Chapter 8 - The Boardroom TrapElena survived.
He stared at his mother’s passport photograph as if the image might disappear if he waited long enough.
Elena Moretti had supposedly died of cancer in Switzerland twelve years earlier.
There had been a funeral.
A coffin.
Death certificates.
A priest.
Luca himself had stood beside the grave.
Now Detective Monroe was telling us Elena had entered the United States under the legal name Elena Rossi.
“How?” Luca finally asked.
“We’re still investigating.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
“No.”
Monroe remained calm.
“But her fingerprints match records from an immigration application she made twenty-seven years ago.”
Luca stood.
“My mother died.”
“Apparently she did not.”
He walked to the window.
I watched his reflection.
Pain can make people look younger.
For a moment, he didn’t look like the head of Moretti Holdings.
He looked like a son.
“Did Vittorio know?” I asked.
Monroe nodded.
“We think so.”
“Then Northshore…”
“Was established through Elena’s trust.”
Luca turned.
“So my mother financed Raymond?”
“We cannot prove she personally authorized recent payments.”
“But the money came from her.”
“Yes.”
It made no sense.
Why would a mother fake her death, vanish for twelve years, then fund a plan targeting her son’s pregnant wife?
Unless—
“Maybe she wasn’t targeting us,” I said.
Luca looked at me.
“What?”
“Vittorio had access to her money.”
Monroe nodded slowly.
“That’s possible.”
We spent the next day unraveling twelve years of ghosts.
Elena’s death certificate came from a private Swiss clinic that had closed eight years earlier.
The physician who signed it was deceased.
The coffin had remained closed because the illness allegedly left her disfigured.
Luca had been twenty-five and devastated.
Nobody questioned anything.
A woman matching Elena Rossi’s passport had lived quietly in France, Croatia, and northern Italy.
She owned almost nothing publicly.
No social media.
No obvious business ties.
Then four months earlier she flew to New York.
After that, she vanished.
Until a traffic camera captured her entering a church in Chicago three weeks before Bellini Café.
St. Anthony’s.
Luca’s childhood church.
He stared at the photograph for a long time.
“She knew I would recognize that place.”
“Maybe she wanted you to.”
“Then why not contact me?”
Nobody had an answer.
Raymond did.
Or thought he did.
From jail, through his attorney, he requested a meeting with me.
I refused.
Then he said he had information about Elena.
I reconsidered.
Luca hated it.
“This is manipulation.”
“Probably.”
“He wants access to you.”
“He’ll get a glass wall and a telephone.”
“No.”
“Luca.”
“No.”
“You walked into a warehouse alone to meet your murderous uncle.”
He opened his mouth.
Closed it.
“That was different.”
“How?”
“It was stupid.”
“Correct.”
He sighed.
I went.
Luca came with me.
Raymond sat behind reinforced glass wearing an orange jail uniform.
Without expensive clothes and arrogance, he looked strangely ordinary.
That disturbed me more.
Monsters rarely look like monsters.
He picked up the telephone.
I did too.
“You look tired,” he said.
I stared at him.
“You asked to talk about Elena.”
His mouth twisted.
“No hello?”
“No.”
“You used to be nicer.”
“I used to be afraid of you.”
That landed.
His expression changed.
“Who is Elena?”
He leaned back.
“Vittorio called her the widow.”
“Did you meet her?”
“Once.”
Luca moved closer behind me.
“When?”
“Before Bellini.”
“Where?”
“Hotel.”
“What did she say?”
Raymond smiled faintly.
“That you weren’t safe with Moretti.”
I nearly laughed.
Of course.
Every manipulator used the same script.
“She said Luca’s family destroys everyone close to them. That eventually he would destroy you.”
“What did she want?”
“For me to get you away from him.”
“By choking me?”
Raymond’s eyes shifted.
“That wasn’t planned.”
There it was.
Cowardice.
“Everything is always someone else’s fault, isn’t it?”
“I lost control.”
“You chose to hurt me.”
“I was angry.”
“You chose.”
His jaw tightened.
I leaned toward the glass.
“That’s the part you never understood. Anger isn’t a person holding your wrist. Rage isn’t a gun. You made choices.”
He looked away.
For once, Raymond Cross had nothing to say.
“Did Elena tell Vittorio to kidnap Luca?”
“I don’t know.”
“Did she fund Anton?”
“I don’t know.”
“What do you know?”
Raymond hesitated.
“She hated Vittorio.”
