Chapter 3 - THE BROTHER BEHIND THE GATES
Luca took the note from my hand and read it again.
His face showed almost nothing.
That scared me.
Men who shouted gave you warning.
Luca Castellano became quiet.
“Who is Matteo?”
“My brother.”
“Where is he?”
“In this house.”
I stared at him.
“You brought my daughter into a house with the man threatening her?”
“We don’t know Matteo wrote this.”
“His name is on the note.”
“Which is exactly why I doubt he did.”
I almost slapped him.
Instead, I walked into Emma’s room, lifted my sleeping daughter, and started toward the stairs.
Luca stepped into my path.
“Move.”
“No.”
“Move.”
“Whoever left that necklace entered a guarded bedroom without triggering an alarm. Walking outside now is exactly what they want.”
“You expect me to stay?”
“I expect you to keep Emma alive.”
The words landed hard.
I hated him for using the one argument I couldn’t defeat.
“Then find your brother.”
Luca looked at Dante.
“Now.”
We moved downstairs.
I carried Emma despite the agony in my ankle.
The mansion seemed different now.
Every shadow had weight.
Every doorway could hide someone.
Matteo Castellano was waiting in the library.
He was older than Luca by perhaps six years, handsome in a polished, expensive way. Gray touched his temples. A glass of whiskey rested in one hand.
His eyes moved from Luca to me to Emma.
“So this is Ava Carter.”
I tightened my hold on my daughter.
“You know me too?”
Matteo smiled.
“I know why my brother has spent three weeks turning Seattle upside down.”
Luca tossed the note onto the desk.
The smile disappeared.
Matteo read it.
Then laughed.
“Cute.”
“Where were you twenty minutes ago?” Luca asked.
“In my office.”
“Alone?”
“Yes.”
“Convenient.”
Matteo’s gaze sharpened.
“You actually think I left this?”
“I think somebody wants me to.”
“Then perhaps you should ask why.”
Luca’s voice lowered.
“I am.”
The brothers stared at each other.
Whatever history existed between them was older than me, older than tonight, maybe older than either man’s willingness to forgive.
Matteo looked at me.
“Did Luca tell you our father knew Samuel Carter?”
I turned toward Luca.
“No.”
Matteo smiled without warmth.
“Of course he didn’t.”
“Enough,” Luca said.
“No. She deserves context.”
Matteo walked toward a cabinet.
Dante moved instantly.
Matteo stopped.
“For God’s sake, I’m getting a file.”
Luca nodded once.
Matteo removed an old photograph.
Three men stood beside a fishing vessel.
One was my grandfather.
Another was a younger man who looked unmistakably like Luca.
His father.
The third man had been scratched out with black ink.
“Samuel Carter and our father built North Sound Development together,” Matteo said.
I stared at the picture.
“Why?”
“The waterfront property was nearly worthless thirty years ago.”
“And now?”
“Now developers would kill for it.”
His eyes stayed on mine.
“Apparently literally.”
Luca took the photograph.
“Who is the third man?”
Matteo’s expression changed.
“You know.”
“Say it.”
“Victor Sloane.”
Dante swore quietly.
I looked between them.
“Who?”
Luca answered.
“A man my father went to war with twenty years ago.”
“Is he alive?”
“No.”
Matteo took a drink.
“His son is.”
The library doors opened.
A security guard entered.
“Mr. Castellano, we found something.”
He placed a tablet on the desk.
Security footage.
At 9:43 p.m., a figure in a dark jacket entered the east corridor.
The face remained hidden.
Then the person turned slightly.
I recognized him.
Marco.
My manager from Marino’s.
My stomach dropped.
“That’s impossible.”
Luca froze the image.
“Your boss.”
“He was at the diner.”
“Until after we left.”
I remembered Marco calling my name.
Table twelve.
VIP section.
He had deliberately sent me to Luca.
Had he known Luca was there for me?
“Find him,” Luca ordered.
Dante left.
I put Emma to bed in another room while Luca doubled the guards.
When I returned downstairs, my ankle was throbbing so violently I nearly fell.
Luca caught my elbow.
“I’m fine.”
“You need treatment.”
“My daughter almost got kidnapped.”
“And you’ll be useful to her when you can’t walk?”
I glared at him.
“You’re incredibly irritating.”
“I’ve been told worse.”
Dr. Marchetti arrived fifteen minutes later.
No fracture.
Severe sprain, inflammation, mandatory rest.
I received a brace, medication, and strict instructions.
When the doctor left, Luca brought me food.
“I’m not hungry.”
“You haven’t eaten since when?”
I looked away.
“Ava.”
“Yesterday.”
His jaw tightened.
“Don’t.”
“Don’t what?”
“Look at me like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like I’m pathetic.”
He crouched in front of my chair.
“I don’t.”
His voice had changed.
Quiet.
Dangerously gentle.
“I think you’ve been surviving so long that suffering feels normal.”
Something inside me cracked.
I hated him for seeing it.
“I didn’t have a choice.”
“I know.”
“No, you don’t.”
“My mother raised two boys after my father went to prison.”
I blinked.
Luca looked toward the dark windows.
“She cleaned offices at night. Worked at a bakery before sunrise. Told us she wasn’t hungry so we could eat.”
His eyes returned to mine.
“I know what it looks like when someone is drowning while insisting they can swim.”
For the first time, Luca Castellano did not look powerful.
He looked like somebody’s son.
“What happened to her?”
“She died six years ago.”
“I’m sorry.”
“So am I.”
Our eyes held.
Something passed between us that had nothing to do with Jake or money.
Then Luca’s phone rang.
Dante.
Luca answered.
His expression changed immediately.
“Where?”
Silence.
“We’re coming.”
He ended the call.
“What happened?”
“They found Marco.”
“Where?”
“Marino’s.”
I started standing.
“You stay.”
“Absolutely not.”
“Ava—”
“He knows something about my daughter.”
Ten minutes later, Emma remained at the mansion with Rosa and six guards while Luca and I drove back toward the diner.
Police lights flashed outside when we arrived.
Luca’s people got us through the rear entrance before uniformed officers noticed.
The kitchen smelled like bleach.
Marco sat inside the walk-in freezer.
Dead.
A gun lay beside him.
A note had been pinned to his jacket.
I couldn’t look.
Then Luca saw something on Marco’s hand.
Ink.
Numbers written across his palm.
317.
I whispered, “Locker number.”
Luca turned.
“What?”
“At the bus station. Marco used to keep telling employees he stored emergency cash in locker 317 because he didn’t trust banks.”
Twenty minutes later we stood inside the nearly empty station.
Locker 317 opened with a key found in Marco’s pocket.
Inside sat a brown envelope.
Luca pulled it out.
Photographs spilled onto the bench.
Me.
Emma.
Mrs. Chen.
Luca.
Then one final photograph.
A hospital room.
A woman lay unconscious beneath white sheets.
I recognized her immediately even though I had not seen her in nineteen years.
My mother.
I stopped breathing.
“She died when I was twelve.”
Luca slowly turned the photograph over.
A date was stamped on the back.
Three weeks ago.
And beneath it someone had written:
ASK LUCA WHY HE KNOWS SHE’S ALIVE.
I looked at him.
He didn’t deny it.
That was the worst part.
“You knew?”
His silence answered before his mouth did.
“Yes.”
May you like
And suddenly the man protecting me became the man I feared most.
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