Chapter 5 - THE TRUTH ABOUT THE CAR BOMB
Carlo ran.
He made it three steps.
Dominic caught him against the library door.
The collision rattled the paintings.
“Get off me!”
Silana did not move.
He still held Carlo’s phone against his ear.
“Say that again,” he told David.
David’s voice came through the speaker.
“Carlo arranged the bombing.”
Carlo shouted, “He’s lying!”
Silana’s gaze never left his cousin.
“Where are you?”
“Not telling you.”
“Then this conversation ends.”
“No. Listen to me.”
Bella stood in the connecting doorway with Leo pressed against her chest.
She recognized David’s voice.
It pulled eight months of anger, love, humiliation and confusion out of a place she had tried to bury.
“David?”
The line went silent.
Then:
“Bella.”
Her knees almost failed.
She gripped the doorframe.
“You’re alive.”
“I’m sorry.”
A laugh broke from her throat.
It sounded nothing like amusement.
“You’re sorry?”
“Bella—”
“You left me pregnant.”
“I was trying to keep you alive.”
“You disappeared.”
“I had to.”
“You let me believe you were dead.”
“I thought that was safer.”
Leo began fussing.
David heard him.
His voice broke.
“Is that Leo?”
Bella’s anger hardened.
“You don’t get to say his name like you know him.”
Silana watched her.
David went silent again.
Finally he said, “I know I don’t.”
Silana interrupted.
“Evidence.”
David exhaled.
“Check the encrypted partition on the freight server. DavidM-17. Password is Isabella’s license plate.”
Silana nodded to Dominic.
Dominic immediately opened his laptop.
Carlo stopped struggling.
Bella saw it.
Silana did too.
Carlo said, “This is ridiculous.”
Silana stepped closer.
“Then why are you frightened?”
“I’m angry.”
“No. I know the difference.”
Dominic typed.
A password box appeared.
Silana spoke Isabella’s old license plate from memory.
The drive opened.
Hundreds of files appeared.
Photographs.
Bank transfers.
Vehicle records.
Audio recordings.
Carlo sagged against the door.
Silana’s face became unreadable.
David continued.
“I found the archive nine months ago while auditing Southside transport accounts. Carlo had been moving money to Castellano companies for years.”
“Why steal fifty thousand?” Silana asked.
“I needed Carlo to think I was running because of money.”
Bella stared at the phone.
“You destroyed our lives as a cover story?”
“I needed to disappear before he realized what I found.”
“You could have told me.”
“And if he tortured you for answers you didn’t have?”
Bella recoiled.
Silana’s eyes narrowed.
David immediately corrected himself.
“I’m sorry. But you understand my point.”
Bella did.
She hated that she did.
Dominic opened an audio file.
A man’s voice filled the room.
Carlo.
“The wife leaves at nine-ten. The child will be with her. I don’t care. Castellano wants Silana broken, not dead. A man without a family is easier to control.”
Silana’s entire body went rigid.
Bella closed her eyes.
No one spoke until the recording ended.
Carlo looked almost elderly.
“Silana…”
Silana slowly put the phone down.
“You knew Matteo would be in the car.”
Carlo’s mouth worked soundlessly.
“Sil…”
“You knew.”
“It wasn’t supposed—”
Silana crossed the room so quickly that Dominic released Carlo and stepped between them.
“Boss.”
Silana stopped.
His hands shook.
Carlo began crying.
“I owed money. Castellano had me trapped. They said Isabella would be delayed, not killed.”
“The recording says otherwise.”
“They edited it!”
Dominic looked at him with disgust.
Carlo turned toward Bella as though she might somehow save him.
“I didn’t know the baby would die.”
Silana’s face broke.
Not anger.
Agony.
“You knew his name.”
Carlo fell silent.
“You held Matteo the day he was born.”
Silana’s voice cracked.
“You stood beside me at his funeral.”
Bella looked away because suddenly she felt like she was witnessing something too private.
Silana stepped backward.
“Take him downstairs.”
Carlo screamed.
“Silana!”
Dominic’s men removed him.
