Chapter 8 - THE MAN BESIDE ME
Marco Bellini had stood beside me through funerals, business wars, threats, arrests, and the worst night of my life.
He had carried my mother’s coffin.
He had pulled Lucia from a wrecked car when she was nineteen.
He had once taken a bullet meant for my father.
If Adrian Prescott had accused almost anyone else, I would have considered it possible.
Marco?
My mind rejected it.
My training did not.
Trust without verification had already cost too much.
I looked at him.
“Your phone.”
Every board member seemed surprised.
Marco wasn’t.
He removed it.
Unlocked it.
Placed it on the table.
“My badge too?”
“Yes.”
He placed that beside the phone.
Camille smiled.
“Finally.”
I didn’t look at her.
Marco unfastened the security access card from his belt.
“Anything else?”
“Stay here.”
He nodded once.
No argument.
No outrage.
That helped him.
But it didn’t clear him.
Federal investigator Erin Walsh watched the exchange.
“You’re voluntarily surrendering access?”
Marco looked at her.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because if Adrian has evidence with my name on it, Mr. Moretti needs to know whether it’s real.”
Walsh nodded.
“Good answer.”
Camille scoffed.
“Or rehearsed.”
Marco finally looked at her.
“You threw boiling tea at an employee.”
Her face tightened.
“I don’t need character analysis from you.”
“No.”
Marco’s voice remained calm.
“You need an attorney who can make you stop talking.”
Even Natalie smiled.
Walsh separated everyone.
The board meeting ended.
No vote on removing me occurred because the allegations now involved too many people to determine anything responsibly.
Daniel remained missing.
Adrian was taken into federal custody for questioning.
Camille was escorted to a conference room.
Nicholas remained with his attorney.
Marco waited alone.
Elena stood beside the windows.
I approached her.
“You should go back to Noah.”
“He’s with Lucia.”
“You trust her?”
“Yes.”
That answer came quickly.
I almost envied my sister.
Elena looked toward Marco.
“Do you?”
“Trust him?”
“Yes.”
“I did.”
“That isn’t what I asked.”
I looked at her.
She had become very good at that.
Cutting through the answer I wanted to give and finding the real one underneath.
“I want to.”
She nodded.
“That’s different.”
“Yes.”
An hour later, Walsh asked me to join her.
Adrian sat in an interview room.
His attorney stood behind him.
He looked exhausted.
Walsh placed a tablet on the table.
“Mr. Prescott has provided messages.”
Adrian wouldn’t meet my eyes.
“From Marco?”
“So he claims.”
She showed me screenshots.
A contact listed as MB.
Messages.
Payments.
Security schedules.
One message read:
ROSA MOVES THURSDAY. CAMERAS DOWN 11:40–12:10.
Another:
GABRIEL WILL BE IN NEW YORK. USE HIS ABSENCE.
My stomach tightened.
“Phone number?”
Walsh enlarged the contact details.
Marco’s number.
I stared at it.
Adrian finally spoke.
“Camille dealt with him.”
“Shut up.”
His attorney leaned forward.
“My client is cooperating.”
I looked at Adrian.
“Did you kidnap Noah?”
He swallowed.
“I arranged it.”
Elena would want the truth.
“Why?”
“To get the ledger.”
“Did Marco help?”
“He gave us the camera access.”
“Did you see him?”
Adrian hesitated.
“No.”
“Did you speak to him?”
“By phone.”
“His voice?”
“Sometimes.”
“Sometimes?”
“Mostly messages.”
“So you never met Marco.”
“No.”
Walsh noticed where I was going.
“Can numbers be spoofed?”
“Yes.”
“Messages fabricated?”
“Yes.”
Adrian’s attorney objected.
Walsh ignored him.
I looked at Adrian.
“Who introduced you to ‘Marco’?”
He frowned.
“Daniel.”
There it was.
Daniel Mercer.
Again.
“Did Camille know?”
“Yes.”
