Chapter 2 - The Apology Behind the Locked Door
I ran before anyone could stop me.
Dante shouted my name behind me.
Carlo ordered the guests to remain downstairs.
Maria grabbed Ellie.
I took the staircase two steps at a time.
For seven years I had avoided the west hallway.
Tonight I crossed it in seconds.
Sofia’s door stood open by less than an inch.
A narrow strip of darkness showed beyond it.
I reached inside and hit the light switch.
Nothing happened.
The bulbs were dead.
I pushed the door wider.
“Sofia?”
The name escaped me automatically.
It was ridiculous.
Pain does that.
It leaves doors open inside your mind long after reality has closed them.
The room smelled like dust and old wood.
Moonlight came through the tall windows.
Her bed remained against the wall.
Her bookshelf.
Her white desk.
The faded paper stars she had stuck to the ceiling.
For one second I was thirty-four again, carrying her into this room because she had fallen asleep downstairs.
Then something moved beside the wardrobe.
I turned.
A man rushed me.
He struck my shoulder.
I hit the wall.
He ran for the hallway.
I caught the back of his coat.
We crashed into Sofia’s desk.
The drawer broke.
He swung at me.
I ducked and drove my shoulder into his chest.
He fell.
By the time Dante reached the doorway, I had the stranger pinned against the floor.
“Who are you?”
The man was older than me.
Maybe fifty.
Gray hair.
Scar under his left eye.
He smelled of cigarettes.
He laughed once.
“You really don’t remember me.”
I pressed his arm harder.
“Try me.”
“Seven years is a long time.”
Behind me, Dante whispered, “Leon.”
I looked back.
My brother knew him.
That was all I needed.
I dragged the man upright.
“Who is he?”
Dante didn’t answer.
Leon did.
“Ask your brother who handled security the night your daughter died.”
The room tilted.
I remembered the name now.
Leon Mercer.
A private security contractor Dante had hired after two threats against my company.
Leon had disappeared after the fire.
I had assumed Dante fired him.
“Why are you here?”
Leon smiled.
“To collect what I’m owed.”
Dante stepped forward.
“He’s lying.”
“About what?”
“Everything.”
Leon laughed again.
“You were always terrible under pressure, Dante.”
I shoved Leon into the chair.
“Start talking.”
He studied me.
“Your daughter wasn’t supposed to be home that night.”
My stomach tightened.
“She was sick.”
“Exactly.”
Sofia had developed a fever that afternoon.
My wife had planned to take her to her mother’s house.
Instead she left Sofia home with Dante while she attended the charity event with me.
I had forgotten that detail.
Leon continued.
“The original plan depended on an empty east wing.”
“What plan?”
Dante moved toward us.
“Vincent, stop listening.”
I turned.
“Why?”
“Because he’s trying to save himself.”
“From what?”
Leon answered.
“Prison.”
A sound came from the hallway.
Maria.
She stood there holding Ellie.
Carlo was behind them.
“I told you to keep them downstairs.”
Maria shook her head.
“The message came again.”
She showed me her phone.
DON’T TRUST THE MAN IN SOFIA’S ROOM.
Leon smiled.
“Cute.”
“Did you send it?” I asked.
“No.”
“Then who did?”
He shrugged.
“Someone who doesn’t want me talking.”
Dante looked toward the windows.
I saw it.
Another tiny movement.
Another calculation.
He was waiting for something.
Or someone.
“Carlo,” I said, “lock the estate gates.”
My uncle nodded and left.
Dante snapped, “That’s unnecessary.”
“Then you won’t mind.”
Leon shifted in the chair.
“The fire wasn’t an accident.”
Maria covered Ellie’s ears.
Too late.
The words had already entered me.
“No.”
“I was paid to disable three cameras and open the service gate.”
“By who?”
Leon looked at Dante.
My brother whispered, “Don’t.”
Leon grinned.
“Your brother.”
I crossed the room so fast Dante barely moved before my fist hit his jaw.
He stumbled against the wall.
Maria gasped.
Ellie began crying.
I stopped.
Immediately.
I looked at the child.
Fear was spreading across her face.
I stepped away from Dante.
“Maria, take Ellie downstairs.”
“No.”
Maria surprised everyone.
Including herself.
She swallowed.
“I spent three weeks afraid because your brother threatened me. My daughter is being threatened now. I’m not leaving until I know why.”
I looked at Ellie.
The child clutched Buttons.
I hated that she was in this room.
I hated more that Maria had a point.
This secret had reached them.
They deserved protection.
“Stay by the door,” I said.
Maria nodded.
Dante wiped blood from his lip.
“You hit me before you heard the whole story.”
“Then give me the whole story.”
He looked at Leon.
Leon leaned back.
“Tell him.”
Dante closed his eyes.
“I owed money.”
The words were almost inaudible.
“What?”
“Seven years ago.”
“How much?”
“Four million.”
I stared.
The Moretti businesses were worth hundreds of millions.
But seven years ago, Dante didn’t control his current assets.
He was reckless.
He gambled.
He invested in things he didn’t understand.
I had covered losses for him before.
“Why didn’t you come to me?”
