Chapter 2 - The Name on the Report
Gabriel did not move.
Neither did I.
Emma kept pointing.
“That’s him.”
My first instinct was to pull her behind me.
I did.
Gabriel looked at Alessandro.
“What is she talking about?”
Alessandro’s expression revealed nothing.
Emma peeked around my leg.
“You put stuff in the shiny box.”
Gabriel laughed once.
It sounded wrong.
“I organize his medication all the time.”
Dr. Hart’s report remained in Alessandro’s hand.
“What did the laboratory find?” Gabriel asked.
Alessandro folded the paper.
“A dosage problem.”
“What kind?”
“Samuel is checking.”
Gabriel looked at me.
Then Emma.
I understood immediately.
Alessandro was lying.
Not because he trusted Gabriel.
Because he no longer did.
“I should take Emma downstairs,” I said.
“No,” Alessandro replied.
His eyes stayed on Gabriel.
“Claire, take her to the library.”
I nodded.
As I passed Alessandro, he caught my wrist.
His grip was surprisingly strong.
“Lock the door.”
I looked at him.
Then I understood.
He wasn’t protecting himself.
He was protecting us.
I carried Emma away.
The library was larger than my apartment building’s lobby. I locked the heavy door and lowered Emma onto a sofa.
She immediately asked for juice.
Children were astonishing.
A criminal conspiracy could unfold around them, and they would still remember snack time.
I found apple juice in a small refrigerator.
“Emma, listen to me.”
She drank through a straw.
“Did you really see Mr. Russo touch the medicine?”
“Yes.”
“What did he put inside?”
“Little white thing.”
“A pill?”
She shrugged.
“Like sugar.”
Powder.
Maybe.
I didn’t know.
“What happened when he saw you?”
“He said go away.”
“Anything else?”
She nodded.
“He dropped one.”
My pulse quickened.
“Where?”
She pointed vaguely toward the floor.
“Under the big thing.”
“What big thing?”
“The desk.”
I stood.
If something had fallen under Alessandro’s desk, it might still be there.
But getting it meant leaving Emma.
I wasn’t doing that.
A knock came.
Three taps.
I froze.
“Who is it?”
“Alessandro.”
I unlocked the door.
He was alone in his wheelchair.
I stepped aside.
He entered and locked the door himself.
Emma smiled.
“Hi, ’Sandro.”
“Hello, trouble.”
“I’m not trouble.”
“No?”
She shook her head seriously.
“I’m Emma.”
For the first time, I saw him genuinely smile.
It lasted perhaps two seconds.
Then he looked at me.
“The lab found digoxin.”
I knew the word but couldn’t place it.
“What is that?”
“A heart medication,” he said. “One I don’t take.”
My stomach tightened.
“How much?”
“Enough accumulated in my blood to suggest repeated exposure.”
Repeated.
Not one mistake.
Someone had been poisoning him over time.
“Could it be accidental?”
“No.”
His answer was immediate.
Emma climbed onto the sofa and arranged Mr. Rabbit beside her.
I lowered my voice.
“What was written on the back of the report?”
His eyes sharpened.
“You noticed.”
“Yes.”
He reached inside his jacket and handed me the folded page.
The handwriting was blocky.
RUSSO.
I stared.
“Who wrote that?”
“Samuel.”
“Why?”
“Because I told him never to put sensitive information in an electronic message if he suspected foul play. He knows my system.”
“So the lab found something connecting Gabriel?”
“Not yet.”
I handed the report back.
“Then why write his name?”
“Samuel found traces of the drug on a pill bottle Gabriel personally delivered three days ago.”
My mouth went dry.
“Why would your best friend poison you?”
Alessandro stared toward the tall windows.
“That is what I intend to find out.”
I thought about the stories online.
Men disappearing.
Businesses burning.
People refusing to testify.
“What are you going to do to him?”
He looked at me.
“Does the answer determine whether you stay?”
“Yes.”
That seemed to surprise him.
I continued.
“My daughter is here. I’m not staying in a house where somebody gets dragged into a basement.”
“There is no basement.”
I stared at him.
His mouth moved slightly.
“Bad joke.”
“Very.”
He leaned back.
“I’m not killing Gabriel.”
“Good.”
“Yet.”
“Mr. Moretti.”
“Alessandro.”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re my employer.”
“I haven’t actually hired you.”
My heart dropped.
Then he added, “Rosa did.”
I realized he was teasing me.
The feared Alessandro Moretti was teasing his maid while someone was poisoning him.
Emma climbed down.
“Cookie?”
She offered him another broken piece.
He took it.
I watched the gesture.
It was ridiculous how normal it looked.
Then Alessandro said something that changed my understanding of him.
“Gabriel has been my friend since I was nine.”
I waited.
“We grew up three streets apart. My father trusted his father. When mine died, Gabriel stood beside me. When my brother was killed, Gabriel identified the body because my mother couldn’t.”
His voice remained steady.
“When I was shot two years ago, Gabriel pulled me out of the car.”
“Then maybe he isn’t doing this.”
“Maybe.”
But Alessandro didn’t sound convinced.
“Who benefits if you die?”
“Too many people.”
“And if you don’t die?”
He looked at me.
“What?”
“If someone wanted you dead, wouldn’t they use enough poison to kill you?”
Silence.
His eyes changed.
I continued.
“What if they want you weak?”
Alessandro turned toward the wheelchair.
That was when I understood.
Everyone watched the chair.
Emma watched his face.
But whoever had poisoned Alessandro might have been watching something else entirely.
His dependence.
His isolation.
His inability to control his own household.
“Someone wants people to think you’re getting worse,” I whispered.
Alessandro said nothing.
A knock interrupted us.
“Mr. Moretti?”
It was Rosa.
Alessandro unlocked the door.
Rosa entered holding an envelope.
“This was delivered by hand.”
“No courier?”
She shook her head.
“Security found it inside the front gate.”
Alessandro opened it.
A photograph slid out.
My breath stopped.
It was Emma.
Taken that morning.
She was walking beside me outside the estate.
Someone had photographed us before we entered.
On the back were six words.
THE CHILD SAW WHAT SHE SHOULDN’T.
My knees weakened.
Alessandro’s face went cold.
Not angry.
Worse.
Controlled.
He pressed a button on his wheelchair.
“Marco.”
A security officer answered through the intercom.
“Yes, sir?”
“Lock the estate.”
Emma tugged my sleeve.
“Mama?”
I picked her up.
Alessandro looked at me.
“No one leaves.”
Then his phone vibrated.
He glanced at the screen.
The color drained from his face.
“What?” I asked.
He turned the phone toward me.
It was a security-camera image.
The timestamp was from seven minutes earlier.
A man stood outside the library door while Emma and I had been locked inside.
The camera showed only his back.
But one hand was visible.
On it was a black ring.
Then Alessandro enlarged the image.
May you like
The man turned slightly toward the camera.
And it wasn’t Gabriel.
