Chapter 7 - A Death Certificate for a Living Man
Carlo Moretti was alive.
At least, somebody wanted us to believe he was.
We traced the call.
Burner phone.
Brooklyn.
Gone within ninety seconds.
Damian's father had allegedly died seven years earlier in Sicily after a boating accident.
No body had been recovered.
My father had insisted Carlo was dead.
Now I wondered whether he had been protecting the family from scandal.
Or protecting Carlo.
Lucia gave me the answer.
“He wasn't dead.”
My mother said it from her wheelchair without blinking.
Sophie stood beside her.
I stared.
“You knew?”
“For three years.”
The room became smaller.
“Explain.”
“Carlo came to me after your father died.”
“Here?”
“No. A church in Queens.”
“What did he want?”
“Money.”
“Why?”
“To disappear permanently.”
I laughed once.
There was no humor in it.
“You paid him?”
“No.”
“Then who did?”
Lucia looked down.
“Richard.”
Our attorney.
Again.
The conspiracy wasn't eleven months old.
It had roots stretching decades.
Carlo had murdered Thomas Bennett, stolen money, faked his death, and remained somewhere beyond the edge of our lives.
Now his son was completing the work.
Or perhaps following orders.
“Does Damian know he's alive?” Sophie asked.
Lucia shook her head.
“I don't know.”
That night, Marco found a storage facility rented under a Richard Vale shell company.
Unit 317.
Federal agents obtained a warrant.
Inside were twenty years of records.
Photographs.
Bank ledgers.
Fake passports.
Thomas Bennett's personnel file.
And one cassette tape.
We found an old player.
Thomas's voice filled the room.
“If you're hearing this, Carlo found out.”
Sophie covered her mouth.
Her father's voice continued.
“Account 714 isn't only theft. They're paying judges, police, inspectors. Richard Vale is moving the money. Carlo is threatening anyone who asks questions.”
Sophie began crying.
I reached for her hand.
This time, she took mine without hesitation.
The recording ended with:
“Tell my Sophie I didn't leave her.”
She broke.
I held her.
Not as an employer.
Not as Massimo Moretti.
Simply as a man holding a woman who had just heard her dead father speak after twenty-two years.
When she finally pulled away, she whispered, “Thank you.”
“I didn't do anything.”
“You found him.”
“No. He left himself for you to find.”
Marco interrupted gently.
“There's more.”
A locked metal case sat beneath the shelves.
Inside were blank death certificates.
One had my name.
One Lucia's.
One Sophie's.
Sophie stared.
“Mine?”
Her certificate listed death by suicide.
Date: Sunday.
The day after my wedding.
The narrative became obvious.
I die of cardiac arrest.
Lucia dies from complications.
Sophie, exposed as thief and murderer, supposedly takes her own life.
Vivian inherits.
Damian controls her.
Carlo remains invisible.
A perfect story.
Except we were reading the script before opening night.
Then Marco found a photograph inside the case.
Recent.
Carlo stood outside the estate gates.
Alive.
Older.
Gray-haired.
Watching.
On the back someone had written:
SATURDAY. LAST ACT.
The wedding wasn't merely our trap.
It was his too.
My phone vibrated.
Unknown number.
One photograph arrived.
Sophie asleep in the secure guest wing.
Taken ten minutes earlier.
Someone was inside my house.
I ran.
Marco followed.
We reached the guest corridor.
Lucia's door was open.
Her wheelchair was empty.
Sophie's door stood closed.
I reached for the handle.
May you like
It was already unlocked from the inside.
Someone was waiting for me.
