Chapter 5 - The Enemy Inside Vincent’s House
Vincent stared at Marco.
“Lock everything down.”
Marco was already dialing.
Grace caught Vincent’s arm.
“Why would Roman take Ethan to your headquarters?”
“To send a message.”
“What message?”
“That he can reach us.”
“Can he?”
Vincent did not answer quickly enough.
Marco swore.
“Security isn’t responding.”
Vincent took out his phone.
Nothing.
Again.
Nothing.
His expression changed from concern to something colder.
“This is internal.”
Grace understood.
“Someone inside your family is helping Roman.”
“Yes.”
The Moretti headquarters occupied the upper floors of an old shipping administration building beside the Brooklyn waterfront.
Grace expected alarms.
Instead, the building looked normal.
Too normal.
Vincent ordered most of his men to stay outside.
He entered with Marco, Grace, and two others.
“You’re staying behind me,” Vincent told her.
“We have done this conversation.”
“Humor me.”
“Find my brother and I’ll consider becoming agreeable.”
“Terrifying prospect.”
The elevator opened on the sixth floor.
Empty desks.
Lights on.
Coffee still warm.
People had left quickly.
Grace spotted a photograph hanging near a conference room.
Vincent at perhaps twenty-five.
Lorenzo Moretti beside him.
Dominic on the other side.
And a fourth man.
Tall.
Silver-haired.
Smiling.
Grace recognized him from one of Anna’s hidden photographs.
“Who is that?”
Vincent followed her gaze.
His face tightened.
“Charles Vescari.”
“Friend?”
“Family attorney.”
Grace stepped closer.
Charles had one hand on Anna’s shoulder in the older photograph.
Anna appeared about seventeen.
She was smiling.
Someone she trusted.
“Where is he now?”
Vincent frowned.
“Retired.”
“Alive?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
“Florida, supposedly.”
Grace looked at him.
“Supposedly?”
Marco returned from the stairwell.
“Vincent, conference room.”
They entered.
Ethan sat in the middle of the room.
Alive.
Untied.
Alone.
Grace ran to him.
“Ethan!”
He stood just in time to catch her.
She hit his shoulder.
“You idiot!”
“I know.”
She hugged him.
Hard.
Then hit him again.
“Ow.”
“You disappeared!”
“I was busy.”
“Being kidnapped?”
“Among other hobbies.”
Vincent scanned the room.
“Where’s Roman?”
Ethan looked at him.
“Not here.”
Marco shut the door.
“Then who brought you?”
Ethan’s expression changed.
“Charles Vescari.”
Grace and Vincent looked at each other.
Ethan frowned.
“You know him?”
Vincent asked, “Where is he?”
“He left five minutes ago.”
“Why did he free you?”
“He didn’t free me. Roman gave me to him.”
Grace moved closer to Ethan.
“Why?”
“Because Roman isn’t in charge.”
Vincent went still.
Ethan took a flash drive from his shoe.
“This is what I stole.”
Marco almost smiled.
“You hid it in your shoe?”
“They searched my pockets.”
Grace sighed.
“That is the smartest stupid thing you’ve ever done.”
Ethan handed it to Vincent.
“I thought Roman built the whole network. He didn’t.”
They plugged the drive into an offline laptop.
Files appeared.
Payments.
Audio.
Videos.
One name repeatedly surfaced.
C. Vescari.
Charles had spent decades serving as attorney to both the Vale and Moretti organizations.
He negotiated disputes.
Managed trusts.
Moved money.
Resolved wars.
And apparently created some of them.
Ethan opened an audio file.
Roman’s voice.
“You promised Anna would never surface.”
Charles answered.
“She didn’t.”
“Her children did.”
“They know nothing.”
“Ethan knows enough.”
“And Grace has the key.”
Roman became quiet.
Charles continued.
“Bring them both to me.”
Grace felt cold.
Vincent leaned toward the laptop.
Another recording.
Lorenzo Moretti arguing with Charles fourteen years earlier.
“I want Anna brought here alive.”
Charles answered, “You signed the extraction.”
“Yes. Extraction. Not execution.”
Grace looked at Vincent.
He had told the truth.
Lorenzo continued.
“Dominic says she has children.”
“That changes nothing.”
“It changes everything.”
Charles’s voice sharpened.
“Since when?”
“Since I buried my wife.”
Silence.
Then Lorenzo said:
“Anna didn’t kill Sofia. You know that.”
Grace’s hand flew to her mouth.
Vincent froze.