“Did Nicholas?”
“Not at first.”
I leaned back.
“What happened to Rosa?”
Adrian’s face tightened.
“I moved her.”
“Against her will?”
“Yes.”
“To where?”
“A motel.”
“Then Nicholas came.”
“Yes.”
“Did he order you to release her?”
Adrian looked surprised I knew.
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you?”
“I did.”
“Then why did she stay hidden?”
“Nicholas paid her.”
I had heard that.
“Who searched Elena’s room?”
Adrian looked down.
“People Daniel hired.”
“And Noah?”
“My idea.”
I wanted to hate him.
I did hate him.
But there was something pathetic about the way he said it.
Not proud.
Not powerful.
A spoiled man who had spent his life borrowing courage from other people’s money.
“Why involve a seventeen-year-old?”
“I panicked.”
“Good men don’t kidnap teenagers when they panic.”
He closed his eyes.
“I know.”
“No. You know now.”
Walsh ended the interview.
Outside, Natalie waited.
“Marco?”
“Forensics are checking.”
“Camille?”
“Her attorney finally convinced her silence is fashionable.”
I almost smiled.
Then Natalie lowered her voice.
“Elena found something.”
“Where?”
“Her mother’s storage box.”
We went to a private office.
Elena stood over a cardboard box full of old folders.
Lucia had retrieved it from storage.
Noah sat nearby eating chips.
He looked much better.
Elena held a photograph.
“My mother.”
She handed it to me.
Evelyn Brooks stood outside a summer fundraiser.
Beside her was Nicholas.
And behind them—
Daniel Mercer.
Younger.
But unmistakable.
Scar on his hand.
Elena removed a letter.
“This was hidden inside a tax folder.”
The letter was addressed to Evelyn.
No signature.
But the handwriting looked familiar.
I had seen it on birthday cards my entire childhood.
My father’s.
Evelyn,
Nicholas has agreed to return the money. Daniel believes exposure will destroy the shelter network and identify several women whose locations must remain protected.
I understand why you do not trust us.
You shouldn’t.
The next line hit harder.
If anything happens to you, the trust for Elena and the child you are carrying will remain beyond Nicholas’s reach.
Except it hadn’t.
Nicholas eventually reached it.
The letter continued.
Daniel will serve as independent trustee.
My blood went cold.
Daniel.
Not Nicholas.
Daniel had controlled the trust from the beginning.
Natalie read over my shoulder.
“This changes things.”
“How?”
“Nicholas signed the later amendment, but Daniel had custody authority.”
“So Daniel could have manipulated Nicholas.”
“Or Nicholas manipulated Daniel.”
Elena shook her head.
“There’s another page.”
She handed me a smaller note.
This one was in Evelyn’s handwriting.
Anthony thinks Daniel is helping.
He isn’t.
I read the sentence twice.
Below it:
Daniel knows where every woman is hidden.
I looked at Natalie.
“Rosa said they were hiding people.”
“Yes.”
“What if Daniel wasn’t only stealing?”
Elena’s face changed.
“What do you mean?”
I thought about confidential shelters.
False identities.
Private addresses.
Information worth a fortune to the wrong men.
“What if he was selling locations?”
Nobody spoke.
Noah stopped eating.
Lucia whispered, “Oh my God.”
That would explain why Evelyn filed a complaint.
Why my father moved money secretly.
Why he protected information.
Why Daniel needed everything buried.
And why eleven years later, he still couldn’t allow the old records to surface.
Natalie immediately called Walsh.
Before she finished, Marco entered.
Two federal agents followed.
He no longer had his badge.
He looked at me.
“They cleared the phone.”
“How?”
“The messages were routed through a cloned number.”
Adrian had been communicating with someone pretending to be Marco.
Relief came fast.
Then disappeared.
Because the real suspect was worse.
“Daniel,” I said.
Marco nodded.
“I think so.”
Walsh entered behind him.