Silana remained standing in the center of the library.
David’s voice still came through the phone.
“There’s more.”
Silana closed his eyes.
“What?”
“Carlo wasn’t working alone.”
Dominic looked up.
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
“Then how do you know?”
“Because somebody inside your house accessed my file after Carlo was detained.”
Silana opened his eyes.
“When?”
“Three minutes ago.”
Bella’s skin prickled.
Someone inside the estate was still helping the Castellanos.
Silana asked, “How do you know what happens inside this house?”
David hesitated.
“I’ve been watching their communications.”
“You’re monitoring us?”
“I’m monitoring Carlo.”
Dominic checked the system.
“There was an unauthorized server request from the east wing.”
Silana turned.
“Who is there?”
Dominic’s expression tightened.
“The staff chapel, old records room…”
He stopped.
“And Beatatrice’s quarters.”
Bella immediately shook her head.
“No.”
Silana said nothing.
“She wouldn’t.”
“Bella—”
“She helped me hide Leo.”
“That does not make her innocent.”
“It makes her someone who risked her job for my child.”
Silana looked at Dominic.
“Find her.”
They found Beatatrice in the kitchen.
She was packing a suitcase.
Bella’s heart sank.
“Beatatrice?”
The older woman froze.
Dominic stepped forward.
“Hands where I can see them.”
Beatatrice slowly raised them.
Tears filled her eyes.
“I’m sorry.”
Bella felt betrayed.
“You helped David?”
Beatatrice shook her head.
“No.”
“Carlo?”
“No.”
“Then why are you leaving?”
Beatatrice looked at Silana.
“Because I knew.”
Silana’s stare sharpened.
“Knew what?”
“About Isabella.”
The kitchen went dead quiet.
Beatatrice’s voice shook.
“The morning she died, I heard Carlo arguing with someone in the conservatory. He said the route had changed and everything was ready.”
Silana stared.
“You never told me.”
“I was afraid.”
“For three years?”
“I had children.”
Bella understood immediately.
Beatatrice continued.
“Carlo knew where they lived. He showed me photographs of my granddaughter walking to school.”
Silana looked physically ill.
“He threatened your family.”
“Yes.”
“Why access the server now?”
Beatatrice opened her apron pocket and removed a flash drive.
“Because I kept something.”
She handed it to him.
“Isabella gave this to me the night before she died.”
Silana’s fingers trembled.
“What is it?”
“She said if anything happened to her, I should give it to you.”
His eyes widened.
“You had a message from my wife for three years?”
Beatatrice began sobbing.
“I was a coward.”
Silana’s jaw clenched.
Bella stepped between them before she had time to consider whether that was wise.
“Her granddaughter was threatened.”
Silana looked at Bella.
“So was my son.”
“I know.”
“No, you don’t.”
“Maybe I do.”
Bella glanced at Leo.
“If David had threatened Leo’s life and told me silence would keep him breathing, I don’t know what I would have done.”
Silana stared at the baby.
His anger slowly changed into exhaustion.
He took the drive.
“Dominic. Get Beatatrice’s family into protection.”
Beatatrice collapsed into a chair.
“Thank you.”
Silana walked away.
Bella followed him to the library.
He inserted the flash drive.
Only one video file appeared.
ISABELLA_FOR_SILANA.
Silana could not press play.
Bella stood beside him.
“You don’t have to watch it alone.”
He looked at her for several seconds.
Then pressed the button.
Isabella appeared on the screen.
Alive.
Smiling nervously.
Silana made a strangled sound.
“My love,” Isabella said, “if you are watching this, then I was right to be afraid.”
Silana gripped the desk.
Isabella continued.
“Someone inside the family is working with Castellano. I think Carlo is involved, but he is not the person I fear most.”
Silana leaned closer.
Bella’s skin prickled.
Isabella looked directly into the camera.
“The person behind Carlo is someone you trust more than your own blood.”
The video glitched.
Then Isabella spoke the name.
Silana stepped backward as though he had been shot.
“No.”
Bella looked at him.
“Who?”
May you like
His lips barely moved.
“My father.”
