Chapter 2 - THE DEAD MAN ON THE PHONE
For nearly ten seconds after the call ended, nobody in Margaret Bellandi’s bedroom moved.
The curtains lifted in the cold air coming through the open window.
Margaret’s overturned wheelchair lay beside the bed.
Rachel heard her own breathing.
Samuel was crying quietly behind them.
Luca still held the phone against his ear.
“Mr. Bellandi?”
Nothing.
“Luca.”
That finally made him look at her.
Rachel had never called him by his first name.
Under any other circumstances, she would have noticed.
Tonight neither of them cared.
“You know that voice,” she said.
Luca slowly lowered the phone.
“Yes.”
Samuel whispered, “Luca—”
Luca turned.
The transformation in him frightened Rachel more than shouting would have.
His face was almost expressionless.
“Do not say my name like you still have the right.”
Samuel looked as though he had been struck.
“I was trying to protect you.”
“For twelve years?”
Luca stepped toward him.
“You watched me bury my father.”
Samuel’s lips trembled.
“Yes.”
“You watched me carry his coffin.”
“Yes.”
“You stood beside me while they lowered an empty casket into the ground?”
Samuel shut his eyes.
“Yes.”
Rachel’s stomach turned.
Luca stared at the elderly man who had practically raised him.
Then he asked one quiet question.
“Who was in the coffin?”
Samuel opened his eyes.
“No one.”
The answer seemed to drain every sound from the room.
Luca nodded once.
Not acceptance.
Calculation.
“Start talking.”
Samuel glanced at Rachel.
Luca moved between them.
“Look at me.”
Samuel obeyed.
“Your father didn’t die twelve years ago.”
“I gathered that.”
“He disappeared.”
“Why?”
Samuel hesitated.
Luca’s jaw tightened.
“Margaret is missing. Celeste is working with someone who knew about the cellar. Rachel’s mother is in a photograph with my father. And apparently my entire childhood was built inside somebody else’s lie.”
He stepped closer.
“So this is the last time I ask politely.”
Samuel broke.
“Your father was terrified.”
Luca laughed once without humor.
“Of whom?”
“Your grandfather.”
Rachel frowned.
Luca stopped moving.
“My grandfather died before my father.”
“No,” Samuel said.
Luca stared at him.
Samuel looked toward the open window as if ghosts could enter through it.
“Your grandfather died publicly before your father.”
Rachel whispered, “What does that mean?”
Samuel swallowed.
“Bellandis have always understood the usefulness of funerals.”
Luca’s eyes turned dangerous.
“Enough riddles.”
Samuel nodded shakily.
“Your grandfather, Vittorio Bellandi, created something he called the Black Ledger.”
Luca knew the name.
Rachel saw it immediately.
“What is it?” she asked.
Luca answered without looking at her.
“A story.”
Samuel shook his head.
“No. It was real.”
According to rumors Luca had heard as a teenager, Vittorio had kept records on everyone who had done business with the Bellandi family—politicians, police officers, contractors, attorneys, judges, union leaders.
Debts.
Bribes.
Payments.
Betrayals.
Insurance.
Luca had always assumed the Black Ledger was mafia mythology.
Samuel told them otherwise.
“It wasn’t one ledger,” he said. “It was a system. Accounts, documents, recordings, ownership records. Enough information to destroy dozens of powerful people.”
“And my father had it?” Luca asked.
“Part of it.”
“Where?”
“I don’t know.”
Luca stared at him.
Samuel hurried on.
“That’s the truth. Vittorio divided access before he disappeared. Your father discovered that one part had been entrusted outside the family.”
“To Rachel’s mother,” Luca said.
Samuel nodded.
Rachel felt suddenly cold.
“My mother cleaned offices,” she said. “She waited tables. She wasn’t involved with people like you.”
Samuel looked at her with unbearable sadness.
“Your mother’s name wasn’t Monroe.”
Rachel’s throat tightened.
“What?”
“Her name was Evelyn Mercer.”
Rachel shook her head.
“No.”
“She changed it when you were six.”
“My mother died when I was six.”
Samuel’s expression made the lie obvious before he spoke.
“No, Rachel.”
“Stop saying that.”
“She survived.”
Rachel backed away.
Luca turned toward her.
She lifted a hand.
“Don’t.”
She couldn’t breathe properly.
She remembered a hospital hallway.
Her aunt holding her.
A closed coffin.
Adults speaking in whispers.
Nobody allowing her to see the body because the accident had supposedly been too severe.
She had been six.
She had believed them.
“What happened to her?”
Samuel answered softly.
“She disappeared the same year your father did, Luca.”
Rachel looked at him sharply.
“Why?”
“Because someone was hunting the second child.”
Silence.
Luca picked up the photograph again.
“The message says keep the second child away from the Bellandis.”
“Yes.”
“Whose second child?”
Samuel’s eyes moved to Rachel.
“I don’t know.”
Luca slammed the photograph onto the table.
“You expect me to believe that?”
“I swear.”
“Then tell me what you do know.”
Samuel did.