“We searched Mercer’s office.”
“What did you find?”
“A second phone.”
She placed it in an evidence bag.
“Messages with Adrian.”
“And Camille?”
“Yes.”
“Anything else?”
Walsh looked at Elena.
“Names.”
Elena stiffened.
“What names?”
“Women.”
The room became silent.
“From the shelters?” I asked.
Walsh nodded.
“Some current. Some old.”
My stomach turned.
“Were addresses listed?”
“Yes.”
Lucia looked sick.
“We need to warn them.”
“We are.”
Walsh continued.
“We also found records of payments from private investigators and two men with known histories of stalking former spouses.”
Elena whispered, “He sold them.”
It wasn’t confirmed yet.
But we all understood.
The Foundation’s system, built to hide women from dangerous men, had been compromised by the man my father trusted to guard it.
Camille’s fraud had accidentally exposed something far worse.
Walsh looked at me.
“Mr. Moretti, I need full access to Foundation records going back fifteen years.”
“You have it.”
“And Moretti Holdings.”
Natalie looked at me.
That was broader.
Potentially dangerous for my business.
Potentially devastating for my family.
My father had left me more than legitimate companies.
There were accounts I had spent years trying to untangle from old alliances.
Opening everything could cost me control.
Maybe more.
I thought of Elena’s burned arm.
Noah tied to a chair.
Margaret framed.
Rosa hiding.
Women whose addresses might have been sold.
“You have it,” I repeated.
Natalie nodded.
That was the moment everything changed.
Not publicly.
Not yet.
But privately.
I had spent my adult life preserving the Moretti empire.
For the first time, I chose people over the empire.
My phone rang.
Marco looked at the screen.
Unknown.
I answered.
No distortion this time.
Daniel Mercer’s voice.
“Gabriel.”
Everyone froze.
“Where are you?”
“You opened the records.”
“Yes.”
A weary laugh.
“You always were more sentimental than your father.”
“You sold women’s addresses.”
Silence.
That was answer enough.
“You’re finished.”
“No.”
Daniel’s voice hardened.
“If I’m finished, the Moretti name is finished.”
“I can live with that.”
Another silence.
Then:
“Can Lucia?”
My eyes went to my sister.
“What are you talking about?”
“She signed documents.”
Lucia turned pale.
“Which documents?” I asked.
“Payments. Transfers. Confidential settlements.”
“Manipulated by you.”
“Prove it.”
“We will.”
Daniel laughed softly.
“You think this ends in a courtroom?”
“Yes.”
“You’ve forgotten what family you belong to.”
“No.”
I looked through the glass toward the city.
“I’m finally remembering what kind of family I don’t want to be.”
Daniel’s voice lowered.
“Then ask Elena about her father.”
Elena stiffened.
“What?”
Daniel continued.
“Everyone has been so interested in Evelyn Brooks.”
My heartbeat slowed.
“You should ask who Noah’s father is.”
Elena grabbed the phone.
“My father died when I was six.”
Daniel laughed.
“I wasn’t talking about yours.”
The call ended.
Elena stared at the phone.
Noah looked confused.
“What does that mean?”
Nobody answered.
Then Natalie slowly sat down.
I knew that expression.
She had just remembered something.
“What?”
She looked at Noah.
Then at me.
“Evelyn’s trust documents.”
“What about them?”
“They identify both children.”
Elena frowned.
“I wasn’t listed?”
“You were.”
“And Noah?”
Natalie swallowed.
“He was listed before he was born.”
“That makes sense.”
“No.”
Natalie looked at me.
“The trust included a paternity acknowledgment.”
The entire room went silent.
Elena whispered:
“From who?”
Natalie opened the scanned record.
Her eyes lifted.
“Nicholas Moretti.”
Noah’s bag of chips slipped from his hand.
May you like
And for the first time since this began, Elena looked at me not as her employer, not as Gabriel Moretti, not even as an ally.
She looked at me like I was family.
