Chapter 8 - The Landlord's SecretMy landlord's name was Marcos Bell.
For six years, he had been the one constant in a life that had never felt stable.
He fixed broken locks.
He lowered my rent after bad months.
He even gave me grocery money once when I was sick.
I had trusted him.
Now I was staring at his face in a photograph taken outside my apartment.
Dante noticed my silence.
“You know him?”
“Yes.”
“How well?”
“Well enough to believe he isn't a killer.”
Dante looked at the photograph again.
“That's what makes him useful.”
We brought Marcos to the estate.
He arrived furious.
Then he saw me.
His anger disappeared.
He looked terrified.
Dante placed the photograph in front of him.
“Explain.”
Marcos said nothing.
“Marcos.”
“I can explain.”
“Then do it.”
He looked at me.
“I was assigned to protect you.”
“By whom?”
“Lucia.”
My mother's name.
I stepped closer.
“My mother hired you?”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“Twenty-four years ago.”
I stared at him.
“You've been watching me since childhood?”
“Yes.”
“Why didn't you tell me?”
“Because your mother made me promise.”
“What promise?”
“That you would never know the truth unless the Moretti family found you.”
Dante's expression darkened.
“My family found her.”
Marcos nodded.
“That means it's time.”
He reached inside his coat and took out a small key.
He placed it on the table.
“Your mother left something for you.”
“What?”
“A house.”
I blinked.
“I never owned a house.”
“You do.”
He gave me the address.
It was in an old neighborhood on the other side of the city.
Dante insisted on coming.
The house had been abandoned for years.
The windows were boarded.
The garden was overgrown.
Inside, dust covered everything.
Then I saw the wall.
Two small pencil marks.
One labeled Isabella.
The other labeled Elina.
I touched them.
A flood of memories returned.
We had stood in this room.
We had measured ourselves against the wall.
We had laughed.
We had promised to grow up together.
Then I remembered something else.
A hidden door.
“Wait.”
I walked toward the fireplace.
There was a loose brick.
I pulled it.
A compartment opened.
Inside was a metal box.
No lock.
Just one photograph.
And a letter.
I opened it.
My mother's handwriting.
My dearest Elina,
If you are reading this, then Isabella is gone and the Morettis have found you.
My eyes filled with tears.
I did not abandon you. I saved you.
I kept reading.
Your father is not dead.
I stopped.
Dante stepped closer.
“What?”
I read the next line.
Your father is closer than you think.
I looked up.
“Who is my father?”
The letter continued.
Do not trust Carlo. Do not trust the police. Do not trust the men who say they loved Isabella.
I looked at Dante.
There was another sentence.
But there is one man Isabella trusted until the end.
I turned the page.
The name had been torn away.
I found only three visible letters.
MOR.
Then the floor creaked.
We both turned.
The back door was open.
Someone had entered.
Dante drew his weapon.
A shadow moved down the hallway.
Then a woman's voice whispered:
“Elina.”
I froze.
I knew that voice.
It belonged to my mother.
“Mom?”
Dante grabbed my arm.
The shadow disappeared.
We rushed outside.
Nothing.
Only an old car speeding away.
Dante's men chased it.
But they lost it at an intersection.
When we returned to the house, Dante found something on the floor.
A small silver chain.
Attached was a key.
He looked at it.
His face changed.
“What?”
He handed it to me.
The key had a number engraved on it.
17.
I stared.
“What's room seventeen?”
Dante looked toward the city.
“An old Moretti hotel.”
“What's there?”
He took a breath.
“My father kept a private archive there.”
“Could my mother have hidden something?”
“Possibly.”
Then Marcos shouted from inside.
We ran back.
He was standing over the letter.
“The ink is disappearing.”
I looked down.
The words were fading.
But one sentence remained.
Elina, your father is the man who buried Isabella.
I looked at Dante.
Neither of us spoke.
Because there was only one man who had the power to bury a truth that deeply.
May you like
My father wasn't just alive.
He was inside the Moretti family.
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