Chapter 3 - The Voice in the Dark
Luca reached for Elena before she could move toward the ringing phone.
“Stay behind me.”
The ringtone continued.
Once.
Twice.
Three times.
Marco drew his weapon but kept it lowered.
A flashlight cut across the warehouse.
The sound came from behind a stack of boxes.
Elena’s heart pounded.
“That ringtone was on my father’s phone.”
“Someone knows that,” Luca said.
“That phone disappeared after his accident.”
“Then someone knows more than that.”
Marco found the device.
It was not Carlo’s old phone.
It was new.
Disposable.
The ringtone had been deliberately installed.
A message waited on the screen.
PLAY ME.
Luca looked around the warehouse.
“Doors?”
“Secured,” Marco said.
“Check again.”
Elena reached for the phone.
Luca stopped her.
“It could be anything.”
“It’s meant for me.”
“That doesn’t make it safe.”
“Nothing about tonight is safe.”
She pressed play.
Carlo Russo’s voice filled the warehouse.
Elena stopped breathing.
“My name is Carlo Russo. If Elena is hearing this, then I failed to keep her away from all of this.”
Her knees nearly buckled.
Luca caught her elbow.
The recording continued.
“Vittorio Valenti and I discovered that someone close to his family had been selling information for years. We built the blue ledger to document every payment, every name, every betrayal.”
Luca stared at the phone.
“My daughter must never be blamed for what I did.”
Elena covered her mouth.
Carlo’s voice became quieter.
“And Luca must know his mother’s death was not an accident.”
Luca’s hand tightened around the edge of a table.
Marco looked at him.
Nobody spoke.
“The person responsible feared Isabella because she discovered the network before Vittorio did.”
Static interrupted the recording.
Then Carlo returned.
“I hid the proof where Isabella once hid Luca when the house became dangerous.”
The message ended.
Elena wiped her cheeks.
“Where did your mother hide you?”
Luca did not answer immediately.
He had spent years refusing to revisit certain memories.
Now one returned.
He was eight.
His mother had pulled him through a narrow door.
She had told him they were playing a game.
Stay quiet.
Do not come out until Mama returns.
He remembered darkness.
Books.
The smell of cedar.
“The library.”
They returned to the mansion.
The guests had finally been released after each was documented and searched.
Enzo remained under guard.
Sofia was nowhere to be found.
That worried Luca more than if she had stayed.
The old library occupied the east wing.
Luca walked directly to a bookcase.
He remembered being small enough to fit behind it.
Marco found the release.
The shelves swung inward.
A narrow room appeared.
Elena entered behind Luca.
There was almost nothing inside.
A child-sized wooden chair.
A cedar chest.
And scratches in the wall.
Luca stared at them.
His mother had marked his height there.
LUCA — AGE 6.
LUCA — AGE 7.
LUCA — AGE 8.
Elena touched his hand.
He let her.
Marco opened the cedar chest.
Inside lay an ivory scarf, several photographs, and a sealed metal case.
The keycard from Carlo’s envelope fit.
Luca opened it.
A blue ledger rested inside.
Elena exhaled.
They had found it.
But Luca did not celebrate.
“Too easy.”
“What?”
“Someone moved Matteo. Cleaned the staircase. Found the chapel compartment. They knew we were searching.”
He looked at the ledger.
“Why leave this?”
Elena understood.
“Because they wanted you to find it.”
Luca opened the first page.
Names.
Dates.
Payments.
For twenty years.
Judges.
Police officials.
Company executives.
Members of both the Valenti and Moretti organizations.
Some were marked with black circles.
Others with red lines.
Near the middle, Luca found Carlo Russo.
Beside his name:
REFUSED PAYMENT.
Below it:
ISABELLA KNOWS.
Luca turned the page.
Several pages had been removed.
Precisely cut.
“The important part,” Elena said.
“Probably.”
Marco leaned over the book.
“There’s something else.”
A name appeared repeatedly in coded entries.
S.V.
Elena looked at Luca.
“Sofia Valenti?”
“Maybe.”
Marco said nothing.
Luca closed the book.
He refused to convict his aunt based on initials.
Especially evidence someone had deliberately left for him.
“Where is Sofia?”
Marco checked his phone.
“No one has seen her since we left.”
Luca called.
No answer.
They searched her suite.
Empty.
Her closet was open.
No luggage missing.
On the dressing table sat a photograph of Luca as a boy.
Beside it was a handwritten note.