Luca and I exchanged a look.
“What?”
“She said he murdered her husband.”
Luca froze.
Raymond continued.
“She wanted proof.”
“Then why help you?” I asked.
“She said making Luca vulnerable would force Vittorio to move.”
Suddenly everything rearranged itself.
Elena hadn’t necessarily wanted Luca destroyed.
She wanted Vittorio exposed.
And she used Raymond’s obsession to create chaos around Luca.
Reckless.
Cruel.
Unforgivable.
But different.
“You were bait,” I said.
Raymond’s face hardened.
“I wasn’t—”
“Yes.”
I almost smiled.
“You thought you were using everyone. Elena was using you.”
He slammed the phone against the glass.
A guard moved forward.
Raymond breathed heavily.
“You think you won?”
“This isn’t a game.”
“You’re still carrying his kid.”
I stood.
“Yes.”
He stared at my stomach.
For the first time, I saw something other than ownership in his expression.
Defeat.
“You’re never getting near her.”
He laughed bitterly.
“You think Moretti can protect you forever?”
I looked at Luca.
“No.”
Then back at Raymond.
“I learned how to protect myself.”
I hung up.
Outside the jail, Luca took my hand.
“I’m proud of you.”
“Don’t.”
“What?”
“Don’t make surviving Raymond sound heroic.”
He frowned.
“I didn’t mean—”
“I know.”
I leaned against him.
“I just want him to become irrelevant.”
“He will.”
That evening, Detective Monroe received a message from an encrypted account.
One sentence.
ASK LUCA WHERE HIS MOTHER USED TO TAKE HIM ON SUNDAYS.
Luca read it.
His face changed.
“What?”
He grabbed his coat.
“The conservatory.”
The Garfield Park Conservatory had been Elena’s favorite place.
As a child, Luca went there nearly every Sunday.
Police surrounded the building before we entered.
This time, nobody went alone.
We walked through warm glasshouses filled with palms, orchids, and the thick smell of wet earth.
Near the fern room stood a woman in a gray coat.
Silver in her dark hair.
Hands clasped in front of her.
Luca stopped.
She turned.
His breath left him.
“Mom?”
Elena Moretti looked at her son.
For twelve years, Luca had believed this woman was dead.
Now tears filled her eyes.
“My Lucky.”
Luca didn’t move.
Neither did I.
Elena took one step toward him.
He stepped back.
The pain on her face was immediate.
“You’re alive,” he whispered.
“Yes.”
“You let me bury you.”
“I had to.”
“No.”
His voice cracked.
“You chose to.”
Elena lowered her eyes.
“I chose to keep you alive.”
Luca laughed once.
Broken.
“You have five minutes to explain twelve years.”
She looked toward me.
Then toward my stomach.
“I’m sorry, Norah.”
“Why?”
“Because Raymond was never supposed to touch you.”
Rage flashed through Luca.
“You put him near her?”
“I needed Vittorio to believe I was attacking you.”
“You terrorized my wife.”
“I was trying to expose the man who killed your father.”
“You used my unborn child as bait!”
Elena flinched.
“I never knew about the crib.”
“What?”
“That was Vittorio.”
She reached into her coat.
Security immediately raised weapons.
“Slowly,” Monroe ordered.
Elena removed a flash drive.
“This contains everything.”
Luca stared at it.
“Everything what?”
“Twenty years of Vittorio’s accounts. Payoffs. Murders. Judges. Police.”
She held it toward Monroe.
“And proof he killed Matteo.”
Luca looked at his mother.
“Why now?”
“Because Vittorio discovered I was alive.”
Silence.
“And he knows I have the evidence.”
A distant crack shattered the glasshouse.
Elena jerked.
A red stain spread across her shoulder.
“DOWN!”
Security tackled us behind a concrete planter.
Another shot struck glass.
People screamed.
Luca crawled toward his mother.
“Mom!”
She was conscious.
Bleeding.
Police rushed toward the exits.
Somewhere beyond the greenhouse, a shooter disappeared into the city.
Elena clutched Luca’s sleeve.
“He found me.”
Luca pressed his hand against her wound.
“Stay with me.”
She looked toward the flash drive lying on the floor.
“No.”
Her voice weakened.
“Find Damian.”
Luca froze.
“What?”
Elena’s eyes closed.
“Vittorio isn’t trying to put Damian in charge.”
May you like
She struggled to breathe.
“He’s planning to kill him.”
