Chapter 5 - THE BROTHER WHO NEVER DIEDElena did not sleep.
Lorenzo refused.
They argued for exactly forty-three seconds.
Then Lena appeared in the kitchen doorway holding Roman’s collar, and the argument ended.
Not because Lorenzo won.
Because Elena looked at her daughter and understood what Lorenzo had been trying to say.
Going back to her apartment could mean walking directly into a trap.
So Elena stayed with Lena while Lorenzo and Matteo left.
Before Lorenzo reached the door, Elena caught his sleeve.
“No killing.”
He looked down at her hand.
Then into her eyes.
“You have my word.”
The apartment building sat on a quiet street on Chicago’s North Side.
Old brick.
Four floors.
No doorman.
No cameras except a cheap one above the lobby entrance.
Lorenzo’s men had already blocked both exits.
Matteo checked his weapon.
Lorenzo did not draw his.
Promise made.
Promise kept.
They entered through the rear stairwell.
Elena’s apartment was on the third floor.
The door was open.
Inside, someone had destroyed everything.
Couch cushions ripped apart.
Cabinet doors open.
Mattress overturned.
Books scattered.
Lena’s stuffed animals lay across the floor.
Lorenzo stopped.
He had seen crime scenes before.
This felt different.
A child lived here.
Someone had gone through her room.
He walked inside.
A noise came from the bedroom.
Matteo raised his gun.
A man stepped out.
Gray coat.
Balding.
Scar beside his ear.
Frank Deluca.
He smiled.
“Well.”
Lorenzo’s expression remained blank.
“That’s unfortunate.”
Deluca slowly lifted his hands.
“I assume the woman ran to you.”
“She didn’t run anywhere.”
“Then how’d you get involved?”
“A little girl asked.”
Deluca laughed.
“Kids.”
He shook his head.
“Always complicating things.”
Matteo took a step toward him.
Lorenzo lifted one hand.
“Where’s Mateo Marquez?”
Deluca’s smile vanished.
“That name is old.”
“So am I.”
“You know better than to dig into Ashford business.”
“You know better than to threaten children.”
“I didn’t threaten anybody.”
“You searched a seven-year-old’s bedroom.”
“That’s not a threat.”
Lorenzo’s jaw flexed.
It took effort not to break his promise immediately.
“What were you looking for?”
Deluca shrugged.
“A ledger.”
“Does Elena have it?”
“If she did, I wouldn’t still be looking.”
“So Victor never recovered the original.”
Deluca realized he had said too much.
Lorenzo almost smiled.
“Thank you.”
Deluca cursed.
Then moved.
Fast.
His hand went inside his coat.
Matteo drew first.
“Don’t.”
Deluca froze.
Lorenzo approached.
He removed the pistol from Deluca’s jacket.
Then his phone.
Then a small envelope.
Inside were photographs.
Elena.
Lena.
Her mother leaving a hospital.
Lena outside school.
Lorenzo felt something inside him turn black.
Matteo saw his face.
“Boss.”
A reminder.
The promise.
Lorenzo stepped back.
“You’re going to tell me where Mateo is.”
Deluca laughed.
“If he’s alive.”
Lorenzo’s eyes sharpened.
“So he might be.”
Deluca said nothing.
That was enough.
“Police,” Lorenzo told Matteo.
Deluca actually looked surprised.
“What?”
“You heard me.”
“You’re turning me in?”
“Yes.”
Deluca laughed harder.
“You really think the cops are going to touch Ashford?”
“Not the old cops.”
Lorenzo had already contacted someone.
Special Agent Nora Beckett.
Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Public corruption division.
A woman who had spent five years trying to connect Victor Ashford to bribery, blackmail, and three suspicious disappearances.
She had lacked witnesses.
Now Lorenzo had one.
Maybe two.
Deluca’s confidence faded.
“You called the feds?”
“I’m trying something new.”
Twenty minutes later, federal agents entered Elena’s apartment.
Nora Beckett arrived personally.
She was forty-five, sharp-eyed, and not remotely impressed by Lorenzo Moretti.
“I never thought I’d see the day.”
“Enjoy it.”
She looked around.
“This is connected to Ashford?”
“Yes.”
“Your evidence?”
“Victim testimony. Recovered phone messages. Deluca.”
Nora looked toward the bedroom where agents were cuffing him.
