Chapter 4 - THE ROSARY IN THE GLOVEBOX
The silence in the vault was suffocating.
I stared at the dead phone in my hand.
“A sister,” Marco whispered, his deep voice cracking. He looked at Isabella. “I have a sister?”
Isabella’s face was pale, but her eyes blazed with a terrifying clarity.
“Vittorio always said he wanted a daughter,” Isabella murmured, gripping her cane. “If Anthony finds her before we do, he will use her as leverage to force you to sign away your birthright, Marco. Or worse, he’ll eliminate her to secure his claim permanently.”
“He’s not going to touch her,” Marco said. The quiet driver was gone. In his place stood a man realizing his true bloodline.
“We have to get to Montana,” I said, my mind racing. “But Anthony grounded the private jets when he locked down the estate. And his men watch the commercial airports.”
Marco closed the briefcase and locked it, tucking it under his arm.
“We drive,” Marco said firmly. “I know safe routes. I can get us out of Illinois before Anthony’s men realize we didn't go back to the city.”
We hurried out of the library and back into the pouring rain.
As we climbed into the armored SUV, Marco reached into the glovebox and pulled something out.
He handed it to me.
It was a heavy, silver rosary.
“Your mother gave this to me on my eighteenth birthday,” Marco said quietly, starting the engine. “She told me it belonged to a man who loved me very much, but couldn't be there to tell me. She told me to keep it close.”
I ran my fingers over the silver beads.
“I remember this,” Isabella said from the backseat, touching the silver cross. “Vittorio carried it every day. But look closely, Elena. The cross is unusually thick.”
I examined the crucifix. She was right. There was a tiny seam along the side.
I pressed my thumbnail into the groove and pushed.
The back of the cross slid open.
Inside the hollowed-out silver was a tiny, tightly rolled piece of parchment paper.
I carefully extracted it and unrolled it under the SUV’s dome light.
It wasn't a prayer. It was a list of names and bank account numbers.
“What is it?” Marco asked, keeping his eyes on the dark road.
“It’s a ledger,” I breathed, scanning the numbers. “These are offshore accounts. Millions of dollars.”
Isabella leaned forward. “Those are the syndicate’s emergency reserves. Only the head of the family is supposed to know they exist. If Anthony doesn't have these numbers, he can't access the true wealth of the family.”
My mother hadn't just hidden the true heirs. She had hidden the family’s entire fortune, ensuring that only the rightful children could claim it.
“That’s why Anthony married me,” I realized, the betrayal hitting me like a physical blow. “He didn't love me. He knew my mother was the bookkeeper. He thought if he kept me close, he would eventually find the money.”
And when he couldn't find it with me, he brought Vanessa in to tear my life apart looking for it.
Suddenly, the SUV jolted violently.
A massive black truck had swerved out of a side street, slamming into our rear bumper.
“Hold on!” Marco roared.
He slammed his foot on the gas. The armored SUV surged forward, the heavy engine roaring.
I looked out the rearview mirror. Two more black trucks were tailing us, their high beams blinding in the rain.
Anthony’s men had found us.
“He’s tracking the car!” Isabella shouted over the noise.
“No, I swept this vehicle this morning,” Marco said, gripping the steering wheel as we took a sharp turn, tires screeching on the wet pavement.
“Then how did they find us so fast?” I yelled, bracing my hands against the dashboard.
Marco glanced at the rearview mirror. His eyes narrowed.
“They aren't tracking the car, Elena,” Marco said grimly. “They’re tracking you.”
I froze.
I looked down at my hands. Then at my clothes.
My eyes landed on my wrist.
The gold bracelet. The one Vanessa had worn at dinner. The one she had happily handed back to me before I left the dining room.
I frantically unclasped the bracelet. I turned it over, looking past my mother’s engraved initials.
Stuck inside the hollow link near the clasp was a tiny, blinking red dot.
A GPS micro-tracker.
Vanessa didn't just want to humiliate me by wearing it. She wanted to ensure they knew exactly where I went when I panicked.
“Roll down the window!” Marco ordered.
I pressed the button, the freezing rain whipping into my face.
I threw my mother’s gold bracelet as far as I could into the dark woods alongside the highway.
Marco killed the headlights and took a sudden, violent swerve onto a hidden dirt logging road. The armored SUV bumped aggressively over the uneven terrain before plunging into the thick cover of the forest.
Through the trees, we watched the three black trucks speed past on the main highway, chasing the signal of the discarded bracelet.
We sat in the dark, breathing heavily.
I had just thrown away the only thing I had left of my mother.
But as I sat there in the dark, I looked down at the piece of parchment in my hand.
I flipped it over.
There was something written on the back in red ink.
“Marco,” I whispered, turning on my phone flashlight to illuminate the paper.
“What is it, Elena?”
“There’s a message on the back of the account list.”
May you like
I read the words aloud, my voice shaking.
“The girl in Montana is not Vittorio’s daughter. She is Vanessa’s.”