Charles replied quietly.
“You cannot prove what happened.”
“I don’t need to. Sofia called me before the crash.”
Vincent stopped the recording.
His breathing had changed.
Grace touched his sleeve.
He did not move.
“She wasn’t driving,” Grace whispered.
Vincent stared at the laptop.
“No.”
Ethan opened another file.
Sofia Moretti’s voice filled the room.
Old recording.
Weak quality.
Urgent.
“Lorenzo, Charles knows Anna has the records. He’s following us. We’re going to Dominic’s. If something happens—”
Static.
Then:
“Protect Anna.”
The recording ended.
Vincent stood absolutely still.
Grace watched thirty years of pain rearrange itself across his face.
His mother had not been killed because of Anna.
She had died protecting her.
Marco whispered, “Charles caused the crash.”
Ethan shook his head.
“Worse.”
He opened a scanned police report.
The vehicle that struck Sofia’s car had been registered to a shell corporation.
That corporation belonged to Vescari Holdings.
Grace whispered, “He killed her.”
Vincent’s expression hardened.
“And my father spent the rest of his life blaming the wrong people.”
Ethan nodded.
“Charles kept the Vale and Moretti families fighting because every conflict moved money through companies he controlled.”
Grace thought of Anna’s letter.
Someone who profited every time we fought.
“Roman knows?”
“Yes.”
“Then why work with him?”
“Because Charles has something on Roman.”
“What?”
Ethan opened another folder.
A photograph of Roman twenty years earlier beside a warehouse fire.
“Roman killed Arturo?”
“No.”
Ethan zoomed in.
Another man stood behind Roman.
Charles.
“Roman helped cover it up.”
Vincent understood.
“So Roman is trapped.”
“Pretty much.”
Grace looked around.
“Why bring Ethan here?”
Ethan answered.
“To lure Vincent.”
Vincent’s head snapped toward the door.
A second later, the building alarms activated.
Not fire alarms.
Security shutters.
Heavy steel barriers dropped over the windows.
The conference room door locked electronically.
Marco tried it.
“Sealed.”
Vincent looked at Ethan.
“What did Charles say before he left?”
Ethan’s face changed.
“He said you’d finally come home.”
A screen at the far end of the room turned on.
Charles Vescari appeared.
Silver-haired.
Calm.
Seventy, perhaps.
He looked directly into the camera.
“Vincent.”
Vincent stepped forward.
“Charles.”
“I hoped you’d bring Grace.”
Grace felt Vincent shift slightly in front of her.
Charles smiled.
“Still your father’s son.”
“What do you want?”
“What Anna took from me.”
“The records?”
“The original ledger.”
Grace thought of the metal case.
“We don’t have it.”
Charles’s smile remained.
“Yes, you do.”
Vincent looked at Grace’s brass key.
Charles continued.
“Anna loved puzzles. A.V.R. was not the vault.”
Grace frowned.
“What?”
“The key opens the vault. But the ledger was never inside it.”
Grace remembered the case.
The papers.
The tapes.
The letter.
No ledger.
Charles smiled wider.
“Anna hid the only copy somewhere her children would keep it without knowing.”
Grace touched the necklace.
The key.
Vincent saw her do it.
Charles laughed softly.
“Not the key, sweetheart.”
Grace froze.
Charles continued.
“Think about what your mother gave you both.”
Grace looked at Ethan.
Ethan looked at her.
They spoke simultaneously.
“Dad’s things.”
Their father’s belongings had been divided after Anna died.
Grace received Daniel’s old wristwatch.
Ethan got his toolbox.
Grace had sold the watch three years earlier to pay rent.
Her stomach dropped.
“I don’t have it.”
Vincent turned.
“What?”
“I sold my father’s watch.”
“When?”
“Three years ago.”
“Where?”
“A pawnshop in Queens.”
Ethan stared.
“You sold Dad’s watch?”
“I was getting evicted!”
Charles watched from the screen with visible amusement.
“Then you had better find it quickly.”
Vincent stepped closer to the camera.
“Why?”
Charles’s smile vanished.
“Because Roman is already on his way.”
The screen went black.
The conference-room lock released.
Vincent pulled the door open.
Outside, the entire floor was empty.
On the carpet sat a single envelope.
Grace picked it up.
Inside was a recent photograph.
Her father’s old watch.
Behind it stood a pawnshop counter.
And reflected in the glass display case was a man Grace recognized immediately.
May you like
Roman Vale.
The photograph had been taken less than ten minutes earlier.
