Chapter 11 - THE MAN WHO HAD BEEN INSIDE OUR HOME FOR ELEVEN YEARS
Nicholas Dane knew where I slept.
He knew which tea I drank when I couldn’t sleep.
He knew Adrian traveled with two backup vehicles but I hated escorts.
He knew our anniversary date.
He knew about the bakery gate.
For eleven years, the man who helped murder my parents had been responsible for protecting me.
I became physically sick when that truth settled in.
Adrian found me sitting on the warehouse floor.
He crouched several feet away.
“Claire.”
“Don’t touch me.”
He stopped.
“Nicholas was at their crash.”
“Yes.”
“You hired him.”
“Yes.”
“Did Marco recommend him?”
Adrian’s face tightened.
“Yes.”
Of course.
Marco had placed his own man inside the estate.
Inside our marriage.
Inside every vulnerability we possessed.
Federal investigators began downloading the Continuity files.
Carlo had documented more than financial crimes.
He had recorded names.
Dates.
Payments.
Photographs.
There was enough evidence to dismantle Marco’s network.
But Marco still had one advantage.
Nicholas knew how Adrian thought.
He knew every emergency property.
Every vehicle switch.
Every hidden entrance.
And he had disappeared with Marco.
Elena approached us.
“Theo is missing again.”
“What?”
“He left the hospital an hour ago.”
Adrian stood.
“Why?”
“He received a message from Nicholas.”
She handed him the phone.
COME ALONE IF YOU WANT ELENA TO LIVE THROUGH THE NIGHT.
Elena stared at the screen.
“They used me to move him.”
Marco needed Theo for one final reason.
The Russo organization still controlled warehouses along the river.
One of them connected to an old Bellandi tunnel beneath the family council building.
Adrian understood immediately.
“Marco isn’t running.”
“He’s going to the council,” I said.
Every senior Bellandi captain was scheduled to meet at midnight the following night.
Marco could seize control if he convinced them Adrian had lost Continuity.
Or kill enough people to make resistance irrelevant.
Adrian looked at me.
“You stay with federal protection.”
I opened my mouth.
He lifted one hand.
Then stopped himself.
“Sorry.”
For the first time in fifteen years, I almost laughed in the middle of a disaster.
He tried again.
“I would feel better if you stayed.”
“That isn’t the same thing.”
“I’m learning.”
I stood.
“I’m coming.”
He closed his eyes.
“Of course you are.”
The Continuity files gave us something Marco didn’t know we possessed.
An old architectural plan.
I recognized it.
The Bellandi council building had been renovated fourteen years earlier.
I designed the emergency exits.
Including one hidden passage Marco had probably forgotten.
Adrian looked at me.
“You built the route we’re going to use against him.”
“I told you architecture was useful.”
“You also told me not to put the wine cellar there.”
“And I was right about that too.”
For one brief second, we were us again.
Then an investigator called Adrian over.
A newly decrypted file had opened.
It contained audio.
Sixteen years old.
Marco.
Nicholas.
And Adrian.
My husband’s voice said:
“Handle the Mercer problem before it reaches my father.”
I stopped breathing.
Adrian slowly turned toward me.
May you like
This time, the evidence wasn’t a signature.
It was his voice.
