Chapter 11 - The Night Theo Disappeared
The door swung inward.
Theo stood there.
Barefoot.
Terrified.
Alive.
Beatrice dropped to her knees.
He fell into her arms.
“Where's Crane?” Adriano asked.
Theo pointed upstairs.
“He said someone was coming.”
“Who?”
“I don't know.”
Luca took Theo outside.
Beatrice refused to leave.
They climbed.
The clinic had been abandoned for years, but one room contained fresh medical equipment.
Crane was gone.
On a table sat files documenting years of illegal treatments.
Marcus had used the clinic to control witnesses.
Mara found her own file.
Then Theo's.
Then Lorenzo's.
One file remained.
Adriano Sarti.
Adriano opened it.
Blood tests.
Medication records.
Photographs.
His father hadn't been the only Sarti being poisoned.
For years, Adriano's private supplements had contained trace compounds designed to weaken him slowly.
“Who prescribed these?” Beatrice asked.
Adriano read the signature.
Samuel Crane.
The plot had never ended.
Marcus had planned to eliminate Adriano gradually and inherit control through compromised lieutenants.
But Luca had replaced too many of Marcus's people.
Beatrice's arrival at the mansion had accidentally complicated everything.
“How?”
“She cleaned my study.”
Mara understood.
“She moved things.”
“Yes.”
Tiny changes made covert access harder.
A drawer no longer left unlocked.
Documents reorganized.
Trash removed before Marcus could retrieve it.
Beatrice had unknowingly disrupted an espionage system.
“That is why they suspected you,” Luca said.
Beatrice laughed without humor.
“I almost got killed because I clean too well.”
A noise sounded downstairs.
Crane.
He tried to escape through the rear.
Police arrested him.
Under interrogation, he confessed enough to confirm the conspiracy.
Marcus had ordered the waterfront attack.
Carlo facilitated it.
Crane falsified medical records.
Mercer helped until guilt turned him.
But one question remained.
Who had fired the shot at Carlo?
Marcus had been elsewhere according to verified footage.
Someone else was still involved.
Carlo survived his wound.
From a guarded hospital bed, he requested Adriano.
“I lied,” Carlo said.
“Frequently.”
“Marcus didn't shoot me.”
“I know.”
“Crane didn't either.”
“Who?”
Carlo looked afraid.
“Your father.”
Adriano stared.
“Lorenzo?”
“He isn't who you think.”
Adriano left immediately.
Lorenzo had vanished from the mansion.
His room was empty.
On the bed lay an old photograph.
Lorenzo and Marcus.
Dated fifteen years earlier.
Partners.
Adriano's stomach turned.
Mara examined the ledger.
There were payments to initials L.S.
Everyone had assumed they referred to a logistics company.
They didn't.
Lorenzo Sarti had financed the original trafficking network.
Marcus hadn't betrayed Lorenzo.
He had worked for him.
Then why fake his death?
Because the network was collapsing.
Lorenzo disappeared to avoid prosecution and allowed his son to inherit the consequences.
Adriano sat in silence.
Beatrice remained beside him.
“My father built it.”
“You didn't.”
“I continued it.”
“You can stop.”
He looked at her.
“I already am.”
“Then keep going.”
His phone vibrated.
Lorenzo.
A message.
COME TO THE WATERFRONT ALONE.
Adriano stood.
Beatrice grabbed his arm.
“No.”
“I have to.”
“No, you don't have to do anything alone anymore.”
He looked at her hand on his arm.
Then at her.
“All right.”
They went together.
Lorenzo waited inside an abandoned warehouse.
He held no weapon.
Only a file.
“You found out.”
“Yes.”
Lorenzo placed the file down.
“I wanted to protect you.”
“You used me.”
“I gave you an empire.”
“You gave me your crimes.”
Lorenzo's face hardened.
“You benefited.”
“Yes.”
Adriano didn't hide from it.
“And I'll answer for that.”
Lorenzo shook his head.
“You'd destroy everything for a housekeeper and her crippled nephew?”
Beatrice flinched.
Adriano's expression became ice.
“Never call him that again.”
Lorenzo smiled.
“There he is.”
Police sirens approached.
Lorenzo looked toward Beatrice.
“You changed him.”
“No,” she said. “He decided to change.”
For some reason, that affected Adriano more deeply.
Lorenzo reached inside his coat.
Adriano moved.
But Lorenzo didn't pull a weapon.
He pulled a photograph.
Mara holding baby Theo.
Behind her stood a man none of them recognized.
On the back was one sentence.
THEO'S FATHER KNOWS EVERYTHING.
Beatrice stared.
“Mara never told us who Theo's father was.”
Lorenzo smiled.
“I know.”
“Who is he?”
Lorenzo looked toward the warehouse entrance.
May you like
Footsteps approached.
Then a man's voice called Theo's name.
