Chapter 12 - The Ledger in the StarSophie had never been taught how to open a coded ledger.
She had, however, spent five years watching her father fix broken things.
Miguel used to turn ordinary objects into puzzles. He hid sweets inside hollow books, coins beneath loose floorboards, and tiny paper stars inside the pockets of his work clothes. Sophie learned early that when Daddy said something was broken, it usually meant he was about to discover something interesting.
The silver pendant had a tiny seam along one point of the star.
Miguel had designed it that way.
The key inside was no bigger than a grain of rice, a small encrypted storage device containing a digital map of the original financial records. The records themselves were hidden inside the Moretti estate's old accounting archive, protected by a separate code.
But the device also held a backup list of payments.
Names.
Dates.
Signatures.
Including payments made on the night Miguel supposedly died.
Elias had helped Sophie connect the pendant to a small reader hidden in the sixth tunnel chamber. He didn't understand every number on the screen, but he understood the name appearing again and again.
Dominic Rourke.
And beneath it, a transfer authorized by Victor Salazar.
The camera in the stone room recorded everything.
So did the camera in the hidden archive.
Dante watched the footage from the ballroom's control station as Sophie pressed a button on the reader.
A document appeared.
Then another.
Then a list of payments routed through companies registered under stolen identities.
Miguel's name appeared near the top.
Beside it was a handwritten instruction, scanned from an original page.
INTERCEPT. RECOVER RECORDS. NO SURVIVORS.
Dante stared at the screen.
“That order carries my authorization code.”
Miguel's voice came through the speaker.
“Victor forged it using a message from you. He copied the wording from an earlier security order.”
“I never approved a kill order.”
“I know.”
Dante turned toward him.
“How?”
“Because I heard you trying to cancel it.”
Silence settled between them.
Miguel continued.
“I was already at the bakery when the men arrived. I escaped through the rear door. Another man was caught in the blast. Victor used his body to close the case.”
Dante looked physically ill.
For three years, he'd believed a trusted employee had betrayed him.
For three years, I'd believed my husband had died.
Victor had built an entire empire of lies upon that single night.
The ballroom doors suddenly opened.
Rourke stumbled inside, dragging Teresa by the arm.
A pistol rested against her neck.
Behind him stood two armed men.
“Shut down the archive,” Rourke ordered.
Nobody moved.
“I said shut it down!”
Dante raised his weapon.
“You're surrounded.”
Rourke laughed.
“By whose men? Yours? Half of them work for Victor.”
“Not anymore.”
Dante pointed toward the ballroom balcony.
His remaining loyal guards appeared above us, weapons raised.
Rourke glanced upward.
His grip tightened around Teresa.
“Then perhaps we'll negotiate.”
Victor stepped forward.
“Release her.”
Rourke looked at him.
“You're giving me orders now?”
“I said release her!”
The two men stared at each other.
And suddenly I understood.
They hadn't been partners in the way everyone assumed.
Victor had planned to abandon Rourke once the records were recovered. Rourke had planned to use the ledger to bargain for his own freedom.
They had spent years betraying each other while pretending to share a purpose.
Teresa stamped on Rourke's foot.
He cursed and loosened his grip.
She twisted free.
One of Dante's guards pulled her behind the marble pillar.
Rourke fired twice and ran through the eastern doors.
Victor remained frozen, watching the screen as Sophie pressed another button.
A final document opened.
At the bottom was a payment authorized three weeks before Miguel's death.
The recipient wasn't Rourke.
It wasn't Victor.
It was Teresa Moretti.
I turned toward her.
She looked at the screen.
Then she looked at me.
May you like
And she whispered the words I had been dreading.
“Isabel, I can explain.”
