Chapter 3 - THE MAN I FORGOT
Six years earlier, I had woken in a hospital believing I was lucky.
Now I wondered whether I had simply survived something I was never supposed to understand.
“Tell me everything.”
My voice sounded steadier than I felt.
Detective Harris immediately raised one hand.
“Before anyone turns this into a private interrogation, I need to remind everybody that if Mr. Moretti has information connected to an unsolved homicide—”
“I gave your department information six years ago.”
Luca’s voice was cold.
“And someone buried it.”
Harris stiffened.
“That is a serious accusation.”
“It is intended to be.”
I watched both men.
“Stop.”
They did.
Apparently being a postpartum woman holding a newborn while everyone else argued gave me more authority than I expected.
I looked at Luca.
“Start with Matteo.”
He did.
His brother had been thirty-one.
Not a gangster.
Not a criminal prince.
Not whatever the Moretti name made people imagine.
Matteo Moretti had been a forensic accountant.
“He hated the family business,” Luca said.
“What family business?”
Marco looked away.
Luca’s mouth almost curved.
“Which one?”
Despite everything, I stared at him.
“That is not reassuring.”
“It was not intended to be.”
Detective Alvarez folded her arms.
“At least he is consistent.”
Luca ignored her.
“Matteo worked independently. Hospitals, charitable foundations, construction companies. He specialized in tracing hidden money.”
“And he found the stolen medical funds.”
“Part of them.”
Six years ago, long before the theft reached eighteen million dollars, Matteo discovered irregular transfers from the Moretti pediatric foundation.
Small amounts at first.
Thirty thousand.
Forty.
A hundred.
Money moved through legitimate vendors, then disappeared into subcontractors that barely existed.
“He believed someone inside the foundation was helping.”
“Who?”
“We never proved it.”
“And Derek?”
“At the time, Derek was a junior associate at a law firm that created several of the shell companies.”
My heart pounded.
“I did not know Derek six years ago.”
“I know.”
“Then why was I in Matteo’s car?”
Luca watched me carefully.
“You truly do not remember him?”
“I remember Matt.”
Fragments came back.
A charity event where I had been serving drinks during college.
Rain outside.
A handsome man in a wrinkled white shirt asking whether I wanted a ride because the buses had stopped running.
He talked too much.
He made terrible jokes.
He sang along badly to old songs on the radio.
Then headlights.
A horn.
Metal screaming.
“I remember the crash.”
Luca’s eyes darkened.
“Tell me.”
“I already told the police.”
“Tell me.”
I looked at my daughter.
Maybe because she was there, I found the courage to reopen the memory.
“We were on Lakeshore.”
“What time?”
“After midnight.”
“It was 12:46.”
I looked at him.
Of course he knew.
“It was raining. A truck came behind us.”
“What kind?”
“I never saw.”
“You told police it was dark.”
“It was.”
“But you saw something.”
I squeezed my eyes shut.
Rain on the windshield.
Matteo cursing.
A pair of headlights in the mirror.
A sharp turn.
“Matt said…”
I stopped.
“What?”
I had forgotten.
No.
Not forgotten.
Buried.
“He said, ‘They found me.’”
The room changed.
Luca leaned forward.
“You never said that in your police statement.”
“I did not remember it afterward.”
“You remember now?”
“I remember him looking in the mirror.”
My breathing quickened.
“He was scared.”
Luca said nothing.
“Then the truck hit us.”
I could hear it again.
The explosion of glass.
The passenger side twisting.
My head striking something.
Matteo shouting.
Another impact.
Then silence.
“I woke upside down.”
My daughter made a soft sound.
I kissed her forehead automatically.
“There was blood everywhere. Matt was still awake.”
“What did he say?”
My eyes opened.
Luca looked less like a feared man now.
He looked like a brother.
That was somehow harder.
“He told me to get out.”
Luca’s jaw tightened.
“He kept saying the car could catch fire.”
My voice broke.
“I could not get my seat belt loose.”
I remembered Matteo reaching across despite the blood covering his hand.
I remembered him cutting the strap with something.
I remembered crawling through shattered glass.
“Someone pulled me.”
“Who?”
“I never saw his face.”
Luca and Marco exchanged a look.
“What?”
Marco spoke.
“No first responder arrived for eleven minutes.”
“I know someone pulled me.”
Luca’s face became unreadable.
“Did he speak?”
I searched the memory.
One sentence.
Low voice.
Close to my ear.
“Run.”
Marco looked at Luca.
Luca looked at Harris.
Harris immediately began typing notes.
I shook my head.
“I did not run. My ankle was hurt. I crawled toward the barrier.”
“What happened to the person?”
“I do not know.”
“And Matteo?”
My throat closed.
“The car caught fire.”
Luca looked away.
For the first time since I met him, his control cracked.
Only slightly.
His hand closed into a fist.
“I am sorry.”
He nodded once.
Then turned toward the window.
I gave him several seconds.
“Why did Matteo give you Derek’s name?”
Luca faced me again.
“He left me a voicemail three days before the crash.”
“Do you still have it?”
“Yes.”
Every hair on my arms rose.
He removed his phone.
Marco said quietly, “Luca.”
“I know.”
