Chapter 4 - WHAT MY WIFE KNEW BEFORE SHE DIED
I had spent eleven months believing Lucia’s death was an accident.
The red folder destroyed that belief in less than ten minutes.
Inside were bank statements, photographs, printed emails, and handwritten notes.
Lucia had been investigating Moretti family finances without telling me.
Not the street operations that had made my name feared throughout Chicago.
The legitimate side.
Commercial properties.
Shipping companies.
Restaurants.
Investment funds.
A charitable foundation established in my mother’s name.
Someone had been moving money through all of them.
Millions.
Marco turned page after page.
“These transfers were disguised as management fees.”
“I know.”
“And most of the recipient companies don’t exist anymore.”
I knew that too.
The signatures at the bottom mattered more.
Carlo Moretti.
My uncle.
My adviser.
The man whose approval appeared on almost every questionable transfer.
But I refused to jump to a conclusion.
“Signatures can be copied.”
Marco nodded.
Then Elena placed the digital recorder on the stone table.
“Should we listen?”
I pressed play.
For several seconds there was static.
Then Lucia’s voice filled the empty greenhouse.
I had not heard it in eleven months.
My knees nearly gave out.
“If Adrien is hearing this, then I probably waited too long.”
I closed my eyes.
She sounded frightened.
Not hysterical.
Not confused.
Lucia was one of the calmest people I had ever known.
“I found money being taken from the family companies. At first I thought it was accounting fraud. It isn’t. Someone is preparing for something larger.”
A car passed somewhere in the recording.
Then Lucia continued.
“I haven’t told Adrien because he trusts this person completely.”
Marco looked at me.
My pulse hammered.
“I found changes to the children’s estate documents. If I die before I can reverse them, Adrien needs to know that someone is trying to position himself between our children and their inheritance.”
The recording abruptly stopped.
“That’s it?” I asked.
Marco inspected the device.
“There are more files.”
He selected the second.
This recording had been made inside a restaurant.
A man’s voice was faint in the background.
Lucia whispered:
“He followed me again.”
Then another male voice came closer.
Low.
Familiar.
I leaned toward the recorder.
Lucia said one name.
“Carlo.”
My chest tightened.
But the next thing she whispered changed the entire meaning.
May you like
“He isn’t the one I’m afraid of.”
The file ended.
