Chapter 1 - THE MAN WHO WAS IN THE PASSENGER SEAT
“Matteo.”
The name left my mouth barely above a whisper.
A fork slipped from someone’s hand.
Across the table, Matteo Moretti stopped breathing.
Luca slowly turned toward his cousin.
Matteo was thirty-eight, Moretti Holdings’ chief financial officer, and one of only three men who could enter Luca’s office without knocking. They had grown up together. Fought together. Built the legitimate side of the Moretti organization together.
Now Luca’s mother was pointing directly at him.
“You were in the car?” Luca asked.
Matteo’s face had gone gray.
Vanessa found her voice first.
“This is insane. Teresa is confused.”
Mrs. Moretti’s fingers moved sharply.
I translated.
“She says Matteo was sitting beside her.”
Luca stood.
“Answer me.”
Matteo looked around the table.
Twenty-six guests.
Locked gates.
Security at every entrance.
Then he closed his eyes.
“Yes.”
The room erupted.
Luca did not raise his voice.
Everyone became quiet anyway.
“You told me you were in Detroit that day.”
“I lied.”
“Why?”
Matteo looked toward Mrs. Moretti.
“She asked me to.”
Vanessa laughed nervously.
“Convenient.”
Mrs. Moretti signed again.
He was helping me.
I translated.
Matteo’s shoulders dropped.
Three months earlier, Teresa Moretti had discovered irregular documents connected to a proposed merger between Moretti Holdings and Bellini Logistics—Vanessa’s family company.
She did not trust Luca’s legal department.
So she contacted Matteo privately.
“She asked me to drive with her to meet Judge Franklin Mercer,” Matteo said.
I knew the name.
Retired federal judge.
Old Moretti family friend.
Luca’s expression sharpened.
“What documents?”
“I never saw all of them.”
“Why?”
“Because we never reached him.”
Matteo looked toward the candlelight.
“Your mother was driving. I was in the passenger seat. About fifteen minutes from Mercer’s house, she hit the brakes.”
His jaw tightened.
“Nothing happened.”
Mrs. Moretti’s eyes filled.
Matteo continued.
“She pulled the emergency brake. We hit the barrier.”
Luca’s voice became dangerously quiet.
“What happened to you?”
“I lost consciousness.”
“You weren’t found in the car.”
“No.”
That surprised everyone.
Matteo had never been mentioned in the accident report.
“When I woke up,” he said, “I was lying behind a maintenance building half a mile away.”
Vanessa shook her head.
“This is absurd.”
Matteo looked at her.
“I saw you.”
Every person at the table froze.
Vanessa’s face emptied.
“What?”
“Before I blacked out again.”
He leaned forward.
“You were standing beside the wreck.”
Luca turned toward his fiancée.
She backed away.
“That’s impossible. I was at the Palmer charity luncheon.”
Several guests nodded.
Apparently she had photographs.
Witnesses.
An alibi.
Then Mrs. Moretti tugged my sleeve.
Her fingers moved.
Not Vanessa.
I frowned.
“What?”
She signed more deliberately.
Dress.
Same red coat.
Different woman.
I looked at Luca.
“Your mother says she didn’t see Vanessa.”
Vanessa exhaled.
Then I translated the rest.
“She saw a woman wearing Vanessa’s red coat.”
Vanessa’s relief vanished.
Mrs. Moretti continued.
Man took Matteo.
Another man searched car.
“Did you recognize them?” I asked.
Her fingers trembled.
One name.
Antonio.
Luca’s face changed.
Antonio Moretti.
His father’s younger brother.
Vice chairman of Moretti Holdings.
Matteo’s father.
And the only Moretti powerful enough to challenge Luca without immediately being destroyed.
Matteo sank into his chair.
“My father?”
Mrs. Moretti nodded.
Then she signed one final sentence.
He was looking for the papers I hid before we left.
Luca leaned toward me.
“Ask her where.”
I did.
Mrs. Moretti looked toward the dark windows overlooking the estate gardens.
Her hands moved.
Greenhouse.
Under Patricia.
Patricia.
Her deaf younger sister.
May you like
Dead for almost twenty years.
And apparently, somewhere beneath something bearing Patricia’s name, Teresa Moretti had hidden the documents powerful people were willing to sabotage a car to find.
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