Chapter 4 - THE MAN OUTSIDE THE WINDOW
Bella dropped the phone.
Silana caught it before it hit the floor.
He read the message.
Something brutal entered his eyes.
“Down.”
He pulled Bella behind the marble half-wall beside the fireplace.
Leo began crying.
Silana handed him to Bella.
“Stay below the window.”
“What about David?”
“He just made a mistake.”
“You don’t know where he is.”
“No.”
Silana drew his weapon.
“But now I know where he was.”
Dominic entered with two guards.
“The east generator was sabotaged. South perimeter camera feed is looped.”
Silana showed him the photograph.
Dominic swore.
“Outside this room?”
“Yes.”
“Impossible. The exterior wall is sixty feet from the tree line.”
“Search it.”
Dominic disappeared.
Bella rocked Leo against her chest.
“It’s me.”
Silana looked at her.
“This happened because I’m here.”
“This happened because David wants you to believe that.”
“He knows your security.”
“Yes.”
“He knows the estate.”
“Yes.”
“He knows where I’m sleeping.”
Silana crouched in front of her.
“That means someone is feeding him information.”
“You keep saying someone.”
“Because I’m not saying a name until I have proof.”
Bella understood.
People close to Silana could die because of suspicion.
Oddly, the restraint reassured her.
Within twenty minutes, power returned.
Dominic found footprints near an ornamental stone wall and a discarded long-lens camera.
David was gone.
But he had left something behind.
A silver bracelet.
Bella recognized it immediately.
Her hand flew to her mouth.
“My mother’s.”
Silana turned.
“What?”
“My mother gave me that bracelet before she died. David kept it in a box because I was afraid I’d lose it.”
She took the bracelet.
There was dried mud in the clasp.
“He had this the entire time?”
“Apparently.”
“No.”
Bella stared at it.
“He wants me emotional. He wants me to go to the apartment.”
“Exactly.”
“Then I should.”
Silana’s expression became stone.
“No.”
“If we want David, he asked me to meet him.”
“You are not bait.”
“I’m already bait.”
Silana stepped closer.
“You have a child.”
“That’s precisely why I need this finished.”
They stared at each other.
Dominic pretended to study the camera.
Finally Silana said, “We have forty-eight hours.”
Bella nodded.
“We use them.”
The next morning, Silana moved his meetings into the library.
Leo sat in a portable playpen between two antique bookcases.
Nobody commented on the absurdity.
Capos entered discussing dock shipments and weapons.
Then a baby threw a plastic giraffe at one of Chicago’s most feared men.
The capo caught it.
Everyone went silent.
Leo laughed.
Silana said, “Give it back.”
The capo obediently returned the giraffe.
Bella almost smiled.
The entire Moretti organization was learning to operate around nap schedules.
But beneath the strange domestic calm, the investigation grew darker.
Dominic traced David’s stolen access badge.
It had been created using security credentials belonging to Carlo Moretti.
Silana’s cousin.
His head of finance.
And one of the few men who had known Isabella’s route the morning she died.
Silana stared at the computer.
Bella saw the implication immediately.
“You think Carlo was involved in the bombing?”
“I think nothing until I know.”
“But you’ve considered it.”
“For three years.”
Bella stopped.
“You suspected your own cousin?”
“Carlo called Isabella that morning and asked her to stop at the pediatrician’s office before visiting her sister.”
“Why?”
“He claimed Matteo’s medical records needed updating.”
“And the bomb…”
“Was placed on the route created by that change.”
Bella felt sick.
“Why didn’t you confront him?”
“Because grief without evidence creates graves.”
The sentence chilled her.
Dominic entered carrying a folder.
“We found the account David used after the theft.”
Silana opened it.
The fifty thousand dollars David stole had not been spent.
It had been transferred.
First to a shell corporation.
Then into an offshore trust.
The trust beneficiary was Leo Jenkins.
Bella stared.
“No.”
Silana looked at her.
“David stole your money for Leo?”
