Chapter 6 - The Woman Who Betrayed Her Father
Fire climbed the eastern staircase.
“Outside!” Alessandro shouted.
Guards rushed through the house.
Sophia fought toward Marie's room.
Alessandro grabbed her.
“She isn't there.”
“The music box!”
“I'll get it.”
“You don't know where it is!”
“Neither do you.”
Sophia looked toward the flames.
Then remembered.
“When I was little, Marie hated the song.”
“What?”
“My mother's music box played Clair de Lune. Marie said she couldn't stand hearing it after Mom died.”
Sophia's eyes widened.
“She kept it.”
“Where?”
“Her apartment.”
They escaped as firefighters entered the grounds.
Someone had deliberately ignited three separate sections of the estate.
A distraction.
By sunrise, Sophia and Alessandro stood inside Marie's apartment.
Drawers had been emptied.
Furniture overturned.
Sophia entered the bedroom.
Nothing.
Then she noticed the closet.
A floorboard sat slightly higher than the others.
Alessandro pried it up.
The music box waited beneath.
Sophia's hands shook as she opened it.
The melody began.
For a moment she was nine again, sitting beside her mother.
Then Alessandro found a hidden compartment.
Inside was a microcassette.
Dante located an old player.
Static filled the apartment.
Then Thomas Chen's voice emerged.
“If you're hearing this, Marie, I hope you've decided to do the right thing.”
Sophia closed her eyes.
Her father's voice.
Alive again for sixty seconds.
“I know you're giving information to Raymond.”
Sophia opened her eyes.
“I know why. You owe money. You're afraid. But Raymond isn't working alone. He reports to Vale.”
Marie sobbed faintly on the recording.
Thomas continued.
“I won't tell Sophia what you did. But you need to leave Bellhaven tonight.”
“Thomas, I'm sorry.”
“You told them about the warehouse meeting.”
Silence.
Sophia stopped breathing.
Marie had betrayed him.
“I didn't know they'd kill you.”
“You knew they might.”
The tape clicked.
Then Thomas said something Sophia would remember forever.
“If I die, take care of my daughter. And spend the rest of your life becoming someone worthy of her forgiveness.”
The recording ended.
Sophia sat on the floor.
Marie hadn't merely hidden the truth.
She had caused the ambush.
Alessandro crouched beside Sophia without touching her.
She leaned against him anyway.
His body went still.
Then his arm slowly wrapped around her.
“I don't know what to feel,” she whispered.
“You don't have to know yet.”
“She raised me.”
“I know.”
“She destroyed my father.”
“Yes.”
“And he forgave her.”
“He gave her the chance to earn forgiveness.”
Sophia looked up.
“Is that different?”
“Very.”
She studied him.
“You think people can change?”
“I have to.”
Before she could answer, Dante entered.
“We found Marie.”
She was at Bellhaven Cathedral.
Sophia insisted on going.
They found Marie sitting alone in the front pew.
No weapon.
No guards.
Just a tired woman staring at candles.
Sophia sat beside her.
“You told Raymond about the warehouse.”
Marie began crying.
“Yes.”
“Did you know?”
“No. Sophia, I swear. I thought they wanted the records.”
“My father knew you betrayed him.”
“I know.”
“And he still asked you to protect me.”
Marie covered her face.
“That was worse than if he'd hated me.”
Sophia's eyes burned.
“Why keep working for Raymond?”
“Because after Thomas died, Raymond showed me photographs of you. School. Grocery store. Your bedroom window.”
Sophia went cold.
“He said if I ever stopped cooperating, you'd be next.”
“So the debts…”
“Camouflage. He needed you poor, exhausted, and dependent.”
“Why?”
“So you wouldn't investigate the inheritance.”
Sophia stood.
“You could have told Alessandro.”
“I thought his family killed Thomas.”
Behind them, Alessandro remained silent.
Marie looked at him.
“I was wrong.”
“Yes,” he said.
No cruelty.
Just fact.
Marie pulled something from her coat.
A phone.
“Raymond called me this morning.”
She handed it to Sophia.
“He wants to meet.”
“Where?”
“The old Caruso shipyard.”
Alessandro immediately said, “No.”
Sophia ignored him.
“When?”
“Midnight.”
“Why?”
“He says Vale is leaving the country tomorrow.”
Dante examined the phone.
“There’s a message.”
Sophia read it.
BRING SOPHIA. NO CARUSOS.
Below it was a photograph.
Lucien Vale stood beside a young man bound to a chair.
Sophia didn't recognize him.
Alessandro did.
His face drained of color.
“Who is that?”
He didn't answer.
“Alessandro?”
Dante whispered, “Matteo.”
Sophia looked between them.
“Who is Matteo?”
Alessandro's eyes remained fixed on the photograph.
“My brother.”
Sophia stared.
“You have a brother?”
“Had.”
The word came out rough.
“He disappeared seven years ago.”
Dante enlarged the image.
The man looked older, thinner, scarred.
But undeniably alive.
Sophia looked at Alessandro.
“You thought he was dead.”
“Yes.”
Raymond's next message arrived.
MIDNIGHT.
May you like
BRING THE WIFE YOU STOLE.
OR MATTEO DIES THE WAY THOMAS CHEN DID.
