Chapter 11 - THE OFFICE WHERE HIS FATHER DIED
Ferrante Tower was evacuated at 7:06 p.m.
Elias entered at 7:12.
Adeline entered beside him.
“I told you to stay downstairs.”
“And I ignored you.”
“I noticed.”
“You need the locket.”
“I could carry it.”
“Vincent asked for me.”
“Which is exactly why—”
“Elias.”
She stopped him.
“He framed me. He tried to kill me. He threatened my mother and kidnapped a baby.”
Her voice became steady.
“I’m done hiding behind you.”
Something flickered in his eyes.
Pride.
Fear.
And something deeper.
“Stay close.”
They reached Roberto Ferrante’s former office on the forty-fourth floor.
Vincent stood behind the old mahogany desk.
Eva was sleeping inside a portable carrier beside him.
A pistol lay against the baby’s blanket.
Lorenzo’s entire body went rigid.
Vincent smiled.
“Family reunion.”
Elias stepped forward.
“Give him the baby.”
“Locket first.”
Adeline removed it.
Vincent extended his hand.
She tossed it onto the desk.
He opened it.
His smile widened.
“Twenty-four years.”
“What does it open?” Elias asked.
Vincent moved to the wall behind Roberto’s desk.
A decorative anchor emblem concealed a narrow key slot.
The metal strip fit inside.
A compartment opened.
Inside was a leather ledger.
Vincent touched it like a religious artifact.
Elias watched.
“You killed my father for that?”
Vincent laughed.
“I didn’t kill Roberto.”
“Who did?”
Vincent looked toward the baby.
“Salvatore.”
Lorenzo shook his head.
“He admitted murders. Not Roberto.”
“Because he doesn’t know.”
Elias’s expression hardened.
“Know what?”
“Roberto was poisoned slowly for eighteen months.”
Vincent opened the ledger.
“Salvatore arranged the medication because he believed Roberto had a heart condition.”
“Who switched it?”
Vincent smiled.
“Maria.”
Elias stopped breathing.
“My mother was dead.”
“Not yet.”
Vincent turned a page.
“She knew Roberto had betrayed her with Claire.”
Adeline looked at Claire, who had entered with Marco.
Claire shook her head.
“That’s a lie.”
Vincent laughed.
“Is it?”
Claire stepped forward.
“Maria forgave Roberto.”
“Eventually.”
Vincent pointed toward the ledger.
“Read page eighty-seven.”
Elias opened it.
A handwritten note from Maria Ferrante.
Roberto is getting weaker.
Vincent says the medicine will only frighten him, not kill him.
Elias looked up.
Vincent smiled.
“She helped me poison him.”
Claire shouted:
“She didn’t know what you were giving him!”
Vincent’s expression darkened.
“That distinction never mattered to me.”
Elias closed the ledger.
“You manipulated everyone.”
“I survived everyone.”
“No.”
Adeline spoke.
“You used everyone because you were too weak to build anything yourself.”
Vincent turned the pistol toward her.
Elias moved instantly.
“Don’t.”
Vincent smiled.
“There it is.”
“What?”
“The weakness.”
He looked at Adeline.
“Roberto had Claire.”
Then at Lorenzo.
“Lorenzo has Rachel and Eva.”
Finally at Elias.
“And you have her.”
Elias’s voice became dangerously quiet.
“Put the gun down.”
Vincent cocked it.
“Tell me, Elias. Was the kiss really strategy?”
Adeline looked at him.
Even now.
Even with death standing ten feet away.
She wanted the answer.
Elias never looked away from Vincent.
“No.”
Vincent laughed.
“I knew it.”
Elias continued.
“The strategy was announcing the engagement.”
His gaze shifted toward Adeline.
“The kiss was because I had just watched a bullet nearly take away the woman I’d spent three months trying not to love.”
Adeline’s breath caught.
Vincent’s expression hardened.
Then Eva began crying.
For one second, everyone looked toward the baby.
Adeline moved.
She threw the heavy signet ring directly at Vincent’s face.
He flinched.
Elias fired.
Vincent’s gun fell.
Lorenzo crossed the room and grabbed Eva.
Marco restrained Vincent.
It was over.
Almost.
Then Vincent started laughing.
Elias looked at him.
“What?”
Vincent glanced toward the ceiling.
“You evacuated the building.”
“Yes.”
“Good.”
Elias’s face changed.
Vincent smiled.
“Because you have four minutes before Roberto’s second ledger burns with the entire foundation archive.”
A red light appeared beneath the desk.
3:59.
3:58.
3:57.
May you like
Adeline whispered:
“He planted a bomb.”
