Chapter 7 - THE TRAITOR BENEATH MY ROOF
We reached the estate in eleven minutes.
It should have taken twenty.
I don't remember most of the drive.
I remember Maisie in the rear seat holding Harper's hand.
I remember Gabriel checking his weapon.
I remember Isabella's voice in my head.
Don't let revenge be the only thing Luca remembers about his father.
I wanted to kill Victor.
I wanted it with an intensity that frightened me.
But I wanted Mrs. Doyle alive more.
That was the difference between the man I had been and the man Isabella had apparently believed I could become.
The front gates stood open.
No guards.
No lights.
Victor had taken my house without firing a public shot.
Reed stared at the security panel.
“Someone reset the credentials from inside.”
“Who can do that?”
“Me. You. Deputy chief.”
“Caleb.”
Reed's face hardened.
Caleb Mercer had worked for him six years.
Married.
Two children.
He brought me coffee every Wednesday before security briefings.
Another ordinary face attached to betrayal.
Harper grabbed my arm.
“Don't go alone.”
“I won't.”
Gabriel stepped beside me.
She looked at both of us.
“That wasn't reassuring.”
We entered through the front.
Victor sat in my library.
Mrs. Doyle was beside him.
Her hands tied.
She looked furious rather than afraid.
“Elias,” she snapped, “if these idiots stain Mr. Luca's rug, I expect you to make them pay for cleaning.”
Victor laughed.
“I've always liked her.”
“Untie her.”
“The ledgers.”
I held up a case.
“First her.”
“You don't dictate terms.”
“Neither do you.”
Victor's gun pressed closer to Mrs. Doyle.
I set the case down.
Gabriel stood several feet behind me.
Victor's eyes went to him.
“Nine years.”
Gabriel said nothing.
“You've aged badly.”
“So has your soul.”
Victor smiled.
“Still dramatic.”
Maisie and Harper remained outside with Reed.
At least, that was the plan.
Then I saw movement near the hallway.
A red knit cap.
My heart nearly stopped.
Maisie.
She had followed us.
Gabriel saw her too.
His eyes widened.
Victor followed his gaze.
No.
Victor smiled.
“There's the problem.”
He turned the weapon away from Mrs. Doyle.
Toward Maisie.
Gabriel moved first.
So did I.
The gun fired.
Gabriel slammed into Maisie and took the bullet through his shoulder.
I fired twice.
Victor's men opened fire.
The library exploded into chaos.
Mrs. Doyle threw herself sideways.
I dragged her behind the desk.
Gabriel shielded Maisie with his body.
Reed's team stormed through the rear doors.
Within seconds, three of Victor's men were down.
Victor disappeared through the hidden passage behind my grandfather's bookshelves.
He knew about it.
Of course he did.
Harper ran to Maisie.
Gabriel lay bleeding on the floor.
Maisie knelt beside him.
“Dad?”
The word froze him.
First time.
Gabriel looked at her.
“I'm okay.”
“You're bleeding.”
“I've done that before.”
“That's not funny!”
“No.”
He smiled weakly.
“But you called me Dad.”
Maisie burst into tears.
Harper pressed towels against Gabriel's shoulder while Dr. Moretti was summoned.
Mrs. Doyle had a bruised wrist.
Nothing more.
I followed Reed toward the hidden passage.
Caleb Mercer stood at the far end.
Gun raised.
Reed stopped.
“Caleb.”
His deputy looked exhausted.
“I didn't have a choice.”
“Everybody says that.”
“He threatened my kids.”
Reed lowered his weapon slightly.
“Where are they?”
“I don't know.”
“Then help us find them.”
Caleb shook his head.
“Too late.”
He looked at me.
“Victor isn't running.”
“What?”
“He wanted you to think this was about the house.”
My stomach tightened.
“What is it about?”
“The foundation.”
Isabella's children's foundation.
“What did he do?”
Caleb's eyes filled with shame.
“He planted explosives at the old foundation headquarters.”
Reed went still.
“Why?”
“Federal agents are searching it tonight.”
Evidence.
If the building blew, records and investigators could disappear together.
Victor could blame me.
“When?”
I demanded.
Caleb checked his watch.
“Six minutes.”
We moved.
I called the FBI field office myself.
Telling federal agents you run a questionable empire but would prefer they not explode is an awkward conversation.
They evacuated.
The building blew thirty seconds after the last person exited.
Windows shattered across three blocks.
Nobody died.
Victor's plan failed.
But the blast gave him exactly what he needed for the next move.
News networks showed the destroyed foundation beside my photograph.
Within an hour, every channel in the country called me a suspected crime boss responsible for eliminating evidence.
My board removed me permanently.
Banks froze accounts.
Federal agents arrived at the estate.
I handed them Isabella's recording.
Rebecca's videos.
Victor's ledgers.
The agent in charge, Special Agent Caroline Hayes, watched me with the expression of a woman who had wanted to put me in handcuffs for fifteen years.
“This evidence could destroy your uncle,” she said.
“Good.”
“It could also destroy you.”
“Then follow it.”
She studied me.
“That's new.”
“So I've been told.”
Gabriel was upstairs receiving treatment.
Maisie refused to leave his room.
Harper stood beside me as agents carried boxes from my office.
“You're giving them everything?”
“Yes.”
“Even records about your businesses?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
I looked at the photograph of Isabella and Luca on the mantel.
“Because Victor spent nine years surviving inside secrets.”
Harper understood.
“No more secrets.”
“No more.”
My phone buzzed.
Unknown number.
A photograph.
I opened it.
My blood went cold.
Caleb's wife and two children were tied to chairs in a warehouse.
Victor stood behind them.
A second image arrived.
Not Caleb's family.
Harper gasped beside me.
It showed a grave.
Freshly opened.
The stone read:
ISABELLA MARCHETTI
1984–2017
Another message appeared.
May you like
YOU WANT THE TRUTH?
COME SEE WHAT YOUR WIFE TOOK TO HER GRAVE.
