Chapter 3 - The Woman in His Shirt
Dario placed a pistol on the console and said, “We need to talk.”
Elena backed toward the surveillance wall.
He carried her father’s photograph in his other hand.
A dark stain covered one corner.
It looked like dried blood.
She understood immediately that Dario knew more than he had ever admitted.
“Where’s Matteo?”
“Busy.”
“With what?”
“Cleaning up the trouble you brought into his house.”
“I didn’t bring anything.”
Dario smiled.
“Your father said the same thing.”
Elena’s pulse hammered.
“You knew him.”
“Everyone knew Antonio.”
“You planted the watch.”
Dario’s smile remained.
“Careful with accusations.”
“You entered my room.”
“Security.”
“You put it under my mattress.”
“Can you prove that?”
Elena glanced toward the camera above the door.
Dario followed her eyes.
“That camera is off.”
Her stomach tightened.
“You came here to kill me.”
“No.”
Dario sounded almost offended.
“If I wanted you dead, you’d already be dead.”
“Then what do you want?”
“To know what you saw.”
“Nothing.”
“Bad answer.”
He took one slow step toward her.
Elena thought about screaming.
The surveillance room was soundproof.
She thought about reaching for the gun.
Too far.
Dario leaned against the desk.
“Your father caused years of trouble.”
“My father is dead.”
“Are you sure?”
The question hit her like ice water.
Elena said nothing.
Dario watched her carefully.
That was when she understood.
He was testing her.
He did not know what was on the recording.
He wanted to see if she knew more.
Elena forced herself to breathe.
“Matteo told me about the accident.”
Dario’s expression barely changed.
Good.
She continued.
“He said my father died because he was trying to leave.”
Dario relaxed slightly.
“Matteo talks too much around pretty women.”
Elena looked at the pistol.
Dario noticed again.
“Don’t.”
She returned her eyes to him.
“You framed me because you thought I had something.”
“Did you?”
“No.”
He studied her.
“Then why did someone shoot at you?”
“You tell me.”
Dario approached.
Elena held her ground.
“You’re wearing his shirt.”
She blinked.
“What?”
Dario gestured toward the white shirt.
“Matteo’s.”
Elena folded her arms.
“It was in the laundry.”
“People have died for touching less.”
“I repaired it.”
“You wore it.”
“My blouse had bleach on it.”
Dario laughed softly.
“You have no idea what you’re doing to him, do you?”
Elena frowned.
Before she could answer, alarms sounded.
Dario looked toward the door.
A second later, someone struck it from the other side.
“Dario!”
Matteo.
Dario’s face changed.
He grabbed his pistol.
Elena stepped away.
The door burst open.
Matteo entered with two guards.
His eyes went first to Elena.
Then to Dario’s gun.
The temperature in the room seemed to drop.
“What are you doing?” Matteo asked.
Dario calmly holstered the weapon.
“Questioning her.”
“In a locked room?”
“She found the archive.”
Matteo looked at Elena.
She saw surprise.
Then anger.
Not at her.
At himself.
Dario continued.
“You told me she didn’t know anything.”
“She doesn’t.”
“She accessed file 2147.”
Matteo’s gaze sharpened.
“How do you know?”
Dario hesitated.
Too long.
Matteo noticed.
Elena noticed him noticing.
“Security alert,” Dario said.
“There was no alert,” Elena replied.
Silence.
Matteo looked toward the keyboard.
Then back at Dario.
“Leave.”
“Matteo—”
“Leave.”
Dario’s jaw tightened.
He walked out.
The guards followed.
Matteo locked the door.
Elena immediately said, “He knows.”
“I know.”
“You knew he was coming?”
“No.”
“He mentioned my father.”
Matteo turned.
“What exactly?”
“He asked if I was sure Antonio was dead.”
Something dark moved across Matteo’s face.
Elena stepped closer.
“Is he?”
Matteo did not answer.
“Is my father dead?”
“I don’t know.”
“You keep saying that.”
“Because I don’t.”
“You said you would tell me the truth.”
“I am.”
She pointed at the monitor.
“I watched his recording.”
Matteo’s face lost color.
“What recording?”
“You didn’t know?”
“No.”
She told him.
Every word.
Antonio.
The stolen names.
The warning.
Saint Gabriel’s.
Matteo closed his eyes.
“What happened at Saint Gabriel’s?” Elena asked.
He opened them.
“When I was seventeen, your father took me there after the kidnapping attempt.”
“Why?”
“He needed somewhere private.”
“And?”
“He gave me a key.”
“What key?”
Matteo opened his shirt slightly and reached beneath it.
A thin chain hung around his neck.
