Chapter 4 - What the Diary Was Really Hiding
"Who was it?" Elena demanded.
Dante didn't answer immediately.
"Dante."
"Marco's brother."
Marco went pale.
"Lucas?"
Dante nodded.
Elena looked between them.
Lucas Bellini had handled Marino financial operations for nearly a decade.
He had attended their wedding.
He had sat at their Christmas table.
He had once driven Elena to the emergency room when Dante was trapped in New York during a snowstorm.
Marco looked stunned.
"That's impossible."
"That's what Adrian said about Philip," Elena replied.
Nobody challenged her.
Dante picked up his phone.
"Find Lucas."
Marco didn't move.
Dante looked at him.
"Marco."
"I know."
Pain crossed Marco's face.
"I'll find him."
Elena stopped him.
"No."
Both men looked at her.
"We keep chasing people."
Dante frowned.
"Elena—"
"Adrian comes here, we chase Philip. Philip calls, now we're chasing Lucas. Every move we make is the move somebody expects."
Dante stared at her.
"What do you suggest?"
"We go to Gallery 17."
Caterina nodded.
"She's right."
Dante looked toward his mother.
"You don't get a vote."
"I've been ignored by more frightening men than you."
"Mother."
"Your father, for example."
Dante pinched the bridge of his nose.
Elena almost smiled.
Then she looked at the diary in her hands.
"There's something else."
Dante turned.
"What?"
"I didn't tell you everything about October seventeenth."
Adrian looked at her.
Neither had he, apparently.
Elena opened the diary.
"I didn't only go to Adrian."
Dante waited.
"I went to Philip first."
Adrian's head snapped up.
"You never told me."
"Because Philip told me not to."
She turned several pages.
"I received an anonymous envelope containing three Bellweather transactions. I recognized one painting."
"What painting?" Adrian asked.
"The Woman in Blue."
He went still.
Dante noticed.
"What?"
Adrian looked at Elena.
"That painting disappeared sixteen years ago."
"The year my father died."
"Yes."
Elena opened the diary to an entry.
"I wrote everything down after I came home."
Dante's eyes lowered.
She didn't hide the page this time.
"I met Philip at the institute. He told me the transactions were probably clerical errors. But when I showed him the painting number, he panicked."
"What did he say?"
"That I needed to forget I'd seen it."
Dante's voice hardened.
"And then?"
"I went to Adrian."
She looked at him.
"I thought if Philip was hiding something, Adrian might help."
Adrian lowered his head.
Instead, he'd convinced her she was imagining a conspiracy.
Elena continued.
"After I left Adrian, someone followed me."
Dante became motionless.
"You never told me that."
"I wasn't sure."
"Elena."
"I wasn't sure of anything by then."
That silenced him.
She looked down at the page.
"I drove around for two hours before coming home."
Dante remembered.
Her damp hair.
Her shaking hands.
Her refusal to let him make breakfast.
He had thought she was upset with him.
"Why did you circle October seventeenth on the final page?"
Elena turned to it.
"Because yesterday I received another envelope."
Dante stared.
"Where is it?"
"I destroyed it."
"What was inside?"
"A photograph of The Woman in Blue."
"Current?"
"Yes."
"Where?"
Elena's eyes met his.
"Gallery 17."
Nobody spoke.
Dante finally understood.
"You were planning to go alone."
"Tomorrow."
His anger flashed.
"You were going to walk into an abandoned building after receiving an anonymous photograph connected to your father's death?"
"When you say it like that—"
"How else would anyone say it?"
"Dante."
He turned away.
She followed.
"This is exactly why I didn't tell you."
"Because I object to my wife walking into obvious traps?"
"Because you hear danger and stop hearing me."
He turned back.
"Then make me hear you."
"I need to know what happened to my father."
"I understand."
"No, you understand why you want to protect me. That's not the same."
Dante stared at her.
She took his hand.
"I have spent years being told I couldn't trust myself. If you lock me away every time I'm afraid, you're helping Adrian's voice survive inside my head."