Know what?
That playing a dead brother’s voice hurt?
That police might take the phone?
That I might hear something I could never unhear?
Luca pressed play.
Static.
Traffic.
Then a man’s voice.
Matteo.
Older than I remembered, yet instantly familiar.
“Luca, I found the lawyer. Morrison. Derek Morrison. Junior associate at Bell & Chase. He’s setting up the shells, but I don’t think he’s the one at the top.”
A pause.
“I’m meeting a source Thursday. If I’m right, this goes higher than the foundation.”
Another pause.
Then Matteo laughed softly.
“And before you start acting like my paranoid older brother, no, I’m not bringing security. I’m an accountant, not the pope.”
Marco muttered something in Italian.
Luca stopped the recording.
“Thursday was the night of the crash,” he said.
“Was I the source?”
“No.”
“How do you know?”
“Because Matteo called me at ten thirty.”
“What did he say?”
“That his source never arrived.”
“Then why was he at the charity event?”
“He went there afterward.”
“And met me.”
“Yes.”
The pieces did not fit.
“Why would anyone follow him if his source never appeared?”
“We think someone knew about the meeting.”
Detective Harris stepped closer.
“Who had access to Matteo’s calendar?”
“His assistant.”
“Name?”
Luca hesitated.
“Rachel Hale.”
I froze.
Hale.
Brittany Hale.
“No.”
Luca saw it.
“You recognize the surname.”
“Brittany.”
“Yes.”
“Are they related?”
“Rachel Hale was Brittany’s mother.”
My skin prickled.
“Was?”
“She died two years after Matteo.”
“How?”
“Overdose.”
“Was it accidental?”
“Officially.”
“Unofficially?”
“We never believed it.”
I stood too quickly again.
Pain tore across my abdomen.
The nurse rushed toward me.
“Ms. Lawson!”
“I am fine.”
“You are three days postpartum. You are absolutely not fine.”
She forced me back onto the bed.
I barely noticed.
“Brittany’s mother worked for your brother.”
“Yes.”
“And now Brittany is sleeping with Derek?”
“Yes.”
“Pregnant by him.”
“So she claims.”
I caught the phrasing.
“So she claims?”
Luca looked toward Alvarez.
The detective’s eyebrows lifted.
Apparently that was news to her too.
“What do you know?”
“Brittany Hale has not received prenatal care at any hospital or clinic connected to her insurance.”
“That does not mean she is not pregnant.”
“No.”
“But?”
“She purchased a positive pregnancy test photograph online six weeks ago.”
I stared.
“That is a thing?”
Marco finally spoke.
“Unfortunately.”
I almost laughed from shock.
“Derek left me for a woman who may be pretending to carry his baby?”
“That appears possible.”
“Why?”
“We do not know.”
I looked down.
My daughter had begun waking.
Her tiny face scrunched.
Then she opened her eyes.
For three years, I had believed Derek’s lies because they had been arranged carefully enough to look like ordinary life.
Maybe Brittany’s pregnancy was another piece of theater.
Maybe refusing the birth certificate was too.
“What happens now?”
Detective Harris answered.
“We question Derek.”
“He will lie.”
“Yes.”
“We question Brittany.”
“She will lie too.”
“Probably.”
“Then what?”
“We collect evidence.”
I laughed bitterly.
“My daughter was almost moved out of the nursery using a fake medical order. How much evidence do you need before I can be afraid?”
Alvarez stepped closer.
“You can be afraid now.”
There was no false comfort in her voice.
“And you can also be careful.”
I appreciated that.
A knock came.
The charge nurse entered.
Her face was pale.
“Detectives?”
Harris stood.
“What?”
“We completed the audit of the nursery access system.”
My stomach dropped.
“What did you find?”
She looked at me apologetically.
“There were three unauthorized attempts to access Baby Lawson’s electronic chart in the last forty-eight hours.”
“From Derek?”
“We cannot tell yet.”
“Where?”
“One came from a workstation on the fourth floor.”
“What is on the fourth floor?”
“Cardiology.”
“And the others?”
“External.”
Harris frowned.
“External access to a newborn chart?”
“Using physician credentials.”
“Whose?”
The nurse swallowed.
“Dr. Samuel Pierce.”
Luca’s head snapped around.
Marco went still.
I looked between them.
“You know him.”
Luca’s voice became dangerous.
“Samuel Pierce was Matteo’s source.”
Silence.
Detective Harris stared.
“The source who never showed?”
“Yes.”
“Where is he now?”
Luca did not answer immediately.
That terrified me.
“Where is he?”
Marco said it.
“Dr. Pierce disappeared six years ago.”
My daughter began crying.
I barely heard her.
Because the nurse was still holding the audit report.
And one line at the bottom was circled in red.
I pointed.
“What is that?”
She hesitated.
“It is the timestamp of the most recent login.”
“When?”
“Fourteen minutes ago.”
Every person in the room stopped moving.
Harris took the page.
“You said this doctor disappeared six years ago.”
“Yes,” Luca replied.
“Then either someone has his credentials…”
“Or?”
Harris looked toward the locked hallway.
May you like
“Or Samuel Pierce is inside this hospital.”
At that exact moment, the lights went out.
