it.
Couch cushions sliced.
Drawers dumped.
Books thrown from shelves.
Kitchen cabinet doors open.
But one thing bothered Olivia.
His expensive television remained mounted.
Laptop gone.
No jewelry taken.
“This wasn’t burglary,” she said.
“No,” Luca agreed.
Marco moved through the apartment.
“Looking for something.”
Olivia went to Daniel’s bedroom.
His framed college diploma lay broken.
A drafting table had been overturned.
The photograph of their father that normally stood beside Daniel’s bed was missing.
She searched.
“Daniel?”
No answer.
Then she noticed something under the bed.
A small wooden box.
She pulled it out.
Luca crouched beside her.
The lid was scratched.
Her father’s initials were carved into it.
E.C.
Olivia stared.
“I’ve never seen this.”
She tried the clasp.
Locked.
Then remembered the brass key.
Tomas had given it to Marco.
She called him.
Marco brought it.
The key fit.
Olivia opened the box.
Inside lay a photograph.
A subway map.
And a cassette tape.
Luca picked up the photograph.
It showed Ethan Carter outside an old firehouse.
Beside him stood Tomas.
And another man.
Much younger than he was now.
But unmistakable.
Luca Moretti.
Olivia looked at him.
“You knew my father.”
Luca stared at the picture.
“No.”
“You’re standing next to him.”
“I was there. That doesn’t mean I knew him.”
“What was this?”
Luca’s expression became distant.
“January 2010.”
“You remember?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“My father was killed that week.”
Olivia looked down at the photograph again.
Two families.
Two dead fathers.
One photograph.
One secret.
She picked up the cassette.
A handwritten label was stuck to the front.
FOR OLIVIA AND DANIEL.
Her father’s handwriting.
Her hands began shaking.
They found an old cassette player in a storage cabinet.
Daniel had apparently kept one.
Olivia inserted the tape.
Pressed play.
Static.
Then her father’s voice filled the apartment.
“Liv, Danny… if you’re hearing this, then I was right to be afraid.”
Olivia covered her mouth.
Luca stood completely still.
Ethan continued.
“I need you to know something before anyone tells you lies about me.”
Static crackled.
“I found evidence connecting people who should never have been connected. Police. Judges. businessmen. And one name kept appearing next to every death.”
Luca leaned closer.
Ethan said the name.
“Sebastian Vale.”
Marco froze.
Olivia looked at him.
“You know him.”
Marco said nothing.
Luca did.
“Yes.”
“Who is he?”
Luca’s voice became cold.
“My mother’s brother.”
Olivia stared.
“Your uncle?”
Luca nodded.
“We buried him twelve years ago.”
The tape continued.
“If Sebastian Vale is dead, then someone is using his name.”
Then there was a long pause.
Ethan’s voice dropped.
“And Luca Moretti cannot know the truth until he is ready.”
Luca’s face hardened.
“What truth?”
Static swallowed the next sentence.
Then Ethan returned.
“The ledger is not in one place. I split it into three pieces.”
Olivia looked at the brass key.
“One is hidden where Olivia learned to be brave.”
She knew instantly.
Her father’s old ambulance station.
“The second is where Daniel learned to lie.”
Olivia frowned.
Daniel had hated lying.
Then she remembered.
High school theater.
He had played a con artist in his senior production.
“The theater.”
Luca listened.
“The third…”
The tape clicked.
Stopped.
Olivia pressed play again.
Nothing.
Marco checked the machine.
“The tape was cut.”
A sound came from the hallway.
Footsteps.
Slow.
Deliberate.
Luca raised one hand.
Everyone went quiet.
Olivia heard the apartment door open.
Marco reached beneath his jacket.
A man stepped into the bedroom doorway.
Daniel.
Olivia gasped.
“Daniel!”
Her brother looked exhausted.
There was dried blood near his temple.
But he was standing.
Alive.
Olivia rushed toward him.
Then stopped.
Because Daniel was not alone.
A woman stood behind him.
She held a pistol at his back.
And when Luca saw her face, all the color left his own.
“Isabella?”
May you like
The woman smiled.
“Hello, brother.”
