Chapter 6 - THE SCARRED MAN'S CONFESSION
“What are you talking about?” Dante whispered, his eyes darting from the child’s drawing in my hand to the scarred man standing in the warehouse doorway.
“This drawing,” I said, my voice trembling as I held it up. “Your mother hid it with her letter. A child drew this.”
Dante stared at the crude crayon lines. The jagged red scar on the paper matched the jagged white scar on the man’s face perfectly.
“I drew that,” Dante breathed, his memory suddenly unlocking. “I was seven. I saw a man in my mother’s bedroom, yelling at her. He hit her. I hid in the closet and drew his face so I wouldn't forget him.”
“Dante,” I whispered, panic tightening my chest. “Arthur Mercer didn't kill your mother. He did.”
The scarred man laughed, the sound echoing harshly across the empty railyard.
“Very good, little Avery,” the man shouted, flicking his lighter open and closed. A small flame danced in the dark. “Isabella was a smart woman, but she underestimated how loyal I was to Vincenzo Valenti.”
Dante stepped in front of me, his gun aimed dead center at the man’s chest. “You worked for my father.”
“I was his best cleaner, kid,” the scarred man sneered. “Arthur Mercer was just a stupid banker who thought he could steal Vincenzo’s wife and his money. When Vincenzo found out from prison, he paid me to handle it. Mercer didn't order the hit-and-run. I drove the car.”
The revelation hit Dante like a physical blow. His father really had ordered his mother’s murder. And the man who carried it out was standing twenty feet away, holding my sister’s life in his hands.
“Then why are you working for Mercer now?” Dante demanded, his voice dangerously low.
“Because Vincenzo is dead, and Mercer pays well,” the scarred man shrugged. “Mercer spent fifteen years trying to find the recipe book to get the offshore money. When Lillian got engaged to you, he thought he finally had his way in. But the old cook ruined everything today.”
The man waved his gun toward the dark interior of the warehouse.
“Now, stop stalling. Send the maid with the key, or I drop the lighter and the kid cooks.”
“No,” Dante said, his voice turning into ice.
He lowered his gun.
He reached into his pocket, pulled out the gold pocket watch, and held it up by its chain. The gold glinted in the moonlight.
“You want the key?” Dante shouted. “Here it is.”
The scarred man’s eyes widened with greed.
“Bring it here, Valenti. Nice and slow.”
“No,” Dante said again. “I’m not a delivery boy.”
Before anyone could react, Dante threw his arm back and hurled the heavy gold watch as far as he could into the overgrown weeds surrounding the railyard.
The watch disappeared into the dark with a faint thud.
“You son of a bitch!” the scarred man screamed, taking a step away from the door to look into the weeds.
It was a fatal mistake.
He looked away for one second.
BANG.
Dante fired. The bullet hit the scarred man directly in the shoulder. The man screamed, dropping the lighter and the gun, falling backward onto the dirt outside the warehouse.
“Go!” Dante yelled, shoving me forward while Marco and his men rushed the downed man.
I sprinted past the bleeding man and into the dark, fume-filled warehouse. The smell of gasoline was overwhelming.
“Mia!” I screamed, my voice echoing in the massive space.
“Avery! I’m here!”
I followed the crying voice to the center of the room. My little sister was tied to a heavy wooden chair, a rag stuffed loosely in her mouth, her eyes wide with terror. Gasoline soaked the dirt floor in a wide circle around her.
I fell to my knees, pulling the pocket knife I used to open boxes at the estate from my apron. I slashed through the ropes tying her wrists and ankles.
“I’ve got you, baby. I’ve got you,” I sobbed, pulling her into a fierce hug.
Mia buried her face in my shoulder, shaking violently. “Avery, they said mom stole something. They said we were going to die.”
“They lied,” I promised, kissing her forehead. “You’re safe now. Come on.”
I helped her stand, and we hurried out of the warehouse.
Outside, Dante’s men had the scarred man pinned to the ground. Marco was tying a tourniquet around his bleeding shoulder.
Dante was standing near his SUV. When he saw me emerge with Mia, his rigid posture collapsed slightly. He walked over, stripping off his suit jacket and wrapping it gently around Mia’s trembling shoulders.
“You’re safe now, Mia,” Dante said softly. “No one will ever hurt you again.”
Mia looked up at the towering, intimidating man, then at me. “Who is he?”
“He’s a friend,” I said, looking at Dante. And for the first time, I truly meant it.
“Take her to my estate,” Dante ordered Marco. “Put her in the guest wing with Rosa. Double the guard. No one gets in or out.”
“What about him?” Marco asked, nodding to the scarred man on the ground.
“Put him in the cellar with the driver,” Dante said coldly. “I’ll deal with him later.”
As Marco led Mia to a secure car, Dante turned to me.
“We need to find the watch in the weeds,” he said.
I nodded, grabbing a flashlight from the SUV. We walked into the tall grass where Dante had thrown the pocket watch.
It took ten minutes of searching, but my flashlight beam finally caught the glint of gold.
I bent down and picked it up. But the impact of hitting a rock had jarred the heavy casing open.
“Dante,” I said, shining the light on the exposed inner face of the watch.
He stepped closer, looking over my shoulder.
Inside the watch, behind the glass face, wasn't a key.
It was a delicate, tightly coiled pearl bracelet.
Dante stared at it, the color leaving his face for the second time that night.
“That’s impossible,” he whispered.
“What is it?” I asked, carefully pulling the pearls out.
“That bracelet,” Dante said, his voice breaking. “My mother was wearing it the night she died. She never took it off.”
He looked at me, a new, horrifying mystery dawning in his eyes.
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“Avery… if the scarred man killed my mother, and Arthur Mercer ordered it… why was my mother’s bracelet hidden inside your mother’s coat?”
TITLE: The Blood on the Pearls
