Chapter 3 - THE MAN WHO DIED TWELVE YEARS AGO
Gabriel fired at the overhead light.
Darkness swallowed the archive.
Tessa heard someone curse beyond the smoke.
“Stay behind me,” Gabriel said.
She wanted to tell him she had been surviving without him for twenty-eight years.
Instead she obeyed.
Because bullets were hitting filing cabinets.
Eleanor dragged open a narrow maintenance panel beside the wall.
“This way.”
Salvatore stared at her.
“You knew about this?”
“I worked here thirty-three years.”
Another shot cracked.
Gabriel fired back.
“Move!”
They crawled through the opening.
Tessa went first.
The passage beyond was barely wide enough for her shoulders and smelled of rust, dust, and wet concrete.
She clutched the blood cards inside her shirt.
Behind her came Eleanor.
Then Salvatore.
Gabriel entered last and pulled the panel shut.
Someone reached it seconds later.
Metal rattled.
“Where does this lead?” Gabriel whispered.
“Laundry tunnel.”
“Outside?”
“Church basement.”
Salvatore stopped.
“Santa Lucia?”
Eleanor glanced back.
“Yes.”
Tessa remembered the question Salvatore had asked at Il Vento.
Did Angelo tell you what happened beneath Santa Lucia?
“You knew this place connected to the church.”
Salvatore said nothing.
Tessa almost screamed at him.
“How many things are you planning to admit only after somebody tries to kill us?”
“Apparently several.”
Under different circumstances, Gabriel might have smiled.
He didn't.
They kept moving.
Ten minutes later they emerged behind an ancient boiler beneath the Church of Santa Lucia.
Gabriel immediately called his security chief.
No answer.
Again.
Nothing.
His expression darkened.
“My men were outside St. Agnes.”
Salvatore leaned against a brick column, breathing hard.
“You think they're dead?”
“I think someone jammed communications and moved faster than my people should have allowed.”
Eleanor looked at him.
“Paul always knew how Salvatore's security worked.”
Gabriel turned.
“Because he designed it.”
Salvatore nodded.
They climbed into the church sanctuary.
It was almost three in the morning.
Rows of empty wooden pews stretched beneath faded saints and dark stained glass.
Tessa sat in the first pew because her legs had begun shaking.
She opened her hand.
The two blood cards were still there.
Gabriel sat beside her.
Neither spoke.
After a moment he said, “If you want to leave, I'll get you somewhere safe.”
Tessa looked at him.
“My mother is in a Manhattan hospital while a man who's supposed to be dead is burning down evidence connected to my birth.”
“I know.”
“No, you don't.”
Gabriel accepted that.
“I don't.”
Her anger faded slightly.
He had just learned his father might not be his father.
She wasn't the only person whose life had split open tonight.
“What are you going to do about the DNA?”
Gabriel stared at the card.
“Find out.”
“You're sure?”
“No.”
That honesty surprised her.
“But I'm tired of everyone else deciding which truths I can survive.”
Tessa looked toward Salvatore.
“So am I.”
Eleanor approached with an old church phone.
“Landline works.”
Gabriel called his security chief.
This time someone answered.
Gabriel listened.
His face went still.
“When?”
He glanced at Tessa.
“Understood.”
He hung up.
“What happened?”
“The men outside St. Agnes were found unconscious.”
“Alive?”
“Yes.”
Tessa exhaled.
Gabriel didn't.
“What else?”
He looked at her.
“Someone checked your mother out of Mount Sinai forty-one minutes ago.”
Tessa stood so fast the pew groaned.
“What?”
“A man presented medical power of attorney.”
“She doesn't have one.”
“He had paperwork.”
“My mother can barely walk right now.”
“I know.”
Tessa's voice rose.
“Then where is she?”
“We're finding out.”
She grabbed her phone.
Three missed calls.
All from the hospital.
Her hands shook as she returned the latest.
A nurse answered.
After several minutes of verification, the nurse confirmed what Gabriel had already been told.
Maria Reed had been removed from the hospital at 2:34 a.m.
Against medical recommendation.
By someone listed as family representative.
“Name?”
The nurse hesitated.
Then read it.
“Richard Mercer.”
Tessa lowered the phone.
Gabriel stood.
Salvatore said something vicious in Sicilian.
Tessa understood every word.
Richard had taken her mother.
But something bothered her.
“Why would Richard use his own name?”
Gabriel looked at her.
“He wouldn't.”
“Exactly.”
Eleanor nodded.
“Someone wanted you to know Mercer took her.”
Salvatore's eyes narrowed.
“Paul.”
Tessa looked at him.
“Why?”
“To force us toward Richard.”
“You keep saying Paul is alive.”
“He is.”
Gabriel turned on him.