I’M SORRY I WAITED THIS LONG.
Elena read it.
“Luca…”
He folded the paper.
“Find her.”
Marco left.
Elena remained.
“You think she did it?”
“I think someone wants me to.”
“What do you think?”
Luca looked at the childhood photograph.
“I think Sofia has lied to me.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
“No.”
He turned toward Elena.
“I don’t think she killed my mother.”
“Why?”
“Because if Sofia wanted me dead, she had twenty-five years to arrange it.”
That afternoon, Matteo regained consciousness.
Luca and Elena visited him at a private clinic.
Matteo looked weak but lucid.
He immediately apologized.
“For what?”
“I should have come to you first.”
“You’re alive. Start there.”
Matteo explained that three weeks earlier he had discovered irregularities in the estate’s archived security records.
Someone had accessed sealed footage from twelve years earlier.
He followed the access trail to the chapel.
There he discovered Carlo’s recording and the ledger.
“Who attacked you?”
Matteo looked ashamed.
“I don’t know.”
“You said you heard a woman.”
“I did.”
“Sofia?”
“No.”
Luca leaned forward.
“You know Sofia’s voice.”
“Yes.”
“Then whose?”
Matteo looked at Elena.
“She said your name.”
Elena frowned.
“What exactly?”
“‘Elena cannot see this.’”
“Anything else?”
“She told someone to take the ledger.”
“Did you recognize her?”
“No.”
Matteo closed his eyes.
“But she called the other person Enzo.”
Silence.
Luca stood.
Enzo.
His cousin had been missing a cufflink.
He had lied about the phone call.
And now Matteo placed him near the attack.
“Where is Enzo?” Luca asked Marco.
Marco checked.
Then checked again.
His expression changed.
“Gone.”
Luca turned slowly.
“How?”
“The guard outside his room was reassigned.”
“By whom?”
Marco looked at the message.
“Your authorization.”
“I gave no authorization.”
Someone was using Luca’s credentials.
Again.
Elena looked toward Matteo.
“The cameras.”
Matteo nodded.
“Whoever is doing this has access to everything.”
Luca called the estate.
“Shut down the internal system. Manual security only.”
Then another message arrived.
From Sofia.
Luca opened it.
COME ALONE IF YOU WANT THE TRUTH ABOUT YOUR MOTHER.
An address followed.
Elena read over his shoulder.
“You’re not going alone.”
“Yes.”
“No.”
“Elena.”
“Someone chased me through your house. Someone nearly killed Matteo. My father died because of this. You don’t get to tell me I’m not involved.”
Luca stared at her.
She did not move.
Finally he said, “You stay in the car.”
“I’ll consider it.”
“That means no.”
“It means I’ll consider it.”
Despite everything, Luca almost smiled.
Almost.
The address led to an abandoned railway depot outside the city.
Luca entered alone.
Sofia waited beneath a broken clock.
She was still wearing black.
But she no longer looked like the elegant woman from the party.
She looked exhausted.
“Where’s Enzo?” Luca asked.
“I don’t know.”
“Matteo heard his name.”
“I know.”
“How?”
“Because Matteo called me three weeks ago.”
Luca stopped.
“You knew about the ledger.”
“Yes.”
“You knew about my mother.”
Sofia’s eyes filled.
“Yes.”
“And you said nothing.”
“I was trying to keep you alive.”
“For twelve years?”
“For as long as necessary.”
Luca stepped closer.
“Who killed her?”
Sofia looked toward the depot entrance.
“Your father discovered the betrayal too late.”
“My father killed her?”
“No.”
“Then who?”
Sofia reached inside her handbag.
Luca tensed.
She removed an envelope.
Inside was a photograph.
Isabella Valenti stood beside Carlo Russo.
Behind them was Gabriel Moretti.
And beside Gabriel stood a woman Luca had never seen.
Elena entered despite Luca’s order.
She saw the photograph.
Her face changed.
“I know her.”
Luca turned.
“Who?”
Elena took the photograph.
“She worked for my father.”
“What was her name?”
“Adriana Serra.”
Sofia closed her eyes.
Matteo’s mother.
Before anyone could speak, a sound echoed from the dark platform behind them.
Slow applause.
Luca turned.
Enzo stepped from the shadows.
But he was not alone.
Beside him stood Matteo Serra.
No hospital gown.
No weakness.
No fear.
May you like
Matteo looked directly at Elena.
Then he smiled.
