Chapter 2 - The Camera Behind the Bookshelf
The mansion went into lockdown at 11:42 p.m.
Every external door was sealed.
The guards were ordered into pairs.
Phones were collected.
The kitchen was searched.
The wine cellar was searched.
The servants' quarters were searched.
No one was allowed to leave.
But Alejandro didn't immediately confront Lorenzo.
That surprised me.
I had seen him on television before.
He was the man who could make rooms go silent simply by entering them.
Yet that night, he didn't rush toward the man whose ring appeared in the hidden recording.
He watched.
He waited.
Mama and I were taken to a small sitting room near the east wing.
A guard stood outside.
Mama paced.
I sat on the couch with my stuffed rabbit.
“Emma,” she whispered.
“Yes?”
“Why did you go upstairs?”
“I told you.”
“You were supposed to stay.”
“I was scared.”
She sat beside me.
Then she held my face in both hands.
“You cannot do that again.”
I nodded.
“I know.”
She looked toward the door.
“I'm not angry.”
“I thought you were.”
“I am scared.”
“Of Mr. Moretti?”
“No.”
“Then who?”
She hesitated.
“Everyone.”
That answer stayed with me.
A few minutes later, Alejandro entered.
Mama stood immediately.
“Sir.”
“Sit.”
She sat.
Alejandro looked at me.
“You should be sleeping.”
I shook my head.
“Too loud.”
He frowned.
“What?”
“The house is loud.”
He looked around.
“It seems quiet.”
I shook my head again.
“No.”
I pointed toward the wall.
“People are walking inside.”
Alejandro glanced at Tommy.
Tommy's expression became serious.
He moved toward the wall.
“There's a service passage behind this room.”
Mama looked alarmed.
“I didn't know.”
Alejandro looked at me.
“How do you know?”
I shrugged.
“I hear things.”
He smiled faintly.
“So I have learned.”
He crouched beside me.
“Does the wall always sound like that?”
I shook my head.
“Only when bad things happen.”
Tommy opened a hidden panel.
A narrow corridor appeared.
Everyone stared.
It was empty.
But there were fresh shoe marks in the dust.
Alejandro stood.
“Seal it.”
Tommy nodded.
Then someone knocked.
The door opened.
Lorenzo Moretti entered.
He was in his sixties, silver-haired, elegantly dressed, carrying a walking cane he barely needed.
He smiled.
“I hear you're alive.”
Alejandro's eyes never left him.
“Disappointed?”
Lorenzo laughed.
“You know me better than that.”
“I thought I did.”
Lorenzo looked toward me.
“And who is this?”
“Emma.”
The smile on Lorenzo's face disappeared for a fraction of a second.
Then returned.
“The little girl.”
I didn't like him.
I couldn't explain why.
But when he looked at me, I felt cold.
He walked closer.
“Your mother works here?”
Mama nodded.
Lorenzo studied me.
“You saved Alejandro?”
I nodded.
He smiled.
“Brave little thing.”
I hid behind Mama.
Alejandro noticed.
“Don't.”
Lorenzo frowned.
“Don't what?”
“Stand too close to her.”
Lorenzo looked amused.
“You've changed.”
“No.”
Alejandro's eyes hardened.
“I'm paying attention.”
Lorenzo's gaze shifted toward Tommy.
“Have you found the culprit?”
“Not yet,” Tommy answered.
Lorenzo sighed.
“Tragic.”
Alejandro pointed toward the door.
“Wait outside.”
Lorenzo's face tightened.
“Why?”
“Because I said so.”
He left.
The moment the door closed, Tommy spoke.
“That's his ring.”
Alejandro nodded.
“I know.”
“Should we bring him in?”
“Not yet.”
Mama looked confused.
“Why not?”
Alejandro answered:
“Because if Lorenzo is guilty, he isn't working alone.”
That night, the camera footage was examined frame by frame.
The hidden camera had recorded nearly six months.
It showed servants.
Guards.
Visitors.
Executives.
Family members.
Alejandro searched the footage himself.
Then he found something.
Three months earlier.
The same room.
The same bookshelf.
Clara entered.
She looked around.
Then she removed a book.
Behind it was a small compartment.
Inside was the same camera.
Tommy stared.
“She knew.”
Alejandro watched the clip again.
Clara spoke to someone off-screen.
“I installed it exactly where you told me.”
The voice of the other person was distorted.
But a phrase was clear.
“When he dies, the old agreement takes effect.”
Alejandro's jaw tightened.
“What agreement?”
Tommy shook his head.
“We don't know.”
Alejandro continued watching.
Clara received something.
A key.
Then the footage ended.
But the camera had recorded something else.
A conversation in the hallway.
A man's voice.
“Lorenzo can't know yet.”
Another voice:
“He'll be angry.”
“We don't need him angry. We need him loyal.”
Alejandro paused.
The voice belonged to Victor Hale.
His father's former attorney.
Victor was supposed to be retired.
He had vanished two years earlier.
Alejandro stared at the screen.
“Find him.”
Tommy nodded.
“I'll send people.”
“No.”
Alejandro stood.
“I'll go.”
Tommy objected.
“You nearly died.”
“Which is why I need to know who has been moving inside my walls.”
Mama spoke quietly.
“You should not go.”
Alejandro looked at her.
She seemed surprised by her own courage.
He smiled.
“You sound like my mother.”
“I didn't mean—”
“I know.”
Then his gaze fell on me.
“Emma.”
I looked up.
“Can you remember what the person sounded like?”
He sat beside me.
“The person near the wine?”
I nodded.
“Was the voice high?”
I thought.
“No.”
“Deep?”
“Yes.”
“Man?”
“Yes.”
“Old?”
I shook my head.
“Younger.”
Tommy looked at Alejandro.
“Could it be Victor?”
“Maybe.”
I closed my eyes.
The sound came back.
A laugh.
A chair moving.
The wine bottle.
Then a voice.
I repeated what I remembered.
“Don't worry. He won't feel it.”
Mama covered her mouth.
Alejandro went still.
Those words had been spoken near the wine.
But then I remembered something else.
“The man said another thing.”
“What?”
“He said…”
I frowned.
“He said, ‘Once the little girl is gone, she'll tell us everything.’”
The room went cold.
Alejandro slowly turned toward Mama.
Rosa's face drained of color.
He asked:
“Who?”
I looked at my mother.
“They said Mama.”
Alejandro stood.
“No one touches Rosa.”
Tommy immediately moved toward the door.
Then a gunshot cracked through the mansion.
Everyone froze.
A guard shouted from the hall.
“Sir!”
Alejandro opened the door.
One of his men lay on the floor.
The bullet had missed his head by inches.
A message had been taped to the wall.
STOP LOOKING.
Alejandro tore it down.
On the back was a photograph.
Me.
Sleeping in my mother's room.
Taken that same night.
Mama began shaking.
Alejandro looked at me.
Then at the photograph.
Something inside his expression changed.
Not anger.
Decision.
“Pack a bag.”
Mama stared.
“What?”
“You and Emma are moving.”
“Where?”
“A place nobody knows.”
“Why?”
Alejandro looked toward the camera.
“Because whoever is doing this has decided your daughter is a witness.”
He looked down at me.
“And I don't abandon witnesses.”
I didn't understand what a witness was.
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I only understood that the tall man with the cold eyes had decided I belonged under his protection.
And somewhere in the mansion, the traitor was listening.
