Chapter 6 - Carmine’s SecretIvy stared at him.
“You knew my father?”
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Because your father asked me not to.”
“My father knew you?”
“We worked together.”
The world seemed to tilt.
Carmine continued.
“Your father was not a criminal.”
“Then why work for you?”
“He was an accountant.”
Ivy blinked.
“An accountant?”
“He discovered financial records showing someone inside my organization was moving money through shell companies.”
“Rocco?”
“No.”
“Gideon?”
Carmine hesitated.
“No.”
“Then who?”
“That’s the question I never solved.”
They returned to the estate.
The entire security team had been doubled.
Carmine locked the library.
Then opened a hidden compartment behind a bookshelf.
Inside was an old metal box.
He placed it on the desk.
“This belonged to your father.”
Ivy stared at it.
“What’s inside?”
“The reason he died.”
She opened it.
Inside was a ledger.
Pages of names.
Dates.
Payments.
One name appeared repeatedly.
Lucia DeLuca.
Carmine’s mother.
Ivy looked up.
“Your mother?”
“Yes.”
“She was involved?”
“My mother was supposed to be dead.”
Ivy went pale.
“Supposed to be?”
“She disappeared seventeen years ago.”
Carmine turned a page.
His voice became quieter.
“The official story was that she was murdered.”
“Wasn’t she?”
“No body was ever found.”
Ivy looked back at the ledger.
At the bottom of the last page was a message written in her father’s handwriting.
If Lucia returns, do not trust her.
Ivy looked at Carmine.
“What does this mean?”
Before he could answer, the doors slammed.
Someone shouted from the hallway.
“Boss!”
Carmine grabbed his gun.
“What?”
“There’s been another breach.”
“Where?”
“Your private vault.”
Carmine’s expression hardened.
Nobody could enter that vault.
Nobody except him.
And Gideon.
They rushed downstairs.
The vault door stood open.
Inside, nothing appeared stolen.
Carmine checked the shelves.
Then froze.
“What?”
He pointed.
A single item was missing.
A small black book.
Ivy recognized it.
“What is that?”
Carmine’s voice was barely audible.
“The death ledger.”
“What does it contain?”
“The names of every man who has ever betrayed me.”
Ivy looked at the empty shelf.
“And now someone has it.”
Carmine turned toward her.
“No.”
He looked at the security cameras.
“Worse.”
The cameras had been disabled for exactly eleven minutes.
“Someone wanted me to believe the book was stolen.”
Ivy stared.
“Why?”
Carmine’s eyes darkened.
“Because they wanted me to search for a traitor.”
He took her hand.
“And they already knew where I would look.”
“Where?”
He pointed toward the CCTV monitor.
At the screen was a frozen image.
Ivy.
Walking into the vault corridor.
Ivy’s blood ran cold.
The timestamp was from two hours earlier.
She had never been there.
Someone had used her face.
Someone had access to her identity.
May you like
And then Carmine said the words that made her stomach drop.
“They’re framing you.”
