Chapter 7 - The Seal Was Gone - But the Thief Was Wrong
For five seconds after Nico told me the seal was gone, I heard nothing.
Not the guests whispering.
Not the guards shifting their weight.
Not Camilla's ragged breathing beside me.
Only my father's voice from thirty years earlier.
A secret is safe only when no one knows you have one.
I had spent two days pretending the seal was bait.
Now it was actually gone.
"Lock the study wing," I said.
Nico nodded to two men.
"No one leaves the ballroom."
Carlo Bellini stepped forward. "You cannot imprison four hundred people because you misplaced an antique."
"Watch me."
"Dante," Salvatore said, almost gently, "you are losing control."
I turned toward him.
He had recovered completely. No anger now. No fear. He wanted everyone in the room to see a younger boss rattled by a child, a woman, and a missing piece of bronze.
That was the story he needed before the council meeting.
"Maybe," I said.
Salvatore's eyes narrowed.
He had expected resistance, not agreement.
"Then let us all calm down," he said. "Release the guests. Speak to Camilla privately. We can settle this as families."
"You poisoned my father."
"You have a recording from a dead security guard who hated his employer."
"The laboratory report?"
"A photocopy."
"Dr. Pell?"
"A doctor with debts. He will say anything for money."
"The poison in my glass?"
Salvatore looked at Camilla with theatrical disappointment.
"A foolish young woman panicking before marriage. Hardly proof of a conspiracy."
Camilla whipped around.
"You told me to do it!"
Salvatore did not even look at her.
"She is emotional."
Camilla lunged toward him.
Her father caught her arm.
"Enough," Carlo hissed.
She stared at Salvatore, and for the first time she seemed to understand the oldest rule of conspiracy: when the plan fails, everyone discovers he was meant to be disposable.
"You promised me," she said.
Salvatore finally looked at her.
"I promised nothing in writing."
I almost admired the cruelty of it.
Almost.
Then Mrs. Greco appeared beside Elena, pale and breathless.
"Mr. Dante," she said, "Sophia is gone."
Everything inside me stopped.
Elena turned so quickly she nearly fell.
"What?"
"She was beside me. Then the shouting started. I thought she went to you."
Elena's face drained of color.
"Sophia!"
She ran toward the doors.
I caught her arm.
"Wait."
"Let go of me!"
"If someone took her, running blind helps them."
"That is my daughter!"
"And we will find her."
She ripped her arm free.
"You do not get to say 'we' like she belongs to you."
The words hurt more than they should have.
I let them.
"Nico. Cameras. Now."
We moved to the security room while the ballroom remained sealed.
The backup recording system had survived the network loop. We searched every angle from the last ten minutes.
There.
Sophia in pink pajamas, slipping out of the ballroom through the service door behind the musicians.
Alone.
Elena pressed a hand to her mouth.
"Why would she do that?"
We switched cameras.
Sophia entered the east corridor.
Then the library hall.
Then disappeared into the third-floor stairwell.
"She went to the study," Nico said.
I was already running.
We reached the third floor in less than a minute.
The study door stood open.
The hidden drawer was extended.
Empty.
Elena made a sound behind me.
Then a tiny sneeze came from under the desk.
I dropped to one knee.
Sophia crawled out holding Captain Pickles in one hand.
"Hi."
Elena sank to the floor and pulled her daughter against her chest.
"Do not ever do that again! Do you understand me? Never, ever, ever leave me like that!"
Sophia's face crumpled.
"I was helping."
"Helping what?"
"The bird."
I looked at her.
"Sophia. Where is the seal?"
She pointed at Captain Pickles.
Nico stared.
"No."
Sophia reached into the cat's recently reopened ear and pulled out a small velvet pouch.
Inside was the Moretti seal.
For the second time in two days, a three-year-old had defeated my security system.
I closed my eyes.
Nico looked offended on behalf of his profession.
"She stole it?"
Sophia scowled.
"I saved it."
Elena looked from her daughter to me.
"How did she know where it was?"
Sophia answered before I could.
"I heard the shiny lady say they wanted the bird. So I got it first."
"When?"
"Before the party."
Nico shook his head.
"Then what did whoever opened the drawer steal tonight?"
I looked inside.
The bait document was gone.
Not the seal.
The false succession draft.
Camilla and Salvatore believed they had the real seal because their accomplice had been told to take whatever was in the drawer without examining it in the dark.
But Sophia had moved the bronze hours earlier.
I started laughing.
Elena stared at me.
Nico stared at me.
Even Sophia looked concerned.
I had not laughed like that in years.
"What is funny?" Elena demanded.
I held up the pouch.
"Your daughter just saved the five families from a coup."
Sophia brightened.
"Do I get a badge now?"
Nico muttered, "Give her my badge. She has earned it."
Elena did not laugh.
She hugged Sophia tighter.
"No more badges. No more helping. No more secret drawers. You are three. Your job is to color and complain about vegetables."
Sophia considered that.
"Can I complain about peas?"
"Especially peas."
I crouched beside them.
"Sophia. Did you see who came into the study tonight?"
She nodded.
"Mr. Marco."
Nico's head snapped up.
Marco DeSantis.
One of his shift captains.
The man who had supervised the third floor for six years.
"Are you sure?" Nico asked.
"He has the crooked nose."
Marco's nose had been broken in a boxing match at nineteen and never set properly.
Nico's face hardened.
"I will find him."
He left.
Ten minutes later, Marco was gone.
His car remained in the staff lot. His phone lay crushed beside the boiler room. A service door under the old wine cellar had been opened with an obsolete mechanical key.
An old tunnel.
One my father had sealed after a kidnapping threat in 1994.
Or believed he had sealed.
Salvatore had known the house before I did.
He knew every old door.
When we returned to the ballroom, Salvatore took one look at my face and understood something had gone wrong.
I walked to the center of the room.
"The seal was not stolen," I said.
Camilla's smile vanished.
Carlo Bellini swore.
Salvatore remained still.
"Then all this drama was unnecessary," he said.
"Not at all. It told me who reached for it."
Nico entered behind me.
"Marco DeSantis escaped through the cellar tunnel."
Salvatore lifted his brows.
"Should that name mean something to me?"
"His father drove for you for twenty-two years."
"Many men drove for me."
"Not anymore."
I faced the room.
"The winter council meets tomorrow night, as scheduled. Every family head will attend. No proxies. No substitutes."
A murmur moved through the guests.
"Until then, Camilla Bellini remains here under guard for attempted murder. Carlo Bellini may remain with her if he wishes."
Carlo's face reddened.
"You have no authority to detain my daughter."
"She poisoned my glass in my house. Try me."
He said nothing.
I turned toward Salvatore.
"You may go."
Nico stared at me again.
Salvatore smiled.
"Still sentimental about blood."
"No."
I took one step toward him.
"I want you at the council."
His smile faded.
"Why?"
"Because my father died without looking his murderer in the face. I do not intend to make the same mistake."
For a long moment, neither of us moved.
Then Salvatore buttoned his jacket.
"Tomorrow, then."
"Tomorrow."
He walked out through the front doors.
I watched him go.
Elena came to stand beside me, Sophia asleep against her shoulder.
"You are letting him prepare," she said.
"So am I."
"What if he runs?"
"He will not."
"How can you know?"
I looked at the portrait of my father across the foyer.
"Because men like Salvatore would rather risk death than live knowing everyone thinks they were afraid."
Elena was quiet.
Then she said, "And men like you?"
May you like
I looked at her.
"I am trying to find out."
