Chapter 8 - The Lie Adriano Built His Empire On
Adriano reached Mercy General twenty-three minutes later.
Lorenzo Sarti was gone.
Beatrice handed him an envelope.
“He left this.”
Adriano stared at his father's handwriting.
For twelve years, he had believed Lorenzo dead.
The envelope contained an address.
Nothing else.
Luca insisted on going.
Beatrice insisted harder.
“If this man knows what happened to Mara, I'm coming.”
The address led to a church outside Chicago.
An elderly priest met them.
“He has been waiting.”
Lorenzo sat alone in a small room.
He looked twenty years older than Adriano remembered.
Father and son stared at each other.
“You're alive.”
“Yes.”
“You let me bury you.”
“Yes.”
Adriano punched him.
Lorenzo fell.
Nobody intervened.
He wiped blood from his mouth.
“I deserved that.”
“Start talking.”
Lorenzo explained.
He discovered Carlo and Marcus were using Sarti-controlled shipping routes for weapons trafficking.
Mara found the books.
She approached Marcus, unaware he was involved.
Marcus planned the explosion to kill Adriano, Mara and several rivals simultaneously.
Lorenzo discovered the plot too late.
Afterward, he helped hide Mara when Marcus attempted to finish the job.
“Why fake your death?”
“Because Marcus poisoned me through Mercer. I survived. If they knew, they would come again.”
“You left me running an empire infected with your enemies.”
“I thought Luca would discover them.”
Luca looked offended.
“Eventually.”
Lorenzo continued.
“Mara escaped the clinic.”
“Where is she?” Beatrice demanded.
“I don't know.”
Beatrice's hope collapsed again.
Lorenzo gave her a small notebook.
Mara's.
The last entry was eighteen months old.
If I can't reach Bea, I will go where Mama took us every summer.
Beatrice knew immediately.
Lake Geneva.
Their mother's cabin.
It had been sold years earlier.
They drove there.
The current owner allowed them to inspect an old storage shed after Beatrice explained.
Behind a loose board they found a waterproof container.
Inside were documents.
Photographs.
And a recent newspaper clipping.
Recent meaning six months old.
Someone had circled a classified advertisement.
HOUSEKEEPER WANTED — CASH PAY — NO QUESTIONS.
Beatrice recognized the town.
Forty miles north.
They traced the employer.
A motel owner remembered a woman matching Mara's description.
“She called herself Mary.”
“Where did she go?”
“She worked here three months. Then a man came.”
“What man?”
“Tall. Scar on his jaw.”
Marcus.
“She disappeared that night.”
Adriano's phone rang.
Luca answered.
His face hardened.
“What?”
He disconnected.
“Marcus just contacted federal investigators.”
Adriano frowned.
“Why?”
“He offered evidence against you in exchange for immunity.”
Lorenzo laughed bitterly.
“Of course.”
“What evidence?”
“Everything your organization has done for twelve years.”
Beatrice looked at Adriano.
He didn't flinch.
“Let him.”
Luca stared.
“Adriano.”
“I already gave them access.”
“You gave them selected legitimate records.”
“Give them everything.”
Lorenzo stood.
“You'll destroy the family.”
Adriano turned on him.
“This family nearly destroyed hers.”
Silence.
Beatrice watched father and son.
Lorenzo said, “You could go to prison.”
“If that's where the evidence puts me.”
Beatrice had never expected those words.
Not from Adriano Sarti.
Later, outside, she found him alone.
“You meant it?”
“Yes.”
“You'd give up everything?”
“No.”
She frowned.
He looked toward her.
“I'd keep what was earned legally. I'd answer for what wasn't.”
“That sounds suspiciously reasonable for a crime boss.”
“I've had a difficult week.”
She almost laughed.
Almost.
Then Luca emerged.
“We found Marcus.”
“Where?”
“Chicago.”
“Where in Chicago?”
Luca showed them a live traffic-camera image.
Marcus's red sedan.
Beatrice recognized the street.
Mercy General.
Her blood went cold.
“Theo.”
They raced back.
Police surrounded the hospital.
Theo was safe.
But Marcus hadn't come for Theo.
He had entered the records wing.
Dr. Anand discovered what he took.
“Theo's original imaging.”
“Why?”
She opened a scan.
“There is something inside the fragment.”
Adriano stared.
“What?”
“A cavity.”
The shrapnel hadn't merely been shrapnel.
Something had been embedded inside it.
A micro-storage capsule.
Mara had hidden evidence inside the very object that injured her son.
But the fragment was now secured in a federal evidence facility.
Marcus knew.
And so did someone else.
Luca's phone vibrated.
A security alert.
The evidence facility had just been breached.
A camera image appeared.
A woman stood inside.
Brown hair.
Older than in the photographs.
A scar along one cheek.
Beatrice stopped breathing.
May you like
The woman turned toward the camera.
Mara Carson was alive.
