Chapter 3 - THE DEAD MAN’S LAST WARNING
“Then why did you come to work in my house?”
Dominic's question was quiet.
That made it more frightening.
Elena stood beside Lily's bed, holding her husband's photograph with both hands.
“Because nobody would listen to me anywhere else.”
Raphael remained near the doorway.
“Mrs. Rossi, you concealed your husband's employment history when you applied.”
“I know.”
“You understand how suspicious that looks?”
Elena turned toward him.
“Would you have hired a widow who believed someone at your company had killed her husband?”
Raphael didn't answer.
Dominic looked down at the photograph.
Mateo Rossi stood beneath a warehouse sign reading FULTON COLD STORAGE.
Dominic recognized the building immediately.
It was one of his oldest Chicago freight facilities.
He had personally approved its expansion five years earlier.
“Why was Mateo dismissed?” Dominic asked.
Elena's expression changed.
“You know about that?”
“No. But nobody on my payroll disappears without some record.”
She lowered her eyes.
“They accused him of stealing company equipment.”
“Did he?”
“No.”
“How can you be certain?”
“Because my husband once drove forty minutes back to a grocery store after discovering the cashier had given him ten dollars too much change.”
Her voice grew stronger.
“Mateo was many things, Mr. Moretti. Stubborn. Proud. Terrible at remembering birthdays. But he wasn't a thief.”
Dominic turned to Raphael.
“Get his employment file.”
Raphael left immediately.
Dominic stayed.
For several moments, neither adult spoke.
Then Lily climbed off the bed and approached him.
“Daddy made that.”
She pointed toward the stuffed rabbit.
Dominic crouched slightly.
“He did?”
Lily nodded.
“He fixed the ear.”
One of the rabbit's ears had been stitched with uneven red thread.
“Looks like he did a good job.”
“He wasn't good at sewing.”
Dominic almost smiled.
“No?”
Lily shook her head seriously.
“But he tried.”
Elena looked away.
That small sentence hurt more than all the accusations she'd endured that afternoon.
Dominic rose.
“Mrs. Rossi, I owe you an apology for how this investigation has been handled.”
Elena looked surprised.
“But I still need the truth,” he continued. “All of it.”
She nodded.
“Then let me show you something.”
From her husband's coat pocket, she removed a folded piece of paper.
It was a handwritten maintenance report.
Several lines had been circled in red.
Three refrigerated shipments had been marked as medical supplies, despite being delivered through an industrial freight account.
Each shipment carried the same unusual notation.
F-17.
“Mateo told me those containers shouldn't have been there,” Elena explained.
“What was inside?”
“He didn't know everything. He said some of the labels didn't match the inventory records.”
Dominic studied the page.
“Why didn't he report it?”
“He did.”
“To whom?”
“He never told me. He said he was going to speak to someone important.”
Her fingers tightened around the photograph.
“The next day, he came home without his job.”
Dominic felt a familiar anger rising.
Not at Elena.
At the possibility that something serious had happened inside his company without reaching him.
An hour later, Raphael returned.
He carried Mateo's personnel file.
“It's worse than I expected,” he said.
Dominic opened it.
Mateo Rossi had been dismissed for unauthorized access to restricted inventory.
His final paycheck had been withheld pending an equipment investigation.
A handwritten complaint was attached.
Dominic read the final line twice.
I am requesting a direct meeting with Mr. Moretti before these records disappear.
“Did he get that meeting?” Dominic asked.
Raphael shook his head.
“There is no record of one.”
“Who rejected it?”
“The complaint was transferred to corporate finance.”
Dominic's jaw tightened.
“Why finance?”
“Because the shipments involved charitable medical accounts.”
Dominic looked at the warehouse notation again.
F-17.
He had seen that code somewhere before.
Raphael continued.
“There's something else. Mateo was told that security had reviewed his complaint and found nothing.”
“Whose security?”
“Our department.”
Dominic turned sharply.
“Yours?”
Raphael looked uncomfortable.
“I wasn't personally involved. At least, I don't remember being involved.”
“Then find out.”
Elena stepped forward.
“Mr. Moretti, if Mateo was telling the truth, someone must have kept those records.”
“Not necessarily,” Raphael said.
Dominic shook his head.
“Financial records survive longer than people expect.”
He looked toward the window.
For years, he'd believed his greatest danger came from rival organizations.
Now he was beginning to suspect that someone had been using his own authority as a shield.
That evening, Dominic ordered the Fulton Cold Storage records preserved and restricted all disposal of old inventory documents.
Then Raphael returned with a second discovery.
The warehouse shipments marked F-17 were linked to a charitable medical distribution program.
The program had been approved eighteen months earlier.
Dominic opened the approval form.
He recognized the foundation's name.
Laurent Care Foundation.
Vanessa's late father had established it to provide medical assistance to elderly patients.
Dominic had donated generously.
But the signature at the bottom of the shipment authorization wasn't his.
It belonged to the foundation's current representative.
Vanessa Laurent.
Dominic stared at the page.
Then he looked toward the adjoining room, where his fiancée's wedding invitations were stacked on a marble table.
His voice turned cold.
“Raphael. Find out exactly what Vanessa authorized.”
And when Raphael pointed out that the shipments continued after Mateo's death, Dominic noticed something even more disturbing.
May you like
The most recent delivery had arrived just three weeks ago.
The same week his headaches began.