“Maybe.”
“Why?”
Dominic slid another page forward.
“There’s more.”
Three months before stealing the money, David purchased a life insurance policy.
Two million dollars.
Beneficiary: Bella Jenkins.
Bella sat down.
“I never knew.”
“Someone was preparing for his disappearance,” Silana said.
“Or his death,” Dominic added.
Bella hugged herself.
The man she had thought simply abandoned her suddenly seemed like a stranger constructed from secrets.
“Was David stealing from you,” she asked, “or was he trying to get something out?”
Silana looked at Dominic.
Neither answered.
Bella understood they had considered the same possibility.
That afternoon, they searched old shipping data.
David had worked under Carlo.
Two weeks before vanishing, he downloaded manifests connected to Moretti-controlled freight terminals.
Not money records.
Vehicle records.
Silana’s attention sharpened.
“What vehicles?”
Dominic pulled up the list.
Bella watched Silana’s face drain of color.
One registration number had been flagged repeatedly.
“What is it?” she asked.
Silana stared at the screen.
“The sedan Isabella was driving when she died.”
Silence.
David had accessed the maintenance records of the bombed car.
Three years after the explosion.
Why?
Dominic dug deeper.
The service logs showed something impossible.
A brake-system inspection had been electronically added twenty-four hours before the bombing.
Authorized by Carlo Moretti.
Silana stood.
The chair behind him fell over.
Bella had never seen such rage contained inside one person.
“Bring Carlo to me.”
Dominic hesitated.
“He’s at the downtown office.”
“Then bring him.”
Bella stepped forward.
“Silana.”
He looked at her.
It was the first time she had used his first name.
“Don’t do anything until you know.”
His eyes met hers.
“What exactly do you think I will do?”
“I don’t know.”
“That makes two of us.”
He left.
Carlo arrived an hour later.
He was fifty, polished, expensive, and offended by the inconvenience.
“What’s this about?”
Silana closed the library doors.
Bella remained with Leo in the adjoining sitting room where she could hear everything.
“You authorized a temporary maintenance badge Tuesday.”
Carlo laughed.
“I authorize dozens.”
“With my credentials.”
Silence.
“You accusing me?”
“I’m asking.”
Carlo’s tone changed.
“Careful, cousin.”
Silana placed the vehicle record on the table.
“Did you authorize this?”
More silence.
Then a chair scraped.
Carlo said, “Where did you get that?”
Bella’s pulse accelerated.
Silana’s voice remained quiet.
“So you recognize it.”
“I recognize company paperwork.”
“This paperwork concerns Isabella’s car.”
Carlo did not answer.
Then Leo made a noise from the next room.
A soft babble.
Carlo froze.
“What was that?”
Silana said nothing.
Carlo walked toward the connecting door.
Bella stepped backward.
The door opened.
Carlo saw Leo.
His reaction was immediate.
Not confusion.
Recognition.
The color drained from his face.
He whispered, “David’s kid.”
Bella’s entire body went cold.
Silana slowly turned.
“You know this child?”
Carlo realized his mistake.
Too late.
Silana stepped between him and the doorway.
“How do you know Leo?”
Carlo backed away.
“I don’t.”
“You just called him David’s kid.”
“I heard the staff—”
“Nobody on this property knows who his father is.”
Carlo looked toward the main door.
Dominic blocked it.
For the first time, fear cracked through Carlo’s polished exterior.
Silana leaned closer.
“Tell me how you know.”
Carlo’s lips parted.
Before he could answer, his phone rang.
The screen illuminated.
Bella could read the caller identification from across the room.
DAVID MILLER.
Nobody moved.
Carlo stared at the phone.
Silana stared at Carlo.
Then Silana picked it up.
He answered.
“David.”
Silence on the other end.
Then a familiar male voice said:
“Silana, if Carlo is standing in front of you, don’t let him leave.”
Bella stopped breathing.
May you like
David continued.
“Because your cousin killed Isabella.”
