Chapter 3 - THE RECORDED TRUTH
A tall, striking woman stepped into the light of the lantern.
She wore an ivory cashmere coat that remained impossibly spotless despite the rain outside. Her dark hair was styled into a flawless chignon, and a diamond tennis necklace glittered at her throat.
Juliet Duca.
Lorenzo’s stepmother. The woman who had spent the last five years hosting high-society charity galas in Manhattan while managing the family's philanthropic foundation.
Behind her stood two men in dark suits, both holding silenced pistols.
“Juliet,” Lorenzo said, his voice deadly quiet. He didn't sound surprised. He sounded disappointed.
“Don't look at me like that, stepson,” Juliet replied smoothly, stepping around the wooden crates with practiced grace. “You’ve grown careless. Relying on a housemaid and a toddler to keep you breathing? Your father would be ashamed.”
Emma whimpered behind my skirt. I reached down, pressing her head into my hip, my eyes never leaving the two armed men flanking Juliet.
“Why?” Lorenzo asked, leaning back against the cot to hide the weakness in his posture. “I gave you everything my father left behind. The brownstones, the foundations, the seat on the board.”
“You gave me an allowance,” Juliet spat, her refined composure cracking for a fraction of a second, revealing the raw, ugly greed beneath. “You treated me like a decorative piece of furniture while you ran the empire. But when the merger with the Moretti family goes through tomorrow morning, I won't be an allowance-holder anymore. I will be the sole executor of the Duca estate.”
“The Moretti merger,” Lorenzo repeated softly, a realization dawning in his eyes. “You traded my head for a seat at their table.”
“Marco was very affordable,” Juliet admitted with a light laugh. “Five million dollars and a penthouse in Miami. He was more than happy to leave the garden gate unlocked tonight.”
She turned her cold, aristocratic gaze toward me.
“It really is a shame about you, Clara,” she sighed. “You were such a quiet girl. You ironed my blouses very well. But you saw too much, and your little girl...” She looked at Emma with disgust. “She shouldn't have been playing in the rain.”
One of the armed men raised his pistol, aligning the barrel directly with my forehead.
Fear pressed down on my chest like a lead weight, but my nursing instincts—the cold, calculating part of my brain that operated under extreme pressure—refused to let me freeze.
“Wait,” I said, stepping forward just enough to shield Emma completely.
Juliet raised a manicured hand, stopping the guard. “Do you have last words, Clara? A plea for your daughter?”
“No,” I said, pulling my phone from my apron pocket. “I have a live recording.”
Juliet’s eyebrows arched in mild amusement. “A recording?”
“When I heard Marco talking outside the shed, I opened an encrypted cloud stream on my phone,” I lied seamlessly, holding up the screen so she could see the active red recording timer. “Every word you’ve spoken for the last three minutes—about Marco, the five million dollars, the Moretti family, and the assassination—has been broadcast to an off-site server.”
Juliet’s face paled slightly. “You’re bluffing.”
“Try me,” I challenged, my voice remarkably steady despite the blood roaring in my ears. “I was a second-year medical student before my life fell apart, Mrs. Duca. I know how data storage works. If I press this screen, or if my heart rate stops, the file is automatically emailed to the District Attorney, the FBI special task force investigating your foundation, and Lorenzo’s undercapos.”
The room went dead silent, save for the rhythmic dripping of water from the stone ceiling.
Juliet looked at the guard, then at my phone, her mind racing to calculate the risk.
Lorenzo let out a low, dark laugh from the cot. “She’s not lying, Juliet. Clara is far smarter than anyone in this room. Shoot us now, and by sunrise, every Capo in the five boroughs will know you sold out the family to the Morettis.”
Juliet’s jaw tightened until a muscle twitched near her ear. “Give me the phone, Clara.”
“Step back first,” I demanded.
“Give me the phone, or I have my man shoot the child right now,” Juliet snarled, dropping all pretense of elegance. “Let’s see if your cloud stream can bring a dead girl back to life.”
The guard aimed his gun at Emma.
May you like
Before I could move, a sudden, deafening bang shattered the silence of the room.
***
