Chapter 2 - THE WRONG BROTHER
The brass doorknob turned again.
Rattled.
Stopped.
Antonio didn’t step back. He stood between me and the door, his posture instantly shifting from a frail patient to the man who had controlled Chicago’s underworld for three decades.
“Step away from the door, Rosa,” Antonio commanded quietly.
Rosa was trembling so hard she could barely walk. She moved behind the wooden mannequin, clutching the yellow envelope like a shield.
Antonio unlocked the door.
He threw it open.
Standing in the dim hallway was a man in his late sixties. Silver hair. Wire-rimmed glasses. He wore a heavy wool coat over a rumpled tweed suit.
He didn’t have a weapon. He had a battered leather briefcase.
Rosa let out a strangled gasp. “Dr. Franklin?”
“Hello, Rosa,” the man said tiredly. He looked at Antonio. “May I come in? Before Michael realizes I slipped past his security?”
“Rosa said you died six years ago,” Antonio said, his voice dangerously low.
“My brother Edward died six years ago,” the man replied. “Heart failure. He was your wife’s oncologist. I’m Dr. Thomas Franklin. I’m a toxicologist.”
He stepped into the sewing room.
He didn’t look at the duplicate silk robe. He looked straight at Antonio.
“Your wife didn’t have cancer, Antonio. Edward realized it two months before she died. Her symptoms were mimicking lymphoma, but they were chemically induced.”
The room went dead silent.
I watched Antonio’s chest rise and fall. Fifteen years in emergency rooms had taught me how shock physically hits the body. It starts in the hands.
Antonio’s hands were perfectly still.
That terrified me more than shaking would have.
“You’re telling me someone poisoned my wife to death?” Antonio asked.
“Yes,” Thomas said.
“And your brother knew?”
“He figured it out too late. When he confronted the person he suspected, he was threatened. He told Lucia the truth, but they were both running out of time. That’s why Lucia hid that second robe. She knew whoever killed her would eventually come for you.”
“Why didn’t you come to me six years ago?” Antonio demanded.
Thomas opened his briefcase. “Because the person who threatened my brother made sure I lost my medical license. They ruined my reputation, froze my accounts, and promised to kill my daughter if I ever came within a mile of this estate.”
He pulled out a thick, leather-bound ledger.
“But my daughter moved to London yesterday. She’s safe. Which means I can finally give you this.”
Thomas handed the ledger to Antonio.
“What is this?”
“Edward kept meticulous records,” Thomas said softly. “It’s a list of every chemical compound he found in Lucia’s bloodwork. And a matching list of the purchases made from a private pharmacy in the city.”
I stepped forward, looking over Antonio’s shoulder.
The dates went back seven years. The amounts were microscopic. A slow, agonizing execution.
“The billing account,” I pointed to the top of the page. “Who paid for this?”
Thomas looked at me, then at Antonio.
“Your sister, Teresa.”
Antonio closed the ledger. The sound was like a gunshot in the quiet room.
“Teresa wouldn’t,” Rosa whispered from the corner. “She loved Mrs. Moretti. They were like sisters.”
“People lie, Rosa,” Antonio said, his voice hollow.
He turned toward the door.
“Where are you going?” I asked, grabbing my medical bag.
“To have a conversation with my sister.”
We walked down to the second floor. The house was unnervingly quiet. Michael was nowhere to be seen. The security guards in the hallway had vanished.
Antonio didn’t knock on Teresa’s bedroom door. He opened it.
The room was empty.
The bed was perfectly made. The closet doors were open. Half her clothes were gone.
“She ran,” I said.
Antonio walked over to the mahogany vanity. Sitting perfectly centered on the glass top was a silver pocket watch.
Antonio picked it up. His face went completely pale.
“Antonio?” I asked cautiously. “What is it?”
He turned the watch over.
“This belonged to my father,” Antonio whispered. “He died twenty years ago.”
He clicked the watch open.
Tucked inside the glass face was a tiny, folded piece of paper.
Antonio pulled it out and unfolded it.
I saw his eyes read the words once. Then twice.
He dropped the paper onto the vanity and leaned heavily against the wood, suddenly looking every single day of his sixty-two years.
I picked up the note.
May you like
It was written in Teresa’s elegant cursive.
Antonio. I didn’t kill Lucia. But I know who did. Check Michael’s son.
