Chapter 5 - THE SECOND ACCOUNT
We returned to the estate before dawn.
I spread the ledger across the dining room table.
Matteo stood beside me.
Neither of us spoke for nearly an hour.
Finally I said, “Your people looked for the second account?”
“For years.”
“And failed.”
“Yes.”
I smiled faintly.
“Then they looked in the wrong place.”
Matteo raised an eyebrow.
“How do you know?”
“Because whoever created this ledger wasn't hiding money.”
I pointed at the entries.
“They were hiding ownership.”
He leaned over the table.
“What does that mean?”
“These companies aren't the final destination.”
I traced a sequence of transactions.
“They're layers.”
Matteo studied the numbers.
“You're saying the money moved through several companies.”
“Yes.”
“And the final account?”
“Was probably created under someone else's identity.”
He looked at me.
“Whose?”
I turned the page.
A small notation appeared in my mother's handwriting.
L.M.
I stopped breathing.
Matteo saw it.
“Lucia Marino?”
“My mother's initials.”
“No.”
I shook my head.
“Not mine.”
He stared at me.
Then suddenly I understood.
“My mother didn't create the account.”
“Who did?”
I looked at him.
“She created it for me.”
Silence.
My mother had known.
She had known Rockford was stealing.
She had known she might not survive long enough to expose him.
So she had hidden something in my name.
We spent the next six hours searching old records.
Birth certificates.
Trust documents.
Property transfers.
Insurance records.
Nothing.
Then Matteo remembered something.
“Your mother owned a bookstore.”
I nodded.
“Before she married your father.”
“Did she ever sell it?”
“No.”
He looked at me.
“Why?”
“I thought my father bought it from her.”
Matteo stood.
“Then let's check the property records.”
Three hours later, we found the answer.
The bookstore had never been sold.
It had been transferred into a private trust.
The beneficiary was listed as:
Lucia Elena Marino.
Me.
I stared at the document.
“My mother left me the bookstore.”
“And whatever was hidden beneath it.”
We drove to Boston that evening.
The bookstore had been closed for years.
Dust covered the shelves.
I walked behind the old counter.
My hands remembered the place even though my mind barely did.
My mother used to stand there.
I could almost hear her humming.
Then I noticed a loose floorboard.
Matteo knelt beside me.
He lifted it.
Underneath was a metal box.
My heart pounded.
Inside was a flash drive, several photographs, and one handwritten letter.
I opened it.
Lucia,
If you're reading this, then I failed to protect you from the truth.
Tears blurred the words.
Your father is not the man you think he is.
I stopped.
Matteo quietly took my hand.
I kept reading.
He did not kill me.
My breath caught.
But he knew the brakes on my car had been tampered with.
I stared at the sentence.
“He knew?”
Matteo's face hardened.
My mother continued:
He told me he would fix it.
He didn't.
I couldn't breathe.
The next line was worse.
Evelyn knew too.
My stepmother.
I dropped the letter.
Matteo caught me.
“Lucia.”
“My mother knew they both betrayed her.”
He held me while I cried.
Not possessively.
Not like a man claiming his wife.
Just holding me because there was nothing else he could do.
After several minutes, I whispered:
“I hate them.”
“You're allowed to.”
“I want them exposed.”
“You will be.”
I looked at him.
“How?”
He held up the flash drive.
“We make sure the truth survives.”
Then his phone rang.
Carlo.
Matteo answered.
His expression changed.
“What?”
A pause.
“Say that again.”
He hung up.
I stood.
“What happened?”
He looked at me.
“Varga has disappeared.”
“Where?”
“He left Boston an hour ago.”
“Where is he going?”
Matteo's eyes were cold.
“Your father's house.”
And for the first time, I realized the conspiracy wasn't buried in the past.
May you like
It was still alive.
And tonight, it was coming for us.
