Chapter 15 - Before BreakfastThe baby was asleep.
Rain began falling again.
Almost exactly as it had that morning.
Dante stood across from Maria.
Lily held his hand.
Anna stood beside Sophia.
Matteo was barely conscious.
Nico raised his weapon.
Maria looked at him.
"You can shoot me."
Dante stopped him.
"Why?"
Maria smiled.
"Because if I die, every file disappears."
Dante looked at the server drive.
"I have the files."
"No."
She laughed softly.
"You have copies."
Dante's eyes narrowed.
"Then what is this?"
Maria looked toward Lily.
"The key."
The music box.
Dante opened it.
The compartment was empty.
Again.
Maria said:
"The box never held the evidence."
Dante stared.
"Then what did it hold?"
"Instructions."
"For what?"
"To remember."
Lily suddenly looked at the box.
"I know the song."
Everyone turned.
Dante crouched.
"What song?"
She touched the brass key.
"This one."
She turned it.
The melody began.
Slow.
Simple.
Beautiful.
Then Lily spoke.
"The room was blue."
Dante froze.
She continued.
"There were twelve beds."
Sophia covered her mouth.
"Mommy was crying."
Anna whispered:
"I remember."
Dante felt something break open inside his head.
A flash.
A hallway.
A child's hand.
His sister.
A laboratory.
His father.
A woman with a red ring.
And a little girl in a crib.
Dante gasped.
He remembered.
Everything.
He was five.
Isabella was seven.
Anna was not yet born.
Lily did not exist.
They were in the white room.
Their father had brought them there.
But someone else had taken over.
Maria.
She had ordered the doctors to begin the memory protocol.
Enzo tried to stop her.
Gabriel was there.
So was Lucia.
And behind the glass was a fourth child.
A newborn.
Dante remembered the baby.
He remembered Maria taking her away.
He remembered his father screaming.
He remembered Isabella trying to fight.
And he remembered one final thing.
A promise.
Enzo had whispered to him:
"Protect your sisters."
Dante opened his eyes.
The rain came down harder.
He looked at Maria.
"You took the fourth child."
Maria nodded.
"Yes."
"Where is she?"
Maria lifted the newborn in her arms.
The baby opened her eyes.
Dark eyes.
The same eyes Dante remembered from the white room.
Dante's breath stopped.
"No."
Maria smiled.
"Meet your daughter."
Silence.
Dante looked at Sophia.
She looked equally stunned.
Lily stared at the baby.
"That's my sister."
Maria nodded.
"Her name is Emma."
Dante stepped forward.
"Why would you bring her here?"
"Because she's the last piece."
"The last piece of what?"
Maria smiled.
"The person who owns the network."
Dante looked at the newborn.
Then at Lily.
Then at the drive.
Nothing made sense.
Until Gabriel's voice came through the helicopter speaker.
"Dante."
He stood behind the helicopter.
Alive.
Bleeding.
Holding no weapon.
"You finally remembered."
Dante stared at him.
"You lied about Lily."
"Yes."
"You're her father."
"Yes."
"You protected her."
"Yes."
"Then why did you kidnap Sophia?"
Gabriel looked at Isabella.
"Because she was going to tell you too soon."
"Tell me what?"
Gabriel looked at the newborn.
"That Maria is not the enemy."
Dante's heart dropped.
"Then who is?"
Gabriel's face changed.
For the first time, he looked afraid.
He whispered:
"Your mother."
Dante turned.
Lucia was standing behind him.
She held a gun.
Her face was wet with rain.
She looked at the baby.
Then at Dante.
And smiled.
"Hello, son."
Dante slowly raised his weapon.
"Why?"
Lucia's eyes filled with tears.
"Because I needed you angry enough to come looking."
He stared.
"For what?"
"For the truth."
She lowered the gun.
"I didn't kill your father."
Dante's jaw tightened.
"Then who did?"
Lucia looked at Maria.
Maria looked at Gabriel.
Gabriel looked at Lily.
And Lily looked at the music box.
The music stopped.
A hidden panel clicked open.
Inside was a tiny photograph.
Dante picked it up.
It showed four children.
Isabella.
Dante.
Anna.
And Emma.
But there was a fifth child standing behind them.
A little boy.
He was smiling.
On the back of the photograph, written in Enzo's handwriting:
THIS IS THE ONE THEY NEVER FOUND.
Dante looked up.
"Who is he?"
Nobody answered.
Then his phone rang.
Unknown number.
Dante answered.
A man's voice spoke.
Calm.
Young.
Familiar.
"You have fifteen minutes before your entire family is killed."
Dante stepped away from everyone.
"Who are you?"
The voice laughed.
"You've spent your whole life trying to find me."
Dante stared at the photograph.
The little boy smiled back from the faded paper.
The stranger spoke again.
"But you never realized the funniest part."
A pause.
"I've been living in your house for nine years."
The call ended.
Dante looked toward the estate in the distance.
The house.
His house.
The house he had believed was secure.
The house where twelve men met every Tuesday.
The house where Sophia worked.
The house where Lily had appeared that morning.
He suddenly understood.
There had never been an intruder.
There had never been a mystery about how the enemy entered.
The enemy had never entered.
He had always been there.
Dante turned to Nico.
"Lock down the house."
Nico reached for his phone.
Dante looked at the people around him.
Isabella.
Anna.
Sophia.
Lily.
Emma.
Maria.
Lucia.
Matteo.
And the empty space where the fifth child should have stood.
Then he heard a soft melody behind him.
The music box had started playing by itself.
For a second time.
And from somewhere inside the house, a child's voice began singing along.
A voice Dante knew.
A voice he had heard every night for nine years.
His own guard.
His most trusted man.
The man who had been standing outside the meeting room that morning.
The man who had sent Lily through the doors.
The man who had known the box existed before Dante ever touched it.
Nico Ferrara.
Dante slowly turned.
Nico was gone.
Only his phone remained on the wet pavement.
It rang once.
Then again.
Dante picked it up.
May you like
A message appeared.
BREAKFAST WAS ONLY THE BEGINNING.
