Chapter 4 - The Woman in the Silver Mask
Elena dropped the phone.
Dante caught it before it hit the floor.
"Elena."
She couldn't answer.
Her father was dead.
She had identified his body.
Or at least—
No.
She hadn't.
She had been sixteen.
Her mother had refused to let Elena see him after the accident.
Closed casket.
"That was my father."
Dante studied her.
"Could've been a recording."
"It wasn't."
"You heard him for five seconds."
"I know my father's voice."
Dante didn't argue.
The SUV accelerated toward the Moretti safe house.
Elena stared at the photograph again.
Richard Brooks standing beside Carlo Moretti.
Two men from worlds that should never have touched.
"What is the red door?" Dante asked.
"I don't know."
"You've never heard that phrase?"
"No."
He zoomed in on the photograph.
A warehouse behind them had a dark door.
Maybe red originally.
The image was old.
Elena leaned closer.
"Wait."
She pointed.
A small company logo was visible on a shipping container.
B&B Events.
Her breath caught.
"That's impossible."
"What?"
"My mother started Brooks & Brooks Events."
"The company you own."
"Yes."
"When?"
"Twenty-eight years ago."
Dante looked at her.
"Your family event-planning company was working with my father's warehouse."
"It looks that way."
Everything Elena thought she knew about her parents was shifting.
An hour later, they arrived at a heavily secured townhouse.
Dante's guards searched every room.
Elena sat at a dining table while Dante made calls.
Sofia arrived with Isabella.
Nobody looked happy.
Sofia studied the photograph.
"I remember Richard."
Elena stared.
"You knew my father?"
"Barely."
"That's already more than I knew."
Sofia sat across from her.
"Your father handled accounts for several Moretti companies."
"You said several."
"Yes."
"He wasn't an event planner."
"No."
"My mother told me he worked at a bank."
Sofia's expression softened.
"Your mother was protecting you."
"Everyone keeps using that word to justify lying."
Dante looked toward her.
The comment hit him too.
Elena continued.
"What happened seventeen years ago?"
Sofia exchanged a look with Isabella.
"Carlo discovered someone was stealing money through his companies."
"My father discovered it first," Isabella said.
"Matteo?"
"Yes."
Sofia nodded.
"Richard Brooks helped trace the accounts."
Elena swallowed.
"So my father worked with them."
"With Carlo and Matteo."
"Against who?"
"We never found out."
"Then Carlo was murdered."
Sofia nodded.
"And Matteo disappeared."
"And my father died two years earlier."
Silence.
Elena looked at them.
"Was his accident really an accident?"
Nobody answered.
That was enough.
She stood abruptly.
"I need air."
Dante followed her onto the terrace.
Cold wind swept across the city.
Elena gripped the railing.
"My whole life may be based on a lie."
"I know."
"No, you don't."
He stood beside her.
"Don't I?"
She looked at him.
He had just learned his mother lied about his father's murder.
Fair point.
Elena exhaled.
"I'm sorry."
"You don't have to be."
For a moment, they stood silently.
Then Elena noticed something.
"Your engagement."
"What about it?"
"Maybe that's why they wanted us together."
"Explain."
"Our fathers were connected."
Dante's eyes narrowed.
"Whoever did this wants Carlo Moretti's son and Richard Brooks's daughter together."
"Yes."
"Why?"
"Maybe because we each have something."
Dante thought.
"The pendant."
"And the red door."
He looked at her.
"Your father warned you not to let me open it."
"Which means he believes we might find it."
Dante's phone buzzed.
Security message.
He read it.
"Isabella wants us inside."
They returned.
Isabella stood before the television.
A new anonymous video had arrived.
A masked woman appeared onscreen.
Silver mask.
Black dress.
Her voice digitally distorted.
"Good evening, Dante Moretti."
Everyone went still.
"Your father spent his final months looking for the truth."
A photograph appeared behind her.
Carlo.
Matteo.
Richard.
Three men together.
"Three fathers formed a private alliance."
Another image.
A ledger.
"They discovered someone inside all three families was financing a separate criminal network."
Sofia whispered:
"No."
The masked woman continued.
"Richard Brooks tried to expose it first."
Elena stared at the screen.
"He died."
"Carlo Moretti tried next."
Dante's jaw tightened.
"He died."
"Matteo Vescari disappeared before he could finish what they started."
Isabella's eyes filled with tears.
Then the masked woman leaned closer.
"Now their children have been brought together."
Elena felt Dante move beside her.
"You have forty-eight hours to find the red door."
The screen changed.
A photograph of an abandoned theater.
Elena recognized it.
"My mother's old event warehouse."
Dante looked at her.
"You know it?"
"She stored props there before she sold the building."
