Chapter 3 - THE LEDGER CARLO NEVER FINISHED
Victoria did not speak for twenty minutes.
That was unusual.
She always had an answer.
A reason.
A softer interpretation.
Now she sat in Matteo’s library under guard while the cuff link, the note, and the bear rested on a table between them.
Anthony stood near the fireplace.
Clara stayed by the door.
Matteo had told her she could leave.
She said:
“No.”
He had stopped arguing.
Anthony picked up the torn note.
“Carlo’s handwriting.”
“You’re sure?”
“I worked with him fourteen years.”
Matteo looked at him.
“Then tell me why Victoria named you.”
Anthony’s expression remained steady.
“Because she knows you’re already suspicious.”
“Of you?”
“Of everyone.”
Fair.
Victoria laughed faintly.
“Convenient.”
Anthony ignored her.
“Carlo came to me eight months before the attack.”
Matteo froze.
“About what?”
“Missing route money.”
“We lose money all the time.”
“Not like this.”
Anthony continued.
“Shipments were being redirected before inspections. Somebody had access to both your private schedules and Angela’s charity transportation network.”
“Angela’s?”
“Yes.”
Matteo looked toward the dark window.
His wife had run a charitable food-distribution foundation.
Legitimate.
Mostly.
Trucks.
Warehouses.
Volunteer routes.
Perfect cover if someone wanted to move something unseen.
“Did Angela know?”
“Eventually.”
“Why didn’t anyone tell me?”
Anthony looked ashamed.
“Because Carlo suspected somebody in your inner circle.”
Matteo laughed bitterly.
“You.”
“Yes.”
“Me?”
“No.”
“Then who?”
“He never said.”
Victoria finally spoke.
“Because he knew Anthony was the leak.”
Clara looked at her.
“You keep talking when nobody asks.”
Victoria’s eyes hardened.
Matteo almost smiled.
Anthony continued:
“Carlo wanted independent proof.”
“What did he use?”
“Angela.”
Matteo’s face changed.
“He involved my wife in an internal investigation?”
“She volunteered.”
“Don’t make that sound better.”
“It doesn’t.”
Anthony nodded.
“She had access to charity route manifests without alerting the organization.”
“What did she find?”
“A duplicate shipment.”
“Meaning?”
“One truck listed twice. Same seal number. Two locations.”
Ghost cargo.
Matteo knew the trick.
Somebody was using Angela’s foundation paperwork to conceal high-value freight.
“Where?”
“Red Hook.”
Anthony looked toward Victoria.
“Whitmore Logistics.”
Victoria’s family company.
Matteo slowly turned.
Her expression did not change.
“We handle hundreds of trucks.”
“Carlo found six duplicate seals tied to you.”
“That doesn’t mean I knew.”
“Did you?”
Silence.
Matteo stepped closer.
“Victoria.”
She looked at him.
“I knew about irregularities.”
“When?”
“Before Angela died.”
“Did you tell Carlo?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because I was trying to help.”
Anthony laughed.
She turned.
“Something funny?”
“Yes.”
He looked at Matteo.
“Carlo never trusted her.”
Victoria’s face tightened.
Matteo frowned.
“You just said he worked with her.”
“He used her.”
Anthony corrected.
“He fed her false route numbers to see where they appeared.”
Matteo stared.
“Where?”
“Gallo’s trucks.”
There.
Frank Gallo.
Again.
“So Victoria was leaking?”
Anthony said:
“Carlo believed someone in her company was.”
Victoria snapped:
“Not me.”
Clara looked at Matteo.
He saw the question.
Do not assume.
Good.
He said:
“Proof?”
Anthony nodded.
“Carlo kept a ledger.”
“The one Angela saw.”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
“We never found it.”
Clara glanced toward the bear.
Then the cuff link.
“Maybe that’s what this is for.”
Matteo looked at her.
“What?”
“The cuff link.”
She picked it up carefully.
“The back is thicker.”
Anthony examined it.
Tiny seam.
He used a pocketknife.
The black enamel face lifted.
Inside—
A small key.
Matteo stared.
Carlo had hidden a key inside the cuff link.
Ben had unknowingly carried it inside Angela’s bear for seven months.
Anthony recognized the shape.
“Deposit box.”
“Bank?”
“No.”
He shook his head.
“Private storage.”
“Where?”
“Carlo rented rooms above an old boxing gym in Bensonhurst.”
Matteo knew it.
His brother trained there as a teenager.
The owner had died years earlier.
Building now mostly unused.
Victoria spoke sharply.
“You’re walking into exactly what Gallo wants.”
Matteo looked at her.
“Why?”
“Because if Carlo left evidence, Gallo has been searching for it too.”
“How do you know?”
Her silence betrayed her.
Matteo crouched in front of her chair.
“How much contact have you had with Frank Gallo?”
She looked away.
“Enough.”
“How much?”
“He called after the attack.”
“When?”
“Same night.”
“What did he say?”
“That Carlo betrayed the family.”
“Which family?”
Victoria hesitated.
Matteo saw.
Not DeLuca.
“Yours.”
She nodded.
Whitmore.
Matteo’s engagement to Victoria had supposedly been romantic.
But her family operated warehouses and trucking lines across New York and Connecticut.
Not Mafia.
Respectable enough.
Useful enough.
“He told your father Carlo was exposing Whitmore routes.”
“Yes.”
“Your father believed him?”
“Yes.”
“Did you?”
