Chapter 5 - THE VIDEO OF ETHAN’S MOTHER
Miles Corbin disappeared before sunrise.
His bedroom at the staff residence was empty.
His car remained parked outside.
His personal phone lay smashed beneath a maintenance stairwell.
His passport was gone.
That answered one question.
It created twenty more.
Dominic watched police search Miles’s security office.
“Can footage be altered?”
Rocco nodded reluctantly.
“If you control the source server.”
“Miles did.”
“Yes.”
“So the video placing him at the west gate could be false.”
“Or recorded earlier.”
Detective Bennett looked at the monitor.
“We found eleven minutes of metadata inconsistent with the rest of the night.”
Dominic stared.
“The same eleven minutes.”
“Yes.”
Miles had given himself an alibi using the system he controlled.
Simple.
Professional.
Then why steal Sebastian’s watch?
To frame Sebastian first?
Sophia second?
Maybe both.
Dominic hated not understanding motive.
Ethan solved part of it accidentally.
He walked into the study carrying an old wooden box.
“Dad?”
Dominic turned.
“What’s that?”
“Mom’s.”
Everything stopped.
Elena Moretti’s music box.
Dominic had not seen it in years.
“Where did you get it?”
“My closet.”
“How long has it been there?”
“Always.”
Sophia came behind him.
“Lily found a key taped underneath.”
Of course she did.
Dominic looked at the toddler.
Lily smiled proudly.
“I find stuff.”
Nobody could argue.
The key opened a narrow compartment in the bottom.
Inside was a flash drive.
And a handwritten note.
For Dominic.
His wife’s handwriting.
Seven years gone.
Still enough to make his knees weaken.
He sat before opening it.
Ethan climbed beside him.
Sophia remained several feet away.
“I can leave.”
“No.”
Dominic looked at her.
“Please stay.”
She did.
The note was brief.
Dom,
If I lose my nerve, make me tell you.
If I don’t get the chance, watch the files.
Do not let Sebastian handle Ethan’s trust alone after I’m gone.
And do not let Miles convince you fear is the same thing as security.
Dominic read the last sentence twice.
Rocco whispered:
“Jesus.”
Sophia’s face changed.
“She knew.”
Dominic could barely speak.
“Yes.”
The flash drive contained six videos.
Elena had recorded them over three months.
In the first, she looked exhausted.
Still beautiful.
Still alive.
Dominic had forgotten how much movement her face contained.
“Dom,” she said to the camera, “if you’re seeing this without me explaining it, then I probably waited too long.”
Ethan gripped his father’s hand.
Elena continued.
“Sebastian’s trust reports don’t balance.”
Dominic closed his eyes.
Seven years.
She had discovered the missing money before it became twenty-four million.
“Every time I ask for originals, he gives me summaries.”
Sophia looked at Dominic.
Same pattern.
People hiding behind summaries.
Video two.
Elena described Miles becoming increasingly involved in security without her approval.
“He tells me I am anxious because Ethan is a baby.”
Her mouth tightened.
“I am anxious because someone entered Ethan’s nursery at 2:11 in the morning and the camera somehow failed.”
Dominic’s entire body went cold.
“What?”
Rocco rewound.
Again.
Someone had entered Ethan’s nursery seven years earlier.
Camera failure.
Miles.
Video three.
Elena showed a photograph.
Sebastian and Miles together outside a bank.
“My brother says it was a coincidence.”
She looked into the camera.
“I don’t believe him.”
Video four was worse.
Elena said:
“I think Sebastian is stealing.”
Then:
“I think Miles is helping him hide it.”
Ethan whispered:
“Uncle Sebastian knew?”
Dominic could not answer yet.
Video five.
Elena held up the tiny gold watch.
The same one.
“My mother’s watch.”
Dominic frowned.
He had always believed it belonged to Sebastian.
Elena explained.
“Sebastian says it’s his because our mother left it to him.”
She smiled without humor.
“She didn’t.”
Dominic looked at Sophia.
“What?”
Elena continued:
“She left it to me.”
The room went silent.