The woman continued.
"Behind the red door is the proof your fathers died protecting."
Dante said quietly:
"Where's Matteo?"
The woman obviously couldn't hear him.
But the video seemed to answer.
"Find the proof, and Matteo Vescari lives."
Isabella covered her mouth.
"Fail, and the past dies with him."
The screen went black.
Elena turned toward Sofia.
"You know that building?"
Sofia shook her head.
But Isabella was staring at her.
"You're lying."
Sofia stiffened.
Dante's voice became dangerous.
"Mother."
Sofia looked at them.
"I've been there once."
"When?"
"The night Carlo died."
Silence.
Elena's heart jumped.
"What was there?"
"I don't know."
"Dante," Sofia said, "your father called me. He told me to come alone. When I arrived, the building was empty."
"Red door?"
"I saw one."
Elena stepped closer.
"And?"
"It was locked."
"Did you open it?"
"No."
"Why?"
Sofia's eyes filled with a fear she had been hiding for fifteen years.
"Because someone was standing behind it."
Dante stared.
"Who?"
"I couldn't see."
"You never told anyone?"
"The next morning Carlo was dead."
Dante walked away, furious.
Elena watched him.
He stopped at the window.
His entire body was rigid.
His mother approached.
"I thought keeping you away from it would protect you."
Dante turned.
"And how well has that worked?"
Sofia looked down.
Elena felt sympathy despite herself.
Secrets created prisons.
Sometimes for everyone.
Dante looked at Elena.
"We go tonight."
Isabella immediately said:
"I'm coming."
"No."
"My father—"
"No."
Elena stepped forward.
"I'm going."
Dante stared at her.
"That wasn't a question."
"Neither was mine."
Two hours later, Elena and Dante entered the abandoned Brooks & Brooks warehouse with six armed guards.
Dust covered everything.
Old chandeliers.
Broken tables.
Artificial trees.
Rolled carpets from weddings long forgotten.
Elena remembered running through here as a child.
Her mother working late.
Her father carrying boxes.
Happy memories suddenly felt suspicious.
They reached the back corridor.
There it was.
A red door.
Still bright despite the years.
Dante raised his weapon.
Elena grabbed his wrist.
"My father said not to let you open it."
"Your father also may be imprisoned by the people who orchestrated this."
"So?"
"So I stopped taking instructions from ghosts yesterday."
He reached for the handle.
Locked.
A guard handed him tools.
Elena looked around.
Something caught her eye.
A small brass hook mounted beside the frame.
She remembered.
Her mother used to hide spare keys inside decorative flowers.
Elena reached into an old artificial rose arrangement.
Her fingers touched metal.
A key.
Dante stared.
"How did you know?"
"I grew up here."
She unlocked the door.
Dante opened it.
Nothing happened.
Behind the door was a small office.
One desk.
One filing cabinet.
One red leather ledger.
Elena walked toward it.
"Too easy."
Dante nodded.
"Agreed."
He opened the ledger.
Pages of numbers.
Names.
Payments.
Then Elena saw something.
"Wait."
One payment was highlighted.
R. BROOKS — $2,000,000.
Her stomach dropped.
"My father was paid."
Dante examined the date.
"Three days before he died."
Elena shook her head.
"No."
Another page.
CARLO MORETTI — TRANSFER DENIED.
Another.
MATTEO VESCARI — TERMINATION AUTHORIZED.
Isabella's father.
Dante turned pages faster.
Then he stopped.
A photograph fell out.
Sofia Moretti.
Standing beside Richard Brooks.
Very close.
Elena picked it up.
On the back, her father's handwriting:
SOFIA KNOWS WHO THE FOURTH PARTNER IS.
Dante's expression darkened.
"My mother."
Elena shook her head.
"It doesn't mean she's involved."
"No?"
"Your father trusted her."
"So did mine."
A noise came from behind them.
The red door slammed shut.
Lights went out.
Gunshots exploded in the corridor.
Dante pulled Elena down.
His guards shouted.
Another shot.
Then silence.
Emergency lights flickered red.
Elena heard breathing.
Not Dante's.
Someone else was inside the office.
Dante raised his gun.
A figure stepped from behind the filing cabinet.
Woman.
Tall.
Black clothes.
Silver mask.
The woman from the video.
Dante aimed directly at her.
"Take it off."
She raised both hands.
Elena stared.
Something about the woman's posture felt familiar.
The masked woman slowly reached toward her face.
Then she spoke without the voice distortion.
"Elena."
Elena's knees nearly gave out.
She knew that voice.
"Mom?"
The silver mask came away.
May you like
Elena's mother stared back at her.
And behind her stood a man Elena had buried seventeen years ago.
