Chapter 6 - The Guests Arrive Before DinnerDante drew his pistol.
Victor didn't flinch.
“Really?” he asked. “We're going to do this in front of a child?”
“You brought an armed traitor into a locked estate,” Dante replied. “You lost the right to discuss manners.”
Rourke smiled faintly.
“Careful, Dante. You still don't know who the traitor is.”
Victor glanced at Sophie.
“Hello, sweetheart.”
She immediately hid behind me.
Bruno positioned himself between her and the doorway, his lips lifting over his teeth.
Victor looked at the dog.
“Still keeping that animal around? I thought he was supposed to be trained.”
“He is,” Dante said. “That's why he knows you shouldn't come closer.”
The two men stared at each other.
I tightened my grip on Sophie's hand.
“Why are you here?” I asked Victor.
He studied me with a peculiar gentleness.
“Because your husband stole something from my family.”
“My husband stole nothing.”
“That's what he told you, I suppose.”
“He told me nothing. He's been dead for three years.”
Victor's expression softened.
“Then I am afraid you have been the victim of several unfortunate misunderstandings.”
Dante moved his gun toward Victor's chest.
“Enough.”
Victor sighed.
“Very well. I'll be direct. Isabel, that pendant belonged to a confidential informant who betrayed our organization. Miguel took it during his final meeting with us. Inside it is information that could destroy decades of business relationships.”
“Then why did you wait three years to retrieve it?”
“Because we didn't know where he'd hidden it.”
His gaze drifted toward Sophie.
“Until now.”
I covered the pendant with my hand.
“You'll never touch her.”
Victor's expression cooled.
“I have no intention of harming a child.”
“Then leave.”
“I can't do that.”
He nodded toward Rourke.
The security chief raised his weapon.
Dante fired first.
The shot struck the wall beside Rourke's head. Rourke ducked, and the study dissolved into confusion. Teresa pulled Sophie down behind the desk while Bruno lunged forward with a ferocious roar.
Victor disappeared through the doorway.
Rourke retreated after him.
Dante shouted to his guards, but the men who had accompanied us were nowhere to be seen.
When the gunfire stopped, the silence felt unnatural.
Dante checked Teresa and Sophie for injuries, then turned to me.
“Are you all right?”
“No.”
“Fair enough.”
I stared at the empty doorway.
“You knew Victor was involved.”
“I suspected.”
“And you still brought us here?”
“I thought he was watching the estate. I didn't know he had found this location.”
I laughed bitterly.
“Does anyone in your world ever know anything?”
“Not until someone tries to kill them.”
A faint whimper interrupted us.
Sophie was looking down at Bruno.
The dog's left foreleg had been cut by a broken piece of wood. Blood stained his black fur.
She began crying.
“Please make him better.”
Dante knelt beside the dog and examined the wound.
“It isn't deep.”
“You promise?”
“I promise he'll receive better medical attention than most members of my staff.”
Sophie managed a tiny smile.
It vanished when we discovered a second message on the desk.
The handwriting matched the note found beneath our sofa.
BRING THE STAR TO THE MORETTI DINNER AT NINE. COME WITHOUT THE DOG.
Beneath the message was a photograph of our cottage.
A man stood outside Sophie's window.
His face was turned toward the camera.
I recognized him.
The silver-haired man from the old workshop photograph.
Elias Mercer.
Except that I had just seen him in another picture, taken three years earlier, standing beside Miguel outside the Brooklyn bakery.
And beneath the photograph was a sentence that made my blood run cold.
ASK TERESA WHY SHE PAID HIM TO DISAPPEAR.
I turned toward Dante's mother.
She looked as though someone had struck her.
“Tell me the truth,” I demanded.
Teresa's lips parted.
Then she sank into a chair.
“I paid Elias to disappear because I believed he had helped kill your husband.”
I heard Sophie sniffle behind me.
Teresa raised her eyes.
“But three weeks ago, he came back.”
May you like
She swallowed.
“And he told me your husband was alive.”
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