“Because you’d already warned me.”
“That didn’t stop you other times.”
“This was different.”
Leon said, “He borrowed from men who don’t send invoices.”
Dante glared at him.
I understood.
Criminal lenders.
Not our world.
Not anymore.
My father had spent decades making the Moretti name legitimate.
Dante had gone backward.
“What did the fire have to do with your debt?”
Dante stared at the floor.
“The east wing contained financial records.”
“What records?”
“Documents from Father.”
Our father had died two years before Sofia.
He had left both of us significant holdings.
I controlled the majority share.
Dante received several properties and trusts.
“Some documents would have exposed money I had taken from one of the family accounts.”
“How much?”
“Two million.”
I laughed.
There was no humor in it.
“You set fire to my house over two million dollars?”
“No.”
Leon said, “He wanted one office burned.”
Dante nodded quickly.
“Yes. Only the office. It was supposed to look electrical. No one was supposed to get hurt.”
My hands shook.
“But Sofia was home.”
“I didn’t know until that evening.”
“And you still did it.”
His eyes filled.
“I tried to call it off.”
Leon snorted.
“You tried to renegotiate.”
Dante spun toward him.
“You said you could control it!”
“So that’s your defense?”
“Shut up!”
I stepped between them.
“What man did Sofia see in the garage?”
Leon raised a hand.
“Me.”
The answer sliced through the room.
“She saw you?”
“Yes.”
“What were you doing?”
“Carrying accelerant.”
Maria closed her eyes.
I could not speak.
Sofia had seen Leon.
She told Dante.
Dante told her not to tell me.
Then the fire started.
“Did you know she was still inside?”
Leon’s expression hardened.
“I thought Dante took her out.”
I looked at my brother.
He shook his head.
“I went upstairs.”
“Did you?”
“Yes.”
“You told police you did.”
“I did!”
“Then why didn’t you reach her?”
“Because the hallway was already burning.”
Leon laughed softly.
Dante stared at him.
“What?”
Leon leaned forward.
“You still haven’t told him.”
My brother’s face changed.
“What haven’t you told me?”
Leon stood.
I shoved him back down.
He looked directly at me.
“Sofia got out of her room.”
The world went silent.
“No.”
“She was alive after the fire started.”
“No.”
“I saw her.”
My legs nearly gave way.
Police had concluded Sofia died in her bedroom.
The roof collapsed before firefighters reached the room.
Her remains were recovered near the bed.
Leon continued.
“She came downstairs.”
I looked at Dante.
He could not meet my eyes.
“Where did she go?”
Leon pointed toward the floor.
“Garage.”
I grabbed Dante by his suit.
“You saw her?”
His mouth opened.
“Vincent—”
“Did you see my daughter alive?”
“Yes.”
Maria sobbed.
I could barely hear her.
“What happened?”
Dante’s whole body began shaking.
“She saw Leon. She saw the containers. She asked what was happening.”
“And?”
“I told her to go back upstairs.”
My grip tightened.
“You sent her toward the fire?”
“No! The east hall was still clear.”
“Why?”
“I panicked.”
“She was nine.”
“I know.”
“Why didn’t you take her outside?”
“I thought I had time.”
I let go because if I didn’t, I would kill him.
I walked toward Sofia’s desk.
My hands pressed against the wood.
Seven years of grief changed shape inside me.
Not an accident.
Not bad wiring.
Not fate.
A chain of decisions.
A debt.
A lie.
A frightened little girl.
I looked at the teddy bear.
“Ellie said there was a photograph.”
Leon suddenly stood.
Dante blocked him.
For one strange second, the two guilty men stared at each other.
Then Leon said, “The photograph isn’t what Vincent should be worried about.”
“What should I be worried about?”
He reached inside his coat.
I moved.
Too late.
He pulled out a small black flash drive.
“This.”
Dante lunged.
Leon threw it across the room.
I caught it.
“What’s on it?”
Leon smiled.
“The security footage your brother paid me to erase.”
Dante’s face went white.
I stared at the drive.
“You kept it.”
“Insurance.”
“Why come back now?”
“Because somebody broke into my apartment yesterday looking for it.”
Dante shook his head.
“Not me.”
“I know.”
That frightened me more than anything he had said.
“Then who?”
Leon looked toward Maria.
Specifically, toward Ellie.
The child hid behind her mother.
Leon whispered, “The person who knows Sofia wasn’t the only child in that house that night.”
Maria froze.
I turned to her.
“What does that mean?”
Her lips trembled.
“I don’t know.”
Leon stood again.
“Yes, you do.”
“No.”
“You’ve spent four years working in this house and you never told Vincent your maiden name.”
Maria stepped backward.
My eyes stayed on her.
“What was your maiden name?”
She said nothing.
“Maria.”
Tears slid down her face.
“Mercer.”
I looked at Leon.
Then at Maria.
Leon smiled without warmth.
“My daughter.”
Ellie stared at him.
Maria whispered, “You told me he was dead.”
Before I could ask who she meant, every light in Sofia’s room went out.
May you like
A gunshot cracked from the hallway.
And someone screamed my name.