“At first.”
Matteo stared.
“And then you met Carlo three days later.”
“Yes.”
“What did he tell you?”
“That Gallo staged the attack.”
“On himself too?”
“Carlo said the original plan was to kill Angela and make him look dead.”
Matteo’s chest tightened.
“Why fake Carlo’s death?”
“Because Gallo wanted Carlo blamed privately while the city believed both died.”
Matteo frowned.
“That makes no sense.”
“It does if Carlo was investigating him.”
Anthony understood first.
“Dead men can’t accuse anyone.”
“And if Carlo secretly survived,” Clara said, “Gallo could keep him somewhere.”
Victoria looked at her sharply.
Interesting.
Matteo noticed.
“Did you know where Carlo went afterward?”
“No.”
“Did you help him?”
“For one night.”
“How?”
“I brought medication.”
“Where?”
“An apartment in Bay Ridge.”
“Then?”
“He left before morning.”
“Message?”
“He said if I cared about Matteo, I should stay away from the Bellini—”
She stopped.
Wrong name.
Everyone noticed.
Matteo’s eyes narrowed.
“From the what?”
Victoria went pale.
Clara frowned.
Anthony’s face changed.
“Say it.”
Victoria whispered:
“Bellomo.”
Matteo froze.
Bellomo family.
Not Gallo’s old faction.
A Staten Island crew that had been at peace with the DeLucas for six years.
“What do the Bellomos have to do with this?”
Victoria looked down.
“Carlo thought Gallo was selling routes to them.”
Anthony shook his head.
“No.”
Victoria looked up.
“No?”
“Carlo thought someone was making it look like the Bellomos.”
Matteo stared.
“Who?”
Anthony answered:
“Gallo.”
A false war.
Classic.
Redirect shipments.
Frame rivals.
Trigger retaliation.
Take control during chaos.
Matteo felt sick.
He had nearly ordered two attacks after Angela died.
Only Anthony talked him out of them.
Trust Anthony.
Carlo’s note suddenly carried more weight.
They left for Bensonhurst at 4:18 a.m.
Clara remained at the estate with Ben.
This time Matteo asked.
“Will you stay with him?”
“Yes.”
No command.
Better.
At the old boxing gym, Anthony opened the upstairs office.
Dust.
Old posters.
One row of metal lockers.
Carlo’s key fit number fourteen.
Inside:
Ledger.
Burner phone.
Photographs.
A red-stone ring.
Frank Gallo’s.
Matteo stared.
“Why would Carlo have it?”
Anthony opened the ledger.
Names.
Dates.
Truck numbers.
Payments.
Some marked W.
Some G.
Some—
V.H.
Victoria Hale.
Matteo’s stomach dropped.
Payment after payment.
Large amounts.
Not from Gallo to Victoria.
From Victoria to Gallo.
Anthony looked at Matteo.
“She paid him.”
“For what?”
“Maybe routes.”
“Maybe protection.”
“Maybe something else.”
Matteo kept reading.
One line:
A.D. — REMOVE BEFORE WEDDING.
His chest tightened.
A.D.
Angela DeLuca.
Dated nine days before her death.
Clara had been right.
Victoria was not simply hiding Ben’s bear because she resented a dead wife.
She had been protecting something.
Then Anthony found one final page.
Carlo’s handwriting.
IF ANYTHING HAPPENS TO ME, MATTEO MUST KNOW THIS:
VICTORIA ISN’T WORKING FOR GALLO.
SHE’S PAYING HIM.
THE QUESTION IS WHY.
Matteo stared.
Not mastermind.
Not innocent.
Complicated.
Again.
The burner phone suddenly rang.
Everyone froze.
Unknown number.
Anthony answered on speaker.
No one spoke.
Then a man’s voice.
Weak.
Older than Matteo remembered.
“Anthony?”
Matteo’s heart stopped.
Carlo.
Anthony’s face drained.
“Carlo?”
A breath.
Then:
“You found the box.”
Matteo grabbed the phone.
“CARLO.”
Silence.
“Carlo, it’s me.”
His brother made a sound that might have been a laugh.
“Matteo.”
Matteo sat down because his legs stopped cooperating.
“You’re alive.”
“Technically.”
“Where are you?”
“No.”
“What?”
“You can’t come.”
“You’ve been dead seven months.”
“I know.”
“My son saw you.”
Silence.
Carlo’s voice changed.
“Ben is talking?”
“Yes.”
A long breath.
“Thank God.”
Matteo’s eyes burned.
“Where are you?”
Carlo ignored him.
“Is Victoria still in the house?”
“Yes.”
“Do not let Gallo know you have her.”
Matteo frowned.
“Why?”
“Because she isn’t his partner.”
“What is she?”
Carlo coughed.
“His daughter.”
Nobody moved.
Matteo stared.
Victoria Hale.
Frank Gallo’s daughter.
Carlo continued:
“And she’s been trying to get away from him for fifteen years.”
Matteo looked at the ledger.
Payments.
Not partnership.
Maybe blackmail.
Then Carlo whispered:
“Matteo, listen carefully.”
He coughed again.
“Angela wasn’t supposed to die.”
Matteo’s face hardened.
“What?”
“She was supposed to disappear.”
“Why?”
“Because she asked me to help her fake her death.”
The world stopped.
Matteo could not breathe.
“What did you say?”
May you like
Carlo’s voice cracked.
“Your wife was planning to leave you.”
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