Chapter 10 - THE BULLET“Lorenzo?”
WE ARE LOCKED IN. LEO?
My hands shook as I typed.
SAFE. RYAN ARRESTED. MARCO HERE.
Three dots appeared.
Then:
STAY THERE.
As if I intended to attend a hostage situation with a baby.
Marco was already communicating with federal agents.
“What’s happening?”
“Electronic lockdown.”
“Fire system?”
“Compromised.”
“Vittorio?”
“Inside.”
The television in the pediatric residence suddenly switched channels.
Live footage from the Rossi Foundation gala.
Someone had hijacked the event’s broadcast stream.
Hundreds of guests stood confused in the ballroom.
Then Vittorio Rossi walked onto the stage.
I recognized him from photographs.
Sixty-five.
Silver hair.
Elegant black tuxedo.
He looked more like a senator than a murderer.
Lorenzo stood twenty feet away with Bianca and Isabella.
Federal agents could not simply shoot Vittorio.
He held a remote trigger.
Nobody knew what it controlled.
Vittorio took the microphone.
“For thirty years,” he said, “my family confused weakness with progress.”
The ballroom fell silent.
“You built charities,” he continued. “Hospitals. Foundations. You shook hands with men who once feared our name.”
Lorenzo stepped forward.
“You poisoned a baby because you were afraid of becoming irrelevant.”
Vittorio smiled.
“There he is.”
“What does the trigger control?”
“You always did skip conversation.”
“Tell me.”
“Explosives.”
People screamed.
Federal agents began moving.
Vittorio raised the remote.
“Anyone approaches, everyone dies.”
The room froze.
At the residence, I held Leo tighter.
Marco spoke rapidly into his headset.
Bomb teams were searching the building.
But they didn’t know where to look.
Then something Evelyn had said came back to me.
Every emergency changed Lorenzo’s schedule.
Vittorio studied security.
The gala was not simply where the Rossi family gathered.
It was where everything important connected.
Security.
Power.
Communications.
Kitchen.
HVAC.
I looked at Marco.
“Where does Vittorio’s company work?”
“What?”
“His legitimate companies.”
“Construction. Logistics. Commercial maintenance.”
“Did any company connected to him work on the gala venue?”
Marco froze.
He began typing.
“Yes.”
“What?”
“Ventilation renovation fourteen months ago.”
My blood chilled.
“Tell bomb squad to check HVAC.”
Marco transmitted the information.
On television, Vittorio continued.
“My brother left control to a boy who wanted respectability.”
Lorenzo laughed bitterly.
“You murdered my wife because she embarrassed you.”
“Sofia was ambitious.”
“She was pregnant.”
“She convinced you to betray your blood.”
Lorenzo’s face became stone.
“You killed her.”
“She made choices.”
I hated the phrase.
Abusers always did that.
They hurt someone, then called the victim’s resistance a choice.
Vittorio looked toward Isabella.
“And you encouraged him.”
Isabella raised her chin.
“I encouraged my son to become better than us.”
“You made him weak.”
“No.”
She stepped forward.
“I made the mistake of letting you stay near my children.”
Vittorio’s smile disappeared.
At the residence, Marco received a message.
“Bomb squad found devices.”
“Where?”
“Ventilation shafts.”
“How many?”
“At least six.”
“Can they disarm them?”
“Not while Vittorio holds the trigger.”
My stomach turned.
Then Leo began fussing.
I rocked him.
His cry increased.
I realized he was hungry.
Of course.
Even during attempted mass murder, babies kept their schedule.
I sat down and fed him beneath a blanket.
The normality of it almost made me laugh.
Marco looked away respectfully.
Then his radio cracked.
“Possible secondary trigger mechanism.”
“What does that mean?” I asked.
“If Vittorio releases the button rather than presses it, devices may detonate.”
A dead-man switch.
The agents in the ballroom could not shoot him.
Could not tackle him.
Could not let him drop the remote.
On television, Lorenzo understood the same thing.
“What do you want?” he asked.
Vittorio smiled.
“You finally ask.”
“Say it.”
“Publicly transfer control of Rossi Holdings to me.”
“You think that matters after tonight?”
“Do it.”
“And then?”
“You walk away.”
Lorenzo laughed.
“Nobody believes that.”
“You have ten minutes.”
A lawyer was brought forward.
Documents appeared.
Vittorio had planned everything.
Lorenzo looked toward Bianca.
Then Isabella.
Then the hundreds of innocent guests trapped around them.
He signed.
Vittorio smiled.
“Good boy.”
Lorenzo placed the pen down.
“Now let them leave.”
“No.”
“You have what you wanted.”
“I have paper.”
“What else?”
Vittorio’s eyes became cold.
“Your confession.”
Lorenzo frowned.
“You will admit publicly that you ordered Sofia’s death.”
My breath caught.
“No,” I whispered.
Vittorio wanted to rewrite everything.
If Lorenzo died tonight, history would blame him.
Leo would grow up believing his father killed his mother.
Lorenzo looked toward the cameras.
Then back at Vittorio.
“You’re afraid of a dead woman.”
Vittorio’s jaw tightened.
“She recorded you.”
Silence.
That landed.
“You didn’t know?” Lorenzo asked.
For the first time, Vittorio looked uncertain.
“Sofia recorded you in the hospital.”
His grip shifted on the remote.
Marco leaned toward the screen.
“Careful.”
Lorenzo continued.
“Your voice. Evelyn’s voice. Everything.”
“You’re lying.”
“Federal investigators already have copies.”
Vittorio’s breathing changed.
He was losing control.
And everyone could see it.
“You killed my wife because she saw what you were,” Lorenzo said. “You poisoned my son because you were too afraid to face me directly.”
“Stop talking.”
“You hired Ryan Cole because even hurting Anna yourself was too dangerous.”
Vittorio’s thumb trembled.
“Stop.”
“You have spent your entire life calling other men weak because you’re terrified someone will discover what you are.”
Vittorio raised the remote.
Lorenzo stepped closer.
“A coward.”
Vittorio lunged.
Not at the trigger.
At Lorenzo.
Bianca threw herself sideways into a table.
The ballroom erupted.
A federal agent grabbed Vittorio’s wrist.
Lorenzo caught the remote before it fell.
For three horrifying seconds, three people fought over the device.
Then Isabella did something nobody expected.
She struck her brother-in-law across the face with a champagne bottle.
Vittorio collapsed.
The agent secured his hand around the trigger.
Bomb technicians rushed in.
One minute.
Three.
Five.
Then Marco’s radio sounded.
“Devices disabled.”
He closed his eyes.
“Safe.”
I cried.
On television, agents dragged Vittorio Rossi away.
He looked toward Lorenzo and screamed, “This family belongs to me!”
Lorenzo stared after him.
“No,” he said.
Then he looked directly toward the camera.
“It belongs to the children who survive us.”
At 12:04 a.m., Lorenzo Rossi walked out of the ballroom alive.
May you like
But when he reached us twenty-six minutes later, there was blood on his shirt.
And it wasn’t Vittorio’s.
