Chapter 9 - THE BLOODLINE AND THE BADGE
Luca wasn’t bleeding. He wasn’t battered.
He was wearing a perfectly clean tactical vest over his dress shirt. Beside him stood Captain Miller, holding a megaphone.
“Drop the weapon, Thorne!” Miller’s voice boomed through the concourse. “FBI! You are completely surrounded!”
Marcus staggered backward, looking wildly at the video feed on his man’s phone. The video of Luca kneeling in the dirt was looping. It was a pre-recorded fake.
“How?” Marcus choked out, pointing his gun at Luca, then back at Ruth.
Luca walked slowly down the escalator, his eyes locked on Marcus. The FBI agents descended with him, their assault rifles raised.
“You think Paulie is the only one who knows how to make a deal?” Luca asked, his voice cold as ice. “When Paulie set the fire, he thought he had me trapped. But I offered him ten million dollars and a safe flight to Europe to betray you instead. He recorded that video, sent it to your men, and then opened the back gates for Captain Miller’s tactical team.”
Marcus looked at his two men. They instantly dropped their weapons and put their hands in the air.
Marcus was completely alone.
“You have nothing on me,” Marcus spat, gripping the aged documents. “These are property deeds. Taking them isn’t a crime.”
“Taking them isn’t,” Captain Miller said, stepping forward. “But the audio recording of you confessing to ordering the murder of Elena Moretti in 1997 is.”
Marcus froze. “What recording?”
I looked at Ruth. She was smiling.
She reached into her cardigan pocket and pulled out my cell phone. The call with Marcus from the SUV hadn’t just been on speakerphone. Ruth had hit the record button.
“I want the shipyard deed... Once I destroy it, Luca’s birthright is gone... Come alone with the old woman. Or I kill the son she sacrificed everything for.”
The recording played loudly from the phone’s speaker, echoing off the tile walls.
Marcus’s face went entirely pale. The arrogant titan of Chicago real estate finally realized he had lost.
“Drop the gun, Marcus,” Luca ordered.
For a second, I thought Marcus was going to shoot Ruth anyway. His finger twitched on the trigger. But looking at the dozen laser sights suddenly painted on his chest, he slowly lowered the weapon and let it clatter to the floor.
FBI agents swarmed him, slamming him against the lockers and slapping handcuffs on his wrists.
Luca ignored him. He sprinted past the agents and threw his arms around Ruth, burying his face in her shoulder.
“You brilliant, stubborn old woman,” Luca breathed, his voice cracking with emotion. “You planned this. You sent me a text on Claire’s phone while I was in the fire.”
Ruth patted his back, tears streaming down her face. “I had to make him think he had won, sweetheart. It was the only way to get him in one place with a confession.”
“Are you okay?” Luca asked, pulling back to examine her face.
“I’m fine,” she smiled, though she looked utterly exhausted. “But I think I’d like to go home now.”
Luca turned to Captain Miller. “The fire at my estate?”
“Contained,” Miller nodded. “The guest wing is gutted, but the main structure is standing. We also picked up Arthur Bellini and his daughter Vanessa attempting to board a private jet at O'Hare. They’re being held as accessories to extortion.”
Luca’s jaw tightened at Vanessa’s name, but he simply nodded. The engagement was dead, and so was the Bellini family’s reign.
“Take them away,” Miller ordered his men.
As they dragged Marcus Thorne past us, Marcus glared at Luca. “You think you’re a king now, Moretti? You’re nothing but an orphan raised by a kitchen maid.”
Luca didn’t flinch. He put his arm proudly around Ruth’s frail shoulders.
“She’s not a maid,” Luca said, his voice ringing with absolute authority. “She is Ruth Moretti. The Matriarch of this family. And you are going to die in a federal prison.”
Marcus was hauled up the escalators, his curses fading into the distance.
Luca turned to me. The heavy, dark weight that had always lingered in his eyes seemed to have lifted. For the first time since I met him, he looked truly at peace.
“Claire,” Luca said softly. “You drove headfirst into an armed ambush to protect her. You didn’t run when you had the chance.”
“She’s family,” I said, shrugging weakly, my knees finally shaking from the adrenaline crash.
Luca reached out and gently squeezed my shoulder. “Yes, she is. And so are you, if you want to be.”
Captain Miller approached, holding the brown leather satchel. “Mr. Moretti, we need to log these deeds into evidence temporarily, but they legally belong to you. However... there was something else in the locker.”
Miller handed Luca a small, sealed white envelope.
It was addressed in beautiful, looping handwriting.
To the woman who saved my boy.
Luca stared at it. “This is my mother’s handwriting. But... she died before Ruth found me.”
Ruth looked at the envelope, her eyes widening. “She didn’t write that for me. She wrote it for whoever found you.”
“Open it,” I whispered.
Luca broke the wax seal. He pulled out a single piece of heavy parchment paper. He read the first few lines, and his breath hitched. He looked up at Ruth, his expression a mix of awe and complete shock.
“Mom,” Luca whispered. “Did you know about this?”
Ruth frowned, looking confused. “Know about what, sweetheart?”
Luca turned the letter around so we could see the bottom of the page.
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“My mother didn’t just leave the shipyard deeds in here,” Luca said, his voice trembling. “She left a birth certificate.”
TITLE: THE SISTER IN THE SHADOWS
