Chapter 6 - THE TRAITOR WHO ASKED FOR ME
Marco chose an underground parking garage in Queens.
I refused to go.
Then he sent proof.
A photograph of Salvatore meeting with a federal informant.
A recording of Salvatore ordering Luca’s attack.
And a page from something called Project Widow.
That name changed my mind.
Rebecca hated the idea.
Adrian hated it more.
We compromised.
Public federal building.
Lawyers present.
No Moretti security inside the room.
Marco arrived wearing a baseball cap and looking like he had not slept in days.
He had expected Adrian.
Instead, he saw me.
“You came.”
“You asked.”
His eyes moved toward my stomach.
I immediately stiffened.
He looked away.
“Sorry.”
“Talk.”
Marco had started working for Salvatore eighteen months earlier.
Not willingly.
His brother owed money to a group Salvatore secretly financed.
Threats became leverage.
Leverage became betrayal.
“I copied the ultrasound,” he admitted.
Adrian surged forward.
Federal agents stopped him.
I held up a hand.
“Why?”
“To confirm the pregnancy.”
“You already had medical information.”
“Salvatore wanted visual proof.”
“Why?”
Marco swallowed.
“Because he didn’t believe the clinic source.”
I sat back.
“How comforting.”
Then I asked about Project Widow.
Marco closed his eyes.
“It was a contingency.”
“For what?”
“If Adrian refused to cooperate.”
The plan involved removing Adrian from leadership.
Not necessarily killing him.
Destroying him legally could work just as well.
Financial records would be altered.
Evidence planted.
Federal investigators pointed toward Adrian.
He would face decades in prison.
Then Salvatore expected me to do one of two things.
Divorce Adrian publicly and disappear.
Or stay loyal.
“And if I stayed?”
Marco looked ashamed.
“You’d be implicated too.”
Adrian swore.
I ignored him.
“What does that have to do with the baby?”
“If Adrian went to prison before the child was born, Salvatore planned to challenge the legitimacy of the marriage.”
Rebecca leaned forward.
“It’s legally valid.”
“In civil court, yes.”
Marco shook his head.
“I mean inside the family trusts. He wanted to claim Claire was part of a sham arrangement designed to manipulate succession.”
Absurd.
But expensive enough to litigate for years.
“He wanted control until the baby became an adult.”
“Yes.”
Eighteen years.
That was the game.
My child had become a financial horizon to a man I barely knew.
I felt suddenly calm.
Dangerously calm.
“What does Salvatore fear?”
Marco blinked.
“What?”
“Everyone fears something.”
He looked at Adrian.
Adrian said nothing.
Marco finally answered.
“Exposure.”
“That’s obvious.”
“No.”
He leaned closer.
“Not criminal exposure.”
“What then?”
“His daughter.”
I frowned.
“I didn’t know he had one.”
“Almost nobody does.”
Her name was Isabella Moretti.
Twenty-four.
Living in California.
No connection to the family.
Salvatore had spent years keeping her away.
“Why?”
“Because she hates him.”
Marco reached into an evidence envelope.
Federal agents allowed him to slide out a copy.
A letter.
Isabella had written Adrian six months earlier.
Adrian stared at it.
“I never got this.”
Marco nodded.
“Salvatore intercepted it.”
The letter said:
Adrian, my father is using the family trust to hide money he stole from legitimate investors. I have documents. If I disappear, he did it.
My skin prickled.
“Is she alive?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
Marco looked at the agents.
“Safe, I think.”
“Think?”
“She contacted me two weeks ago.”
He swallowed.
“She has the original trust ledgers.”
Adrian’s face changed.
Those ledgers could destroy Salvatore.
“Where is she?”
Marco answered:
“Coming to New York.”
“When?”
He looked at the clock.
“Her flight landed twenty minutes ago.”
Then a federal agent’s phone buzzed.
His expression hardened.
He stepped outside.
Returned thirty seconds later.
May you like
“Isabella Moretti never exited the airport.”
Salvatore’s daughter had vanished before she could reach us.
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