Chapter 3 - THE VAULT
I stared at the tiny photograph of David inside the silver watch.
My chest tightened. The air in the sitting room felt suddenly too thick to breathe.
David was smiling. He was wearing the gray sweater I bought him for our second anniversary.
“Why is my husband inside your father’s watch?” I whispered.
Luca snapped the watch shut. The metallic click echoed like a gunshot.
“That is exactly what we are going to find out,” Luca said.
He didn’t sit back down. His energy had shifted from quiet concern to absolute, lethal focus.
“Where is Toby right now?”
“At my apartment. With my neighbor, Mrs. Gable. She watches him when I work late.”
Luca pulled out his cell phone. He dialed a number without looking at the keypad.
“Thomas,” Luca said. “Send two men to Rachel’s apartment. Give them the address.” He looked at me. I recited the address numbly. Luca repeated it into the phone. “Bring the boy and the neighbor here. Now. Treat them like family.”
He hung up before Thomas could answer.
“They’re bringing Toby here?” I asked, panic rising again. “To this house? With Patrick upstairs?”
“Patrick won’t be a problem for much longer,” Luca said flatly.
He walked to the mahogany side table, opened a drawer, and pulled out a heavy, black Sig Sauer handgun.
He racked the slide.
I shrank back into the sofa.
“Mr. Moretti—”
“Luca,” he corrected, slipping the gun into the waistband at the small of his back. He pulled his suit jacket down to cover it. “Patrick has my master card. He thinks he has until midnight to access the east wing vault.”
“What’s in the vault?”
“The original blueprints to every port warehouse my family owns. Including the security blind spots.”
Luca walked to the door. “Can you walk?”
“I don’t know.”
“Try.”
I stood up. The ice had numbed my ankle slightly. I put my weight on it. It burned, but my knee didn’t buckle.
“I can manage,” I said.
“Good. Stay behind me.”
We left the sitting room. The hallways were entirely empty. It was too quiet. The usual hum of the estate staff cleaning up after dinner was missing.
“Where is everybody?” I whispered.
“I put the staff on lockdown,” Luca said. “Nobody leaves their quarters.”
We moved toward the east wing. The lighting here was dimmer, the art on the walls older and heavier.
“Luca,” I said softly, struggling to keep up with his long strides. “Patrick called me the ‘architect’s widow.’ He said I didn’t know anything.”
“David designed the security system for the east wing,” Luca said without stopping. “Ten years ago. Long before you met him.”
I stopped walking.
Luca turned to look at me.
“David was a residential architect,” I said, my voice shaking. “He built houses. Kitchens. Sunrooms. He didn’t work for the mafia.”
Luca’s expression softened, just a fraction.
“He didn’t work for the mafia, Rachel. He worked for my father. As a favor.”
“What kind of favor?”
“The kind you owe someone who saves your life.”
Before I could ask what that meant, a sharp beep echoed from the end of the corridor.
It was the electronic keypad at the heavy steel door of the vault room.
Luca held up a hand. We pressed ourselves against the wall.
Down the hall, a figure was standing in front of the keypad.
It was Patrick.
He was holding Luca’s black master card. He swiped it.
The light on the keypad turned green. The heavy deadbolts clicked open with a loud thud.
Patrick pushed the door and stepped inside.
Luca didn’t hesitate. He moved fast, silent on the marble, closing the distance. I followed, terrified to be left alone in the dark hallway.
When we reached the door, it was cracked open.
Luca pushed it wide.
The vault room was lined with steel lockboxes. In the center was a massive oak table covered in rolled-up blueprints.
Patrick was standing at the table, frantically unrolling a large set of papers.
“Looking for something?” Luca asked.
Patrick spun around. His face went dead pale.
He looked at Luca, then at me. His eyes darted to my ankle, then back to Luca’s face.
“Luca,” Patrick said, his voice remarkably steady for a man caught in the act. “I was just securing the documents. There’s been a breach in the system.”
“The only breach is standing in front of me,” Luca said.
Patrick forced a smile. “Be reasonable. You know I handle the security audits.”
Luca took a step forward. “You zip-tied my maid to an elevator rail. You stole her locker key. You took my master access card. And you left my dead father’s watch in her locker with a threat against her child.”
Patrick’s smile vanished completely.
But he didn’t look scared anymore. He looked tired.
“I didn’t put the watch in her locker, Luca.”
Luca stopped. “Don’t lie to me.”
“I took her key,” Patrick admitted, his voice dropping. “I took your master card. But I didn’t leave the watch. I don’t even have access to the basement lockers.”
I stepped forward. “You’re lying. I saw you looking at me.”
“I was looking at your shoe because I knew you were hiding the card!” Patrick snapped.
He turned back to Luca.
“I swear to God, Luca. I was trying to get the blueprints out of here before he got them.”
“Before who got them?” Luca demanded.
Patrick opened his mouth to speak.
Suddenly, the lights in the vault room shut off.
Pitch black.
I gasped.
A split second later, a loud, suppressed CRACK echoed in the small room.
I screamed and dropped to the floor.
Something heavy hit the ground near the oak table.
“Rachel, stay down!” Luca yelled in the darkness.
The heavy steel door of the vault slammed shut. The deadbolts locked automatically.
We were trapped inside.
Luca pulled out a flashlight from his jacket and clicked it on.
The beam cut through the dark.
It swept across the oak table.
Then it moved to the floor.
Patrick Sloan was lying on his back. A dark pool of blood was spreading across his white dress shirt from a single wound in his chest.
He was dead.
I covered my mouth to muffle my sob.
Luca knelt beside the body. He wasn’t looking at Patrick’s face.
He was looking at Patrick’s right hand.
Patrick’s dead fingers were clutching a piece of paper.
Luca gently pried it loose and unfolded it under the flashlight beam.
It wasn’t a blueprint.
It was a child’s drawing in blue crayon.
A drawing of a house, a tree, and a little boy.
At the top, written in clumsy, six-year-old handwriting, were the words:
For Mommy, from Toby.
May you like
Luca looked at me, the flashlight catching the absolute terror in my eyes.
“Rachel,” Luca whispered. “Someone else has been in your apartment.”