“You gift-wrapped him?”
“I’m sentimental.”
Her eyes narrowed.
“Why?”
Lorenzo said nothing.
Nora followed his gaze toward Lena’s ruined bedroom.
Understanding crossed her face.
“The child?”
“Yes.”
She stopped joking.
“We’ll handle it.”
Lorenzo looked at her.
“Will you?”
“That depends.”
“On?”
“Whether you stay out of my investigation.”
He smiled faintly.
“You know that won’t happen.”
“Then at least don’t shoot anybody.”
“I made that promise already.”
Nora raised an eyebrow.
“To whom?”
He didn’t answer.
Back at Lorenzo’s house, Elena had put Lena to sleep in one of the guest rooms.
Roman lay beside the bed like a furry guard.
When Lorenzo returned after midnight, Elena was sitting alone in the kitchen.
She stood.
“Well?”
“Deluca is alive.”
“Thank you.”
He found that interesting.
Not relief that Deluca had been arrested.
Relief that Lorenzo had kept his word.
“They found surveillance photos.”
Her face changed.
“Of what?”
“You. Lena. Your mother.”
Elena sat.
“They know where my mother is?”
“Yes.”
“She’s at St. Catherine’s.”
“I already placed security there.”
“You what?”
“Two people.”
“Armed?”
“Yes.”
She closed her eyes.
“Of course.”
“They’re outside her room, not inside.”
“That’s supposed to make me feel better?”
“A little.”
It almost did.
She hated that.
Lorenzo sat across from her.
“Deluca thinks Mateo may still be alive.”
Elena stopped breathing.
“What?”
“He reacted when I asked.”
“That doesn’t mean—”
“No.”
Lorenzo leaned forward.
“It doesn’t.”
Hope frightened her more than grief.
For eight years, she had survived by believing her brother was dead.
Not because she wanted him to be.
Because waiting for him every day had almost destroyed her.
“What exactly did he say?”
Lorenzo told her.
Elena pressed both hands over her mouth.
“He could be alive.”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
“I don’t know.”
“You can find him?”
“I can try.”
Tears filled her eyes.
She stood abruptly and walked toward the window.
Lorenzo stayed seated.
“I stopped searching,” she whispered.
“You were surviving.”
“I stopped.”
“You had a child.”
“I promised my mother I would never stop.”
“You did what you had to do.”
She shook her head.
“No.”
He let the silence exist.
Eventually, Elena looked back.
“Lena’s father died when she was two.”
Lorenzo had not asked.
“Car accident.”
“I’m sorry.”
“He was good to us.”
Lorenzo nodded.
“I loved him.”
“I believe you.”
The answer seemed to surprise her.
She stared at him.
“You don’t have to explain your life to me.”
“I know.”
“Then why?”
“I don’t know.”
Maybe because he was the first person from her old life who still remembered who she had been before fear.
Maybe because the last time she had seen him, he had been bleeding and helpless.
Tonight, their positions had reversed.
His phone vibrated.
Matteo.
Lorenzo answered.
“What?”
Matteo said something that made Lorenzo sit straighter.
“When?”
Another pause.
“Send it.”
Elena watched him.
“What happened?”
Lorenzo opened the incoming message.
A photograph.
Old.
Grainy.
Taken three months earlier at a freight terminal outside Detroit.
The man in the picture was thinner.
He wore a beard.
But Elena recognized him instantly.
Her knees almost gave out.
Lorenzo caught her.
“My God.”
She grabbed the phone.
“My God.”
It was Mateo.
Eight years older.
Alive.
Underneath the photograph was a customs employment record.
A name.
Matthew Marcus.
Elena started crying.
Not quietly.
Not carefully.
Eight years of grief broke open at once.
Lorenzo held her because there was nothing else to do.
She clutched his shirt.
“My brother is alive.”
“Yes.”
“He’s alive.”
“Yes.”
She pulled back.
“How?”
Lorenzo looked again at the photo.
There was something Elena had not noticed.
Mateo was not alone.
Standing behind him was Victor Ashford’s oldest business partner.
Samuel Crane.
A man believed to have died six years ago.
Lorenzo’s expression hardened.
Mateo was alive.
But if Samuel Crane was alive too, then Victor Ashford’s secrets were much bigger than a corrupt wedding family.
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And whatever had happened eight years ago was not finished.
Not even close.
