Chapter 3 - Luca Learned Why I Had Been Hiding in His Office for Three Years
The firefight lasted nine minutes.
Nine minutes felt like a lifetime.
Luca kept me behind him.
Every time a gunshot came from the corridor, his body shifted between mine and the threat.
At one point I grabbed his sleeve.
"You don't need to keep doing that."
He looked at me.
"I do."
"Why?"
"Because you're under my protection."
"I was already protecting you."
A faint smile appeared.
"You were."
Then the smile disappeared.
"Which means I'm returning the favor."
We escaped through a service elevator.
When the doors opened in the basement, rain hammered the loading dock.
Luca's driver brought the car around.
Inside, nobody spoke.
I watched Detroit blur outside the window.
Finally, Luca asked, "Why did you apply to work for me?"
I stared at my hands.
"Because I needed access."
"To what?"
"My father's records."
"And you stayed three years."
"Yes."
"Why?"
I hesitated.
"Because I started caring about you."
Silence.
Luca looked out the window.
"That was not part of your plan."
"No."
"Did you ever intend to betray me?"
"No."
"Did you know about Bellini before tonight?"
"I suspected."
"Why didn't you tell me?"
"Because I didn't know who I could trust."
He looked at me.
"You trusted me enough to work for me."
"I trusted you enough to watch."
He gave a small laugh.
"You really are different from everyone else."
"What does that mean?"
"Most people come near me because they want something."
"I wanted answers."
"And now?"
I looked at him.
"Now I want the truth."
He nodded.
"You'll get it."
We arrived at one of his private residences.
The house was nothing like the cold corporate office.
It was quiet.
Warm.
Books lined one wall.
A piano stood near the windows.
I hadn't expected that.
"You live here?"
"Sometimes."
I smiled.
"You're secretly normal."
"Don't spread that rumor."
I laughed.
For the first time, the tension eased.
Then Luca poured two glasses of water.
Not alcohol.
Water.
"We need a plan."
"We need to identify the second traitor."
"I already know one."
"Who?"
"My chief financial officer."
I looked at him.
"Are you sure?"
"He disappeared before the archive attack."
We checked his records.
His name was Andrew Hale.
Payments had been made to him for years.
But something didn't fit.
The payments stopped six months ago.
"Someone else took over," I said.
Luca stared.
"You're right."
"Someone wasn't paying him anymore because they didn't need him."
"Who?"
I opened the ledger.
A series of coded initials appeared.
One matched someone I recognized.
S.B.
Sebastian Bellini.
My blood ran cold.
"Luca."
He looked at the page.
"That's my mother's initials."
I frowned.
"What?"
"She was Sophia Bellini before she married my father."
My mind went blank.
"Your mother is a Bellini."
"Yes."
I looked at the documents.
"Then Bellini isn't just trying to take your empire."
"No."
"He is your mother's family."
"And my father's enemy."
Suddenly, everything made sense.
The old alliances.
The secret accounts.
The altered contracts.
Bellini didn't want Luca dead for business.
He wanted the Moretti name controlled by Bellini blood.
Luca sat down.
"My father knew."
"About his family?"
"Yes."
"He tried to stop them."
"He failed."
I sat beside him.
"What happens now?"
Luca looked at me.
"Now we find out what your father left."
"My father left a key."
"The one around your neck."
I touched it.
"Yes."
He studied it.
Then he said, "That key opens my father's private vault."
I froze.
"How do you know?"
"He told me about it once."
"Where?"
"Below the old Moretti estate."
The next morning, we went there.
The estate had been abandoned after Luca's father's death.
The walls were covered in dust.
The garden was overgrown.
But the hidden elevator still worked.
It descended three levels underground.
A steel door waited at the bottom.
The key opened it.
Inside was a room filled with photographs.
Letters.
Bank records.
And one wall covered entirely in names.
Some were crossed out.
Some were circled.
At the center was one name.
Luca Moretti.
Beneath it:
The last heir.
And beside it:
Sophia Bennett.
Witness.
Luca stared.
"Witness to what?"
I walked toward a locked drawer.
Inside was another recording.
This one was from my father.
"Emily, if you are hearing this, then I need you to trust one person."
I frowned.
"My name isn't Emily."
Luca looked at me.
The recording continued.
"Trust Sophia."
I stopped breathing.
My father's message had been meant for someone else.
Someone with my name.
Then another voice joined the recording.
Luca's father.
"If she reaches Luca, tell him everything."
The message ended.
I looked at Luca.
"My father knew I would find you."
He nodded slowly.
"Maybe your father didn't work for my family."
"Then what did he do?"
May you like
Luca stared at the wall.
"He was protecting it."
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