CHAPTER SEVEN Locker C-17
The white lily trembled in Alessandro's hand.
Not because of the wind.
Because someone had walked through one of the most heavily guarded estates in New York...
Left a message...
And disappeared without triggering a single alarm.
Every security officer looked at Marco Bellini.
Even though he had already been relieved of command.
Marco's face remained unreadable.
But a vein pulsed at his temple.
He knew what everyone was thinking.
Either security had failed...
Or someone inside security had opened the door.
Alessandro held up the luggage tag.
"C-17."
His eyes moved to the silver key.
"The same code."
Daniel Ross looked as though he wanted to run.
"Throw them away."
Nobody listened.
"Please!"
His voice cracked.
"You don't understand what C-17 means."
Alessandro stepped closer.
"Then help me understand."
Daniel hesitated.
His breathing grew shallow.
Finally, he whispered,
"It isn't a locker."
Everyone frowned.
"What is it?"
"It's a person."
The silence that followed felt heavier than the rain.
"A person?"
Daniel nodded.
"They use letters instead of names."
"Why?"
"So nobody knows who anyone really is."
"Then who is C-17?"
"I don't know."
"You just said it's a person."
"I've never seen their face."
Daniel looked genuinely terrified.
"We were never allowed to."
"They wore masks."
No one laughed.
Not after everything that had already happened tonight.
The family lawyer spoke quietly.
"You're asking us to believe a secret organization uses coded identities?"
Daniel looked at him.
"I'm asking you to stay alive."
Alessandro slipped the key into his pocket.
"We'll verify everything."
Daniel lunged forward.
"No!"
Guards immediately restrained him.
"You can't keep it!"
"Why not?"
"They'll come for it."
"Who?"
Daniel closed his eyes.
"They always come."
A strange feeling settled over me.
Not fear.
Something colder.
As if invisible eyes were watching every person in the courtyard.
Emma shifted uneasily in my arms.
"Mama..."
"What is it?"
"The nice grandpa is gone."
I looked down.
"What nice grandpa?"
"The piano man."
Her eyes searched the crowd.
"He was standing right there."
She pointed toward the fountain where Daniel's SUV had crashed.
Nothing.
Only broken stone and rainwater.
A forensic officer approached Alessandro.
"Sir."
"What now?"
"We found fingerprints."
Everyone looked hopeful.
"On the suitcase?"
"No."
"The lily."
The hope disappeared almost instantly.
"Whose?"
"We don't know yet."
The technician hesitated.
"But..."
"But what?"
"There are only two sets."
"The florist's."
"And..."
He looked toward Isabella.
"Emma's."
My heart stopped.
"What?"
The technician nodded apologetically.
"The child touched the flower."
"I never..."
Then I remembered.
When the guards had rushed toward the veranda, Emma had reached out instinctively.
She had brushed the petals for only a second.
Enough.
Enough to contaminate the evidence.
I felt sick.
"I'm sorry."
Alessandro looked at me.
His expression remained calm.
"It wasn't your fault."
But I knew what everyone else was thinking.
The maid's daughter had become the center of everything.
Sophia stepped beside her grandson.
"She's being led."
Alessandro looked at her.
"Emma."
Sophia nodded.
"Someone wanted that child to speak."
I frowned.
"What do you mean?"
Sophia turned toward me.
"Children don't invent details like floral stitching."
"They repeat what they've seen."
"Or..."
She paused.
"...what someone carefully showed them."
The possibility hit me like ice water.
Someone had intentionally let Emma see the fake pregnancy cushion.
Not by accident.
On purpose.
She hadn't stumbled onto the truth.
She had been guided to it.
Alessandro looked down at Emma.
"Sweetheart."
She smiled.
"Yes?"
"Can you remember anything else about the piano man?"
Emma thought very hard.
"He was sad."
"Sad?"
"He cried."
The guests exchanged puzzled looks.
"Why?"
"He looked at Mama."
My pulse skipped.
"Me?"
Emma nodded.
"He asked if Mama was happy."
I couldn't breathe.
"When?"
"Yesterday."
Yesterday...
I had spent the entire afternoon cleaning the music room.
Alone.
Or so I thought.
Fragments of memory suddenly surfaced.
A melody.
Someone playing a piano.
Softly.
I had assumed it was one of the recordings Antonio often used while cleaning.
Had someone actually been there?
"What did he look like?"
Emma closed one eye.
"He had a beard."
"What color?"
"White."
"And?"
"He walked funny."
Daniel suddenly lifted his head.
His eyes widened.
"No..."
He whispered.
"No, no, no..."
Alessandro turned.
"What?"
Daniel stared at Emma.
"Did he have a cane?"
Emma smiled.
"Yes!"
Daniel's face drained of every trace of color.
"Oh God..."
He looked at Alessandro.
"That's him."
"Who?"
Daniel's lips trembled.
"C-17."
The courtyard erupted into whispers.
"You said you'd never seen his face."
"I haven't."
"But..."
Daniel swallowed.
"We all knew about the cane."
"C-17 always carried one."
At that exact moment...
A security officer shouted from the mansion.
"Mr. Moretti!"
Everyone turned.
The officer was running at full speed.
Out of breath.
"The surveillance room..."
"What happened?"
"Someone accessed the deleted recordings."
Alessandro's eyes sharpened.
"Recovered them?"
The officer nodded.
"Partially."
"Show me."
Within minutes, everyone crowded into the estate's surveillance center.
Rows of monitors covered one entire wall.
Technicians hurried from screen to screen.
One recording had finally been restored.
Timestamp:
3:42 PM.
The hallway outside Vanessa's bedroom appeared on the monitor.
The footage flickered.
Glitched.
Then stabilized.
There was Vanessa.
Standing outside her room.
She looked around carefully.
Then opened the door.
A man in black gloves emerged carrying a blue suitcase.
Exactly as Emma had described.
A collective gasp filled the room.
Marco Bellini slowly lowered his head.
It was him.
There was no denying it now.
The gloves.
The suitcase.
The hallway.
The time.
Vanessa looked ready to collapse.
The video continued.
Marco handed the suitcase...
Not to Michael Graves.
Not to Daniel Ross.
To an elderly man with white hair.
A beard.
And a black cane.
The man smiled politely.
Tipped his hat.
Then looked directly toward the security camera.
For one impossible second...
It felt as though he were staring straight at all of us.
Then he reached up...
And with astonishing precision...
Tapped the lens of the camera once with his cane.
The screen exploded into static.
The recovered footage ended.
Nobody moved.
Nobody spoke.
Finally...
The technician whispered the words none of us expected.
"Sir..."
Alessandro looked at him.
The technician swallowed.
"That camera..."
He pointed at the frozen timestamp.
May you like
"...has been broken for six months."
End of Chapter Seven
