Chapter 3 - THE BLACK COAT AND THE BROKEN WATCH
“Anthony, don't.”
Luca's voice cut through the dining room.
Anthony Russo froze with his hand inside his jacket.
Two guards immediately moved toward him.
“Easy,” Anthony said.
He pulled out a black leather wallet.
Inside was a faded photograph.
Not a weapon.
“My wife,” he said quietly. “And my daughter.”
Luca didn't lower his guard.
“What does that have to do with Oliver?”
Anthony looked exhausted.
“My daughter has been missing since yesterday morning.”
For seventeen years, Anthony had been a constant presence in the Moretti household.
He had driven Sofia to medical appointments.
He had carried Oliver upstairs when the boy fell asleep during family dinners.
He had even helped Luca choose the engagement ring for Vanessa.
Now his hands trembled around a photograph of a teenage girl.
“Her name is Grace,” Anthony said. “She's sixteen.”
I looked at the picture.
Grace had curly dark hair, a gap between her front teeth, and the kind of smile that made her look younger than sixteen.
“Did you call the police?” Luca asked.
Anthony shook his head.
“Her school called yesterday because she never arrived. Then I received a photograph showing her sitting in a room I didn't recognize.”
“From whom?”
Anthony looked toward the library.
“Bellini.”
Luca's jaw tightened.
“You should have come to me.”
“I was told Grace would disappear permanently if I did.”
“And instead you helped these people threaten my son?”
Anthony flinched.
“I never touched Oliver.”
“That's not what I asked.”
Silence.
Then Anthony whispered, “I disabled the camera outside Marcus's office.”
The admission seemed to cost him everything.
“I thought they were only taking business records. I didn't know Marcus would be hurt.”
Luca stepped closer.
“You knew enough.”
“Yes.”
Anthony lowered his head.
“And I will answer for it. But please help my daughter.”
For a long moment, nobody spoke.
Then Oliver moved beside me.
He studied Anthony's photograph.
“Grace.”
Everyone turned.
Anthony's face changed.
“You know Grace, little man?”
Oliver nodded.
“She gave me a cookie.”
My heart tightened.
Anthony's daughter had visited the mansion occasionally, usually during school vacations.
She sometimes helped Oliver decorate gingerbread houses in the kitchen.
“That's right,” Anthony whispered. “She did.”
Oliver looked at his father.
“Find her.”
Two small words.
But they carried more authority than anything Luca had said that evening.
Luca turned toward Daniel.
“Give the police everything Anthony has told us. Find out who last saw Grace.”
Anthony's shoulders sagged.
“Thank you.”
“Don't thank me yet,” Luca said. “You endangered my family. That hasn't changed.”
Daniel escorted Anthony toward the library.
Luca remained beside the clock.
The silver watch rested in his palm.
He opened it again.
4:24.
“Those numbers,” I said. “Oliver used the signal before he found the watch.”
Luca looked at me.
“Marcus trained my father’s original security team. Four-two-four was one of their emergency codes.”
“Then maybe someone deliberately stopped the watch at that time.”
Luca studied the broken chain.
“Possibly.”
I hesitated.
“Mr. Moretti, why was your father's watch hidden inside your wife's clock?”
He looked toward the moon painted above the dial.
“Sofia restored antique clocks. My father gave her this one when we married.”
“Did she know about the compartment?”
“I don't know.”
He closed the watch.
“My father and Sofia were close. Sometimes I thought she understood him better than I did.”
There was regret in his voice.
I recognized it.
The sound people make when they realize there are questions they can no longer ask.
Oliver tugged on my sleeve.
He was looking at the drawing.
I crouched.
“Sweetheart, what happened to the man's face?”
Oliver touched the black square.
“Coat.”
“A black coat?”
He nodded.
Luca frowned.
“Anthony wears black coats. So do half the people who work here.”
Oliver shook his head sharply.
He pointed to his own chest.
Then drew an imaginary line down his body.
“Long coat.”
Something stirred in my memory.
Six months earlier, shortly before Oliver stopped speaking, I'd found him hiding beneath the kitchen table.
It was late evening.
Vanessa had just returned from an appointment.
She wore a cream-colored dress and expensive perfume.
Behind her stood a tall man in a long black overcoat.
I hadn't seen his face.
I'd been carrying groceries through the service entrance.
But I remembered one detail.
He had been holding an old-fashioned wooden walking cane.
Not because he seemed weak.
He moved quickly.
The cane looked more like something he wanted people to notice.
“Luca,” I said, “there was a visitor here six months ago. A man with a black coat and a wooden cane.”
His eyes narrowed.
“When?”
“The night Oliver started having nightmares.”
Luca went completely still.
“What night?”
“March seventeenth.”
He stared at me.
“That was the night Sofia's memorial charity held its private board meeting.”
I blinked.
“I didn't know.”
“It was supposed to be a small meeting. Vanessa organized it.”
Luca turned toward Oliver.
“Buddy, did you see that man?”
Oliver nodded.
“What did he do?”
The boy's breathing changed.
I touched his shoulder.
“You don't have to tell us everything right now.”
He leaned against me.
Then whispered, “Mommy's room.”
Luca looked up sharply.
“The man went into Mommy's room?”
Oliver nodded.
That room had remained locked for two years.
Vanessa said keeping Sofia's belongings untouched was unhealthy.
Luca never argued.
He simply stopped going there.
“Who had the key?” I asked.
Luca looked toward the hallway.
“Vanessa.”
We went upstairs together.
Luca carried Oliver.
Daniel followed after asking another guard to remain with the detained guests.
At the end of the west corridor stood a white door.
A small brass plaque displayed Sofia's initials.
S.M.
Luca hesitated.
Then turned the handle.
Locked.
Daniel brought the master key.
Inside, everything smelled faintly of lavender and old books.
A blue cardigan hung over an armchair.
Framed photographs covered the dresser.
On the nightstand sat a small music box shaped like a white swan.
Oliver suddenly stiffened.
“No.”
Luca stopped.
“What's wrong?”
Oliver pointed toward the wardrobe.
“Bad coat.”
Daniel opened it carefully.
Inside hung Sofia's winter clothes.
Cream wool.
Navy cashmere.
A beautiful green evening coat.
And at the far end, wrapped in clear plastic, hung a man's black overcoat.
I stepped closer.
Its lining had been repaired with red thread.
I remembered that crooked stitching.
The man from six months earlier had worn the same coat.
Daniel examined a label inside the collar.
“Custom-made. No name.”
Luca reached into one pocket.
His fingers touched something.
A brass button.
Beneath it was a small white card.
He read the handwriting.
Then sat heavily on Sofia's bed.
“What does it say?” I asked.
He handed it to me.
The card contained a date.
November 14.
The night Sofia died.
Below it were four words.
SHE DID NOT DIE ALONE.
Luca's breathing became uneven.
“Who wrote this?”
Before anyone could answer, Oliver pointed toward the music box.
“Mommy.”
Luca opened it.
A delicate melody began playing.
Inside the lid was a photograph of Sofia holding newborn Oliver.
But tucked behind the photograph was something else.
A parking ticket from the hospital where Sofia had been taken after her crash.
The printed entry time was 10:42 p.m.
Nearly an hour after police records said Sofia had died at the scene.
May you like
On the back, written in Sofia's unmistakable handwriting, were the words:
IF LUCA EVER FINDS THIS, TELL HIM I WAS TRYING TO SAVE HIS FATHER'S NAME.