Attached was an old brass key.
Elena stared.
“I’ve worn it nineteen years.”
“You never knew what it opened?”
“No.”
“Then why keep it?”
“Because Antonio told me one day his daughter might ask for it.”
Elena’s throat tightened.
“My father knew?”
“He planned farther ahead than anyone I’ve ever met.”
“Then Saint Gabriel’s is where we go.”
“No.”
She stared.
“No?”
“Someone just attacked this mansion.”
“Exactly.”
“Which means leaving is dangerous.”
“My father left us a trail for nine years.”
“And somebody may have spent nine years waiting for you to follow it.”
“I’m going.”
Matteo stepped into her path.
“You’re stubborn.”
“You noticed.”
“I could have men search the church.”
“And if one of those men works for Dario?”
Matteo fell silent.
Elena knew she had won.
They waited until dawn.
Matteo sent the household away under the pretense of repairs.
Rosa hugged Elena before leaving.
“Be careful, querida.”
“Did you know my father?”
Rosa froze.
Just for a second.
Then she kissed Elena’s cheek.
“I knew he loved you.”
Elena watched her go.
Another unanswered question.
By seven, exhaustion dragged at Elena’s body.
Matteo told her they would leave after dark.
She returned to the ballroom because she could not stand the bunker anymore.
Broken glass had been removed.
The chandelier remained dark.
Morning sunlight crossed the marble floor.
Elena found a speaker system near the wall.
She pressed a button.
Old jazz filled the room.
Her father loved jazz.
He used to dance with her mother in the kitchen on Sundays.
Elena closed her eyes.
For a few minutes, she let herself remember.
Her mother laughing.
Her father spinning her around.
A tiny apartment smelling like tomato sauce and coffee.
She moved slowly across the marble.
One step.
Then another.
Bare feet.
Oversized white shirt.
No audience.
No accusations.
No guns.
For sixty seconds, Elena was not Antonio Moretti’s daughter.
Not a suspect.
Not a woman trapped in a dangerous man’s house.
She was simply Elena.
She turned beneath the dark chandelier.
And smiled.
What she did not know was that Matteo had entered the surveillance room upstairs.
He stopped when her image appeared on the ballroom monitor.
He watched.
At first because he had intended to check security.
Then because he could not look away.
Elena moved with her eyes closed.
His shirt floated around her.
Her hair had fallen loose from its tie.
She looked completely different from the frightened woman he had accused hours before.
Matteo felt something shift inside his chest.
He hated it.
Attachment was weakness.
His father had taught him that.
Love made leverage.
Trust made graves.
Yet watching Elena dance alone in a room that had been empty for seven years, Matteo remembered why the chandelier remained dark.
His mother had loved that ballroom.
After she died, his father shut it.
Matteo had never reopened it.
Until Elena.
She stopped dancing.
Opened her eyes.
And looked directly toward the hidden surveillance window.
Matteo stepped back instinctively.
Impossible.
She could not see him.
But Elena smiled faintly anyway.
Then she lifted one hand and waved.
Matteo nearly laughed.
Instead, he turned off the monitor.
That evening, they drove to Saint Gabriel’s alone.
Matteo refused to bring Dario.
The church sat between two old brick buildings on the South Side.
Closed.
Scheduled for demolition.
They entered through a side door Matteo still remembered.
Inside, dust covered pews.
Candles had not burned in years.
Elena walked toward the altar.
“My father brought me here every Christmas.”
Matteo touched the key beneath his shirt.
“He brought me once.”
“Where?”
Matteo pointed toward the confessional.
Inside, they found a narrow cabinet built into the wall.
The brass key fit.
Elena held her breath.
Matteo opened it.
Inside sat a metal box.
No money.
No jewels.
Only documents.
Photographs.
And a cassette recorder.
Elena lifted the first photograph.
Her father stood beside Salvatore Valente.
Beside them was another man.
Dario Bellini.
Much younger.
Smiling.
Elena turned the photograph over.
Three words were written on the back.
TRUST THE SON.
She looked at Matteo.
Before either could speak, headlights swept across the church windows.
Multiple vehicles.
Doors slammed outside.
Matteo grabbed Elena’s hand.
“Behind me.”
A voice echoed through the church.
“Matteo!”
It was Dario.
Matteo’s face hardened.
Elena clutched the metal box.
Dario called again.
“This doesn’t have to become ugly.”
Matteo drew his pistol.
Then another voice came from behind the altar.
A voice Elena had not heard in nine years.
Older.
Weaker.
But unmistakable.
“Elena?”
She stopped breathing.
May you like
A hidden door slowly opened.
And her father stepped through...
