Chapter 2 - THE DEAD MAN WHO WORKED FOR MORETTI
Clara did not sleep that night.
Neither did Adrien.
By midnight, Mia was curled beneath a blanket in a guest room with two stuffed pillows around her and a housekeeper sitting nearby.
Clara remained in Adrien’s study.
Not because he detained her.
Because she refused to leave until someone explained why her dead husband’s name had made an old butler look like he had seen a ghost.
Adrien stood beside the fireplace.
“Daniel Harper worked for one of my companies.”
Clara stared.
“He told me he was an accountant.”
“He was.”
“Then why did your butler say he wasn’t supposed to have a child?”
Salvatore stood near the door.
Adrien looked at him.
“Explain.”
The old man sighed.
“Because when Daniel disappeared, the family believed he had no wife.”
Clara’s expression hardened.
“He didn’t disappear.”
Adrien looked at her.
“What did you believe happened?”
“Car accident.”
“When?”
“Four years ago.”
Adrien’s eyes narrowed.
Daniel Harper disappeared from Moretti employment four years and eight months earlier.
His abandoned car was found near Lake Michigan.
No body.
No accident report.
No funeral arranged by the company.
Clara had been given a completely different story.
“Who told you he died in an accident?”
“A lawyer.”
“Name?”
“Peter Voss.”
Adrien knew it.
Too well.
Voss had served his uncle Carlo for almost twenty years.
Adrien turned toward Salvatore.
The old butler looked away.
“You knew.”
“No.”
“Did you know Voss handled Daniel?”
“Yes.”
Clara stood.
“You’re talking about my husband like he was a shipment.”
Adrien’s attention moved to her.
She was afraid.
But anger was beginning to beat fear.
Good.
Fear made people hide.
Anger made them speak.
“What did Daniel tell you about his job?” Adrien asked.
“Almost nothing.”
“Nothing?”
“He said the less I knew, the safer Mia and I would be.”
Adrien looked toward the hallway.
“Mia was already born?”
Clara shook her head.
“I was pregnant when he died.”
That explained why the family believed Daniel had no child.
Then Adrien held up Alessandra’s bracelet.
“And this?”
“Daniel gave me a box before his last business trip.”
“What box?”
“I never opened most of it.”
Adrien stared.
“You kept a box from a man connected to my family unopened for four years?”
Clara’s eyes flashed.
“I thought it contained my dead husband’s personal things.”
Fair.
“Where is it?”
Her expression changed.
“Storage.”
Adrien reached for his phone.
“No.”
Clara stepped forward.
He looked at her.
“You don’t send men to take it.”
“I was going to protect it.”
“You were going to take control.”
Silence.
Clara held his gaze.
“I will get it.”
Adrien almost refused.
Then remembered the child telling him he was slow.
Strangely, the lesson carried.
“Fine.”
He turned to Luca Bellandi, his security chief.
“You go with her.”
Clara shook her head.
“One car.”
Luca stared at her as if nobody had ever negotiated guard quantities before.
Adrien said:
“One.”
Forty minutes later, Clara returned carrying a small metal box.
Rust along one edge.
Daniel’s name scratched beneath the handle.
They opened it together.
Inside:
A watch.
Two photographs.
An old passport.
A leather notebook.
And a stuffed gray rabbit.
Clara frowned.
“That isn’t Mia’s.”
Adrien picked it up.
Something rattled inside.
He cut one loose stitch along the bottom.
A brass key dropped onto the desk.
Attached to it:
A metal tag.
WEST 4.
Adrien went completely still.
Clara noticed.
“What is West 4?”
May you like
He looked toward the sealed wing of the mansion.
“A room that has not been opened since my sister died.”
