Chương 3 - THE SISTER WHO NEVER WENT TO MILAN
Nico found me that afternoon.
Not because Arthur betrayed me.
Because I made the mistake of using an ATM camera.
I stepped out of a laundromat carrying my clothes and found him leaning against a black SUV across the street.
No guards visible.
No anger.
Just Nico.
Dark coat.
No tie.
Eyes that looked like he hadn't slept.
My first instinct was to run.
I hated that.
He crossed the street but stopped six feet away.
“Elena.”
Three years.
Thousands of conversations.
And somehow my name sounded different after hearing him say he'd forget it.
“Friday isn't here yet,” I said.
He flinched.
Good.
“I didn't mean it.”
“I know about the bug.”
That surprised him.
His eyes shifted toward the diner behind me.
“Arthur.”
“Don't punish him.”
“I wasn't going to.”
“Yes, you were.”
“Probably.”
At least that was honest.
He looked at my duffel bag.
“You left everything.”
“Everything you bought.”
“I bought the hoodie.”
“No. You insulted the hoodie. I bought it.”
His mouth almost moved.
Then he stopped himself.
“I need you somewhere safe.”
“I was safe until I met you.”
That one landed.
Nico stepped closer, but not close enough to touch me.
“Salvatore has photographs of you.”
“I know.”
Now real fear entered his face.
“How?”
“Arthur.”
He muttered something in Italian.
“There's another problem,” I said.
I handed him the photograph with Valentina's reflection.
Nico stared.
His expression emptied.
“That's not possible.”
“Arthur said she's missing.”
“She is.”
“You told me Milan.”
“I couldn't tell you the truth.”
“There seems to be a lot you couldn't tell me.”
He took the hit without defending himself.
Then he studied the photograph.
“This was six days ago?”
“Yes.”
Nico called Arthur.
Within thirty minutes, they traced the bookstore camera footage.
Valentina appeared clearly.
Alive.
She watched me for seventeen minutes.
Never approached.
Then left in a gray sedan.
The car belonged to a shell corporation connected to Salvatore Rizzi.
Nico went completely still.
“My sister is with Salvatore.”
“You don't know that willingly.”
“She hated me when she disappeared.”
“What happened?”
He hesitated.
I laughed.
“Still protecting me with silence?”
His jaw tightened.
Then he told me.
Eleven months earlier, Valentina discovered something inside the Bellandi accounts.
Money moving through construction companies.
Nico believed his uncle Marco was skimming funds.
Valentina accused someone else.
Their father.
Alessandro Bellandi.
She disappeared two days later.
Nico had spent months searching quietly because public knowledge that a Bellandi woman was missing would create weakness.
“Did you think your father killed her?”
“I didn't know.”
“Does he know she's alive?”
“No.”
Nico's phone rang.
His father.
Of course.
Nico answered.
Alessandro's voice was loud enough that I heard it.
“Bring Elena home.”
Nico looked at me.
“How do you know I'm with her?”
Silence.
Then Alessandro said, “Because Salvatore just sent me a photograph.”
Nico's hand tightened around the phone.
“What photograph?”
A message arrived.
He opened it.
The image showed Nico and me standing outside the laundromat.
Taken less than five minutes earlier.
Someone was watching us now.
Underneath was one sentence.
THE GIRL FOR VALENTINA.
I looked at Nico.
May you like
His sister was alive.
And apparently I was the price for getting her back.