Seventeen years earlier, Evelyn Mercer had arrived at the Bellandi estate late at night carrying a little girl.
Rachel.
Samuel remembered her sleeping in her mother’s arms.
Evelyn had demanded to speak to Luca’s father, Alessandro Bellandi.
They argued for nearly two hours inside the old library.
Before dawn, Alessandro ordered Samuel to prepare money, identification documents and transportation.
For Evelyn.
Not himself.
“He was helping her escape,” Samuel said.
“From whom?” Rachel asked.
“He never told me.”
“You expect me to believe he risked everything without telling anyone why?”
“He told Margaret.”
That explained the envelope.
Rachel’s heart pounded.
“And seventeen years later Margaret decides to tell Luca?”
“She believed Celeste had found the ledger.”
Luca went still.
“What?”
Samuel nodded.
“Three weeks ago Margaret noticed documents missing from your father’s old archives. Then she saw Celeste meeting with a man she recognized from the past.”
“Who?”
Samuel hesitated.
Then headlights swept across the windows below.
Luca instantly moved toward the glass.
Three black SUVs were coming through the estate gates.
His security team had not announced them.
One of Luca’s guards appeared at the bedroom door.
“Boss.”
“I see them.”
“We didn’t authorize entry.”
“How did they get through?”
The guard touched his earpiece.
His expression changed.
“The gate system has been overridden.”
Luca looked at Samuel.
Samuel turned pale.
Rachel understood.
Whoever had watched the mansion through the hidden cameras also controlled its security.
Luca reached inside his jacket.
Rachel caught sight of a handgun.
He noticed her noticing it.
“Stay here.”
“No.”
Luca looked at her.
“They asked for me.”
“They asked for you because they want you.”
“They have Margaret.”
“And they’re coming here.”
She stepped closer.
“I’ve spent seventeen years believing my mother was dead. You’ve spent twelve believing your father was dead. Whoever is doing this expects us to be confused.”
Luca studied her.
“That doesn’t make you bulletproof.”
“Neither does being rich.”
For the first time that night, something almost human crossed his face.
Then it disappeared.
“Samuel stays with you.”
“No.”
Samuel’s voice surprised them both.
“I’m finished hiding.”
Luca stared at him.
Samuel straightened despite his shaking hands.
“You asked who Margaret saw meeting Celeste.”
“Yes.”
Samuel looked through the window at the approaching vehicles.
“It was Daniel Vaughn.”
Rachel frowned.
“Celeste’s father?”
Luca slowly shook his head.
“Daniel Vaughn died nine years ago.”
Samuel gave him a grim look.
“Apparently your family isn’t the only one good at funerals.”
The SUVs stopped.
Doors opened.
Men stepped onto the driveway.
But there was no attack.
One man walked alone toward the entrance.
He was perhaps seventy.
Tall.
Silver-haired.
Walking with a cane.
Luca froze.
Rachel looked at him.
“Is that—”
“My father.”
Alessandro Bellandi entered the mansion twelve years after his funeral.
But he wasn’t carrying Margaret.
He carried a small wooden box.
He stopped beneath the chandelier and looked up toward the staircase.
Directly at Luca.
Then at Rachel.
His eyes filled with something Rachel did not expect.
Recognition.
“Evelyn’s daughter,” he whispered.
Luca descended two steps.
“Where is Margaret?”
Alessandro placed the wooden box on a table.
“Alive.”
“Bring her home.”
“I can’t.”
Luca’s hand tightened beside his jacket.
“You have five seconds before this reunion becomes unpleasant.”
Alessandro almost smiled.
“You sound like me.”
“I spent twelve years making sure I didn’t.”
That smile disappeared.
Alessandro looked at Rachel.
“I didn’t kidnap Margaret.”
Samuel came down behind them.
“You called from her phone.”
“Yes.”
“You threatened Rachel.”
“Yes.”
“Then what exactly would you call it?”
“A lie necessary to get here before Daniel did.”
Luca glanced toward the front windows.
The other vehicles outside remained dark.
Alessandro continued.
“Daniel Vaughn took Margaret.”
Rachel felt her stomach tighten.
Luca’s expression never shifted.
“You said bring you Rachel.”
“Because Daniel is searching for her too.”
“Why?”
Alessandro looked at Rachel for a long moment.
Then opened the wooden box.
Inside was a tiny silver baby bracelet.
Rachel stopped breathing.
Engraved on it was a name.
Not Rachel.
ISABELLA BELLANDI.
Rachel stared.
“What is that?”
Alessandro’s eyes filled with regret.
“The bracelet your mother put on you the night you were born.”
Luca’s head snapped toward him.
Rachel whispered, “No.”
Alessandro looked at Luca.
Then at Rachel.
“You asked whose second child she was.”
His voice became almost inaudible.
“Mine.”
Nobody moved.
Rachel stared at Luca.
Luca stared at his father.
And Alessandro Bellandi finally said the sentence that would change both their lives.
“Rachel isn’t connected to this family because her mother helped me.”
May you like
He swallowed.
“She is connected because she is my daughter.”
