Chapter 6 - The Man They Tried to Bury Twice
“No.”
The word left me before anyone moved.
The agent read Luca his rights.
Luca didn’t resist.
That frightened me more than resistance would have.
Martin placed the bloody shirt inside an evidence bag.
“Found in Vargo’s vehicle.”
“That’s impossible,” I said.
Martin looked at me with manufactured sympathy.
“Elena, I’m sorry.”
“You’re lying.”
“Grief can make facts difficult.”
I wanted to hit him.
Instead, I remembered my father.
Evidence.
Not emotion.
I looked at the shirt.
Then at Martin.
“You said it was found in Luca’s vehicle.”
“Yes.”
“Which vehicle?”
Martin hesitated.
Barely.
But enough.
Luca owned several.
Martin shouldn’t have known which one investigators searched unless someone had told him.
Or unless he planted it himself.
I said nothing.
They took Luca.
Sloane left smiling.
That was his mistake.
Arrogant people often think silence means surrender.
For the next twelve hours, Isabella and I worked.
She explained her disappearance.
Seven years earlier, she discovered Sloane still controlled remnants of her father’s organization.
She staged her death and infiltrated his financial network.
My father found her two years later.
They worked together.
The drive contained recordings.
Emails.
Transaction histories.
But most importantly, it contained Belladonna’s hidden surveillance archive.
Martin had recorded everything for years.
Including himself.
We found footage from the previous night.
Martin entering Luca’s parking garage.
Carrying a bag.
We found another recording.
My father alive.
Martin interrogating him.
Timestamp: forty minutes after prosecutors claimed Luca killed him.
The murder charge collapsed.
But Dad was still missing.
Then Isabella found something else.
A microphone transmission embedded in Martin’s recording system.
Live.
Martin was speaking somewhere.
We listened.
Sloane’s voice.
“You should have killed Marlowe twelve years ago.”
Martin answered.
“You told me Vargo’s father handled it.”
“He failed.”
“And now?”
“Tonight it ends.”
A third voice groaned.
Dad.
Alive.
We traced the signal.
Not to a warehouse.
Not to some secret compound.
To the building above Belladonna.
Room 417.
Again.
The safest hiding place had always been the one everyone thought had already been searched.
Federal investigators surrounded the building.
Luca was released just before midnight.
He wanted me to stay outside.
I gave him a look.
He sighed.
“I knew you were going to do that.”
“You’re learning.”
We entered behind the agents.
Room 417 was empty.
But Isabella found a second door behind the filing cabinets.
Stairs descended between the walls.
An old service passage.
At the bottom was a storage room.
My father sat tied to a chair.
Alive.
Martin stood beside him.
Sloane stood near the rear exit.
Agents shouted.
Martin raised his hands.
Sloane didn’t.
He looked at me.
“This is what your father gave you.”
“What?”
“The belief that truth matters.”
“It does.”
“No. Power matters.”
He smiled sadly.
“Truth is whatever powerful people can make others believe.”
I looked toward the cameras on the agents’ uniforms.
“Then you probably shouldn’t have said that while being recorded.”
His face changed.
For the first time, Victor Sloane looked ordinary.
Old.
Afraid.
He tried the exit.
More agents waited outside.
Martin began bargaining immediately.
Sloane called him a coward.
Martin responded by offering evidence against Sloane.
It was almost funny.
Men who had spent decades demanding loyalty abandoned each other within thirty seconds.
Dad was freed.
I ran to him.
He hugged me.
This time I didn’t slap him first.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered.
“You owe Mom twelve years.”
“I know.”
“You owe me twelve.”
“I know.”
“You’re going to spend a long time making that up.”
He started crying.
“I hope I get the chance.”
“You do.”
Outside, dawn was beginning.
Sloane and Martin were taken away separately.
Journalists crowded the sidewalk.
Luca stood apart from them.
He looked exhausted.
I approached him.
“You okay?”
“No.”
“Good answer.”
He smiled weakly.
“My sister is alive.”
“My father is alive.”
“We’ve had a strange week.”
“I used to serve scallops.”
“You were good at it.”
“You barely ate yours.”
“They were overpriced.”
I laughed.
Then his expression became serious.
“Elena.”
I knew that tone.
“What?”
“I need to leave New York.”
My smile disappeared.
“The investigations into my organization are going to expand. They should. I’ve spent years trying to separate myself from what my father built, but wanting to change doesn’t erase responsibility.”
“You’re going to run?”
“No.”
He looked at the federal building across the street.
“I’m going to cooperate.”
That was when I understood.
He might lose businesses.
Money.
Freedom.
Everything.
“You don’t know what they’ll charge you with.”
“No.”
“And you’re doing it anyway?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
His eyes held mine.
“Because you were right.”
“About?”
“Truth.”
He touched my cheek.
Then stopped himself.
His hand fell.
“I meant what I told you.”
“What?”
“I don’t own you.”
“I know.”
“I won’t ask you to wait.”
That hurt more than I expected.
“You’re annoyingly noble for a mafia boss.”
“I’m trying to retire from the stereotype.”
I kissed him.
This time longer.
When we separated, he whispered:
“Was that your decision?”
“Completely.”
He smiled.
“For me?”
“Don’t ruin it.”
Agents called his name.
He walked toward them.
I watched him go.
Then my father came beside me.
“You love him.”
“I barely know him.”
“That wasn’t what I said.”
Before I could answer, Isabella rushed from Belladonna carrying the recovered drive.
“Elena.”
Something in her voice frightened me.
“What?”
“We missed one file.”
She opened her laptop.
A video appeared.
Recorded twelve years ago.
My father.
Luca’s father.
Victor Sloane.
And my mother.
All four were sitting at the same table.
My mother placed a document between them.
The camera zoomed close enough to show the heading.
SUCCESSION AGREEMENT.
Beneath it was my name.
ELENA MARLOWE.
May you like
And beside my name was a date.
Tomorrow.
