Chapter 4 - THE PHOTOGRAPH FROM EAST HARBOR
Lucia Moretti opened her apartment door wearing slippers and an old gray sweater.
Her expression changed when she saw her brother.
“Alessandro? You're home early.”
“Where is Mia Carter?”
Lucia gripped the doorframe.
“What?”
“Answer me.”
“She went to New Jersey.”
“No.”
Lucia stared at him.
“Alessandro—”
“I found her locked inside our reserve cellar. She's been there for three days.”
The color left Lucia's face.
For several seconds, she couldn't speak.
Then she whispered, “Dear God.”
Alessandro stepped inside.
“Tell me what happened.”
Lucia sat heavily on the living room couch.
“I thought she was safe.”
“Why would you think that?”
“Because Enzo told me she'd gone home.”
Their uncle.
Enzo Moretti.
Sixty-six years old.
The man who had helped Alessandro rebuild the family shipping company after Salvatore's death.
The man who controlled the compensation fund established after the East Harbor fire.
Alessandro felt a familiar childhood memory rise inside him.
Enzo teaching him how to tie a necktie before his first business meeting.
Enzo standing beside his father's hospital bed.
Enzo promising that no Moretti would ever face trouble alone.
“Start at the beginning,” Alessandro said.
Lucia walked to a cabinet.
From its bottom drawer, she removed a large cream-colored envelope.
Inside was an old photograph.
Two men stood beside a loading gate at East Harbor.
One was Salvatore Moretti.
The other wore a faded blue work jacket.
Daniel Carter.
Mia's father.
They stood close together.
Salvatore's hand rested on Daniel's shoulder.
Both men were smiling.
The photograph was dated eleven years earlier.
Three weeks before the fire.
“Why would our father be photographed with a warehouse foreman?” Alessandro asked.
“Because Daniel wasn't an ordinary foreman.”
Lucia spread three more photographs across the coffee table.
“He supervised safety inspections. Dad trusted him. They'd been discussing problems with the emergency exits.”
Alessandro studied the images.
In one, Daniel stood beside Gate Six.
A thick chain hung against the gate.
Another showed an inspection notice attached to a metal post.
“Why didn't I know this?”
“Because by the time you returned from the overseas negotiations, the fire had happened and the company was falling apart.”
Alessandro remembered.
His father had aged ten years in a single winter.
Seven families had buried loved ones.
Hundreds of workers feared losing their jobs.
Salvatore had ordered everyone to stop discussing the disaster outside official meetings.
“Last month,” Lucia continued, “I was sorting old foundation photographs for a memorial display. Mia recognized her father.”
“And?”
“She asked about the compensation fund.”
Lucia looked ashamed.
“I checked.”
Alessandro waited.
“The fund made regular payments for several years. Then the amounts became smaller. Some family accounts stopped receiving anything.”
“Why?”
“I asked Enzo.”
“What did he say?”
“That the recipients had accepted settlements. That everything had been resolved.”
“And you believed him?”
“I wanted to.”
The answer angered Alessandro more than a lie would have.
Lucia wiped her eyes.
“Mia said her mother never received the final payment promised after Daniel died. I checked the older records. There were discrepancies.”
“Then why take her into the cellar?”
“Because Enzo stores the original foundation inventory records there during renovations. Mia believed some of the old shipping records had been placed with them.”
Alessandro leaned forward.
“Where was Enzo?”
“He was supposed to meet us.”
“Did he?”
Lucia shook her head.
“I went downstairs with Mia. We found an old storage cabinet, but it was locked. Then Enzo's assistant asked me to come upstairs. He said there was an urgent problem with the foundation accounts.”
“You left Mia alone?”
“Only for a few minutes.”
Lucia's voice cracked.
“When I returned, Enzo said Mia had received a family emergency message. He told me she'd already left.”
“Did you speak to her?”
“No.”
“Did you see her leave?”
“No.”
Alessandro stood.
“And when her four-year-old daughter asked where she was?”
Lucia covered her mouth.
“I thought the housekeeper was taking care of her.”
“Harper spent three nights trying to tell people her mother was underground.”
Lucia began crying.
Alessandro wanted to comfort his sister.
He couldn't.
Not yet.
“Come to the estate tomorrow,” he said. “You're going to tell Mia everything you just told me.”
Lucia nodded.
As Alessandro reached the door, his phone displayed a message from Rafael.
An image.
A maintenance work order recovered from the cellar renovation files.
Installation of a steel security hasp.
Date: Three days earlier.
Authorized by: Executive Office.
Beneath those words was the embossed Moretti family seal.
And beside it was a handwritten authorization.
Alessandro stared.
It contained his initials.
A.M.
Lucia approached.
“What is it?”
He showed her.
She looked from the document to her brother.
“But you were in Sicily.”
Alessandro knew that.
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Whoever had authorized Mia's imprisonment had used his office and his family seal.
And the person responsible wanted the evidence to lead directly back to him.