Adrian visibly flinched.
Dante looked down at their hands.
Then back at her.
"What do you want?"
"I want to go."
"With me."
"Yes."
"Marco."
"Yes."
"Security."
"Discreet."
"Body armor."
Elena gave him a look.
"Negotiable."
"No."
She sighed.
"Fine."
Dante nodded.
"Then we go."
Gallery 17 occupied the basement of the old Boston Conservation Annex near the waterfront.
They arrived shortly before dawn.
The building had been closed for twelve years.
Dust covered the corridors.
Emergency lights cast weak pools across concrete floors.
Elena walked beside Dante.
Not behind him.
He noticed.
Said nothing.
Adrian guided them downstairs.
"Seventeen is at the end."
They passed fifteen.
Sixteen.
Then stopped.
Gallery 17's steel door stood open.
Dante raised a hand.
Everyone froze.
He entered first.
Elena followed.
Inside were dozens of covered paintings.
Crates.
Old ledgers.
Shipping containers.
And one empty easel.
Elena approached it.
A small brass plaque remained.
THE WOMAN IN BLUE — PRIVATE COLLECTION
"It's gone," Adrian said.
"No."
Elena pointed toward the floor.
Fresh wheel marks ran through the dust.
"Moved recently."
Dante followed them toward a freight elevator.
Marco inspected the controls.
"Used within the last few hours."
Elena walked toward a desk.
Something lay on it.
A cassette recorder.
Old.
Her father's initials scratched into the plastic.
S.R.
Her hands began shaking.
"Dante."
He came beside her.
She pressed play.
Static.
Then a voice.
Her father's voice.
Elena stopped breathing.
"If Elena ever hears this, then I failed to keep this away from her."
Her knees weakened.
Dante placed a hand at her back.
The recording continued.
"Philip Mercer isn't the architect. He's afraid. Vittorio Marino isn't the architect either. He came to me because he discovered the same thing."
Dante looked at Caterina.
She covered her mouth.
Samuel continued.
"Someone is using both families. Someone close enough to know every shipment before it moves."
Static interrupted.
Then:
"The Woman in Blue isn't valuable because of the painting. The evidence is behind the lining."
Elena turned toward the empty easel.
The painting was gone.
Her father's voice continued.
"If they learn what I found, they will come for Elena someday. Not because she knows the truth."
A pause.
"Because they'll think I gave it to her."
The tape clicked.
Then one final sentence.
"Elena, if you're hearing this, trust what you see. Don't let anyone teach you otherwise."
Elena broke.
Not loudly.
Her hand simply covered her mouth as tears came.
Dante pulled her into him.
She let him.
For several seconds, there was no mafia boss.
No conspiracy.
No missing painting.
Only a daughter hearing her father's voice after sixteen years.
Then applause came from the doorway.
Slow.
Deliberate.
Everyone turned.
Philip Mercer stood there.
His face was bruised.
A gun hung loosely from his hand.
Dante stepped in front of Elena.
Philip laughed bitterly.
"If I wanted her dead, Dante, you would never have heard me enter."
"Put it down."
Philip did.
Immediately.
Marco searched him.
"Where's Lucas?" Dante asked.
Philip looked at Marco.
"Trying to save his brother."
Marco froze.
"What?"
Philip looked at him with pity.
"You really don't know."
"Know what?"
"Lucas didn't betray Dante."
"Then whose voice was on the phone?"
"His."
"Why was he with you?"
"Because I asked him for help."
Dante's eyes narrowed.
"Help from whom?"
Philip looked toward Caterina.
She became pale.
"Tell them," he said.
Caterina shook her head.
Philip laughed.
"Sixteen years and you're still protecting him."
Dante turned to his mother.
"Protecting who?"
Caterina's lips parted.
Before she could answer, the freight elevator sounded behind them.
Once.
Then again.
Someone was coming down.
Philip looked terrified.
"Too late."
Dante turned toward the elevator.
May you like
The doors began opening.
And the man inside was wearing Vittorio Marino's ring.