“You told me he died of a heart attack in Florida.”
“He disappeared after Angelo tried to expose St. Agnes.”
“When?”
“Twelve years ago.”
Gabriel stared at him.
“You attended his funeral.”
“Closed coffin.”
“You gave the eulogy.”
“I was trying to convince people he was dead.”
Gabriel's expression became almost disgusted.
“Do you hear yourself?”
Salvatore flinched.
That was the first time Tessa saw Gabriel truly hurt his father.
Not with violence.
With disappointment.
Salvatore lowered his voice.
“I was trying to protect you.”
“From knowing you built our entire family on lies?”
“From Paul.”
Gabriel stepped closer.
“You kept his son inside your restaurant.”
Tessa frowned.
“Richard?”
Salvatore nodded.
“Why?”
“Because for years I wasn't certain Richard knew his father had survived.”
Gabriel laughed bitterly.
“And tonight you used Tessa to test him.”
“Yes.”
“And now her mother is gone.”
Salvatore looked toward Tessa.
“I miscalculated.”
“No,” she said. “You gambled.”
He accepted that too.
The distinction mattered.
Eleanor touched Tessa's arm.
“Your mother may know more than Paul realizes.”
“What?”
“Maria was not a passive participant forever.”
Tessa stared at her.
“What does that mean?”
“After you were born, she came back.”
“When?”
“Six months later.”
“Why?”
“To ask who your father was.”
Tessa's chest tightened.
“She didn't know?”
“Paul told her the biological father had abandoned her.”
“That doesn't make sense. She knew Angelo.”
“Not as Angelo Rossi.”
Tessa closed her eyes.
Of course.
Secrets inside secrets.
Eleanor continued.
“Maria had met him as Angelo Cosenza.”
“So she thought he was just some man from Sicily.”
“Yes.”
“What happened when she came back?”
“I told her the truth.”
Tessa stared at her.
“You told my mother my father was a Rossi?”
“Yes.”
“And she never told me?”
“She became terrified.”
“Of Salvatore?”
“No.”
Eleanor looked at Salvatore.
“Of Paul.”
She reached into her coat.
“I gave Maria a copy of one page.”
“What page?”
“The original transfer order.”
Tessa's pulse changed.
“What was on it?”
“Paul's signature.”
Gabriel looked at her.
“If your mother kept it—”
“She has proof.”
Salvatore nodded.
“Proof Paul orchestrated the switch.”
Tessa's phone rang.
Unknown number.
Everyone went silent.
Gabriel held out his hand.
“Speaker.”
She answered.
“Hello?”
Nothing.
Then breathing.
“Tessa?”
Her knees weakened.
“Mom?”
Maria sounded exhausted.
“Sweetheart, listen to me.”
“Where are you?”
“I don't know.”
A male voice murmured somewhere near her.
Maria's breathing accelerated.
“Tessa, don't give them the red book.”
“Mom—”
“Angelo told me this day might come.”
Tessa's eyes filled.
“You knew?”
“I knew enough.”
“Why didn't you tell me?”
“Because he made me promise.”
A sound like a door opening interrupted them.
Maria rushed her words.
“The paper is not at home. It never was.”
“Where is it?”
“Remember where Angelo took you every Easter?”
Tessa froze.
Santa Lucia.
Before she could answer, another voice came onto the call.
Richard Mercer.
“Tessa.”
Gabriel reached for the phone.
Tessa stopped him.
“Where is my mother?”
Richard sounded strange.
Not smug.
Not powerful.
Terrified.
“I didn't take her.”
“You signed her out.”
“No. Someone used my name.”
“Your father?”
Silence.
Then Richard whispered:
“You know.”
Salvatore stepped closer.
“Richard.”
The line went completely quiet.
When Richard spoke again, he was almost pleading.
“If Salvatore is with you, don't believe everything he's told you.”
Gabriel's face hardened.
“Put Maria on.”
“I can't.”
“Why?”
A long pause.
“Because my father just walked in.”
There was a sudden crash.
Maria screamed.
Richard shouted something in Sicilian.
Then three gunshots exploded through the phone.
The call went dead.
Tessa stared at the screen.
Gabriel grabbed his coat.
“Trace it.”
His phone buzzed immediately.
His security chief had already begun.
Salvatore stood in the aisle, pale.
Eleanor looked toward the altar.
Tessa noticed something she had missed before.
One of the bells above the church began ringing.
Once.
Then twice.
Then three times.
At three in the morning.
Nobody was pulling the rope.
Gabriel looked up.
Eleanor whispered:
“Angelo's signal.”
Tessa turned.
“What signal?”
May you like
The old nurse stared at the bell tower.
“The one that means somebody found what he hid beneath the church.”