“I gave it to Sebastian after Dad died because he was falling apart.”
Her eyes softened.
“I thought it might remind him we were still family.”
Then Elena looked directly into the camera.
“If he ever gives it away, something is very wrong.”
Video six had been recorded the day before Elena died.
Dominic recognized the sweater.
She wore it the last morning he kissed her goodbye.
“I confronted Sebastian.”
Her face was pale.
“He admitted using trust money temporarily.”
Dominic stopped breathing.
“He says Miles helped move it through private accounts.”
Then:
“I told him I’m removing him as trustee tomorrow.”
Sophia covered her mouth.
Elena continued:
“Miles came to see me afterward.”
Her voice dropped.
“He said I was putting Ethan in danger by destabilizing the family.”
Dominic’s hands curled.
“He said something I cannot stop thinking about.”
She looked toward the door before speaking.
“He said, ‘Accidents happen when powerful people panic.’”
Nobody moved.
Elena forced a smile.
“I may be overreacting.”
Dominic whispered:
“No.”
His wife on the screen could not hear him.
“I’m driving into Manhattan tomorrow to meet with the bank.”
Tomorrow.
The day she died.
Elena’s car went through a guardrail on the Saw Mill River Parkway during rain.
Police blamed slick roads.
Dominic had believed it.
He had been too destroyed to ask more.
Then Elena said one final thing.
“Dom, if anything happens to me, don’t become your father.”
His face broke.
Ethan looked at him.
“What does that mean?”
Dominic stared at the screen.
His father had answered betrayal with bodies.
Fear with more fear.
The Moretti empire had survived.
The people inside it had not always.
Elena continued:
“Take Ethan and choose a life where the people around him can tell you the truth without being afraid of what you’ll do with it.”
Sophia’s eyes filled.
The video ended.
Nobody spoke for a long time.
Then Rocco’s phone rang.
He answered.
“Yes?”
His face changed.
“Where?”
Dominic stood.
“What?”
Rocco lowered the phone.
“Police found Miles.”
“Alive?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
“Albany bus station.”
“Did they arrest him?”
“He surrendered.”
That surprised everyone.
Rocco continued:
“And he says he’ll talk.”
Dominic’s voice went cold.
“About Ethan?”
“Yes.”
“Sebastian?”
“Yes.”
“About Elena?”
Rocco hesitated.
“Yes.”
Dominic looked at the frozen image of his late wife on the screen.
Miles Corbin had hidden inside his house for seven years.
If Elena’s warning was true, he had helped steal from Ethan.
Perhaps worse.
Dominic wanted to drive to Albany himself.
Wanted to put Miles against a wall and demand every detail.
Instead he looked at his son.
Elena’s last request echoed.
Don’t become your father.
Dominic called Detective Bennett.
“Bring him in legally.”
Sophia watched.
He knew she understood what the choice cost him.
An hour later, Bennett called from the station.
“Miles is cooperating.”
“Why?”
“He says Sebastian is going to kill him.”
Dominic frowned.
“Sebastian?”
“Yes.”
Then Bennett said:
“And he claims the cake was never supposed to kill Ethan.”
Dominic’s blood turned cold.
“What does that mean?”
“Miles says someone changed the amount.”
“Who?”
A pause.
“Sebastian.”
Dominic stared.
Miles had poisoned the cake.
Sebastian had supplied the substance.
But according to Miles, the plan had originally been something else entirely.
Not murder.
A medical emergency.
A public failure of Dominic’s security.
Enough to remove Ethan from Dominic’s custody.
Enough to trigger a clause in Elena’s trust.
Sophia whispered:
“What clause?”
Dominic looked at the attorneys.
They were already searching.
Then one found it.
If Ethan’s legal guardian were deemed unfit or unable to protect him, temporary control of Ethan’s trust and person passed to his maternal next of kin.
Sebastian Vale.
The attempted poisoning had two possible outcomes.
If Ethan survived, Sebastian could argue Dominic was incapable of protecting him.
If Ethan died—
the stolen money would become harder to trace inside the chaos of a funeral and foundation transfer.
Either way, Sebastian benefited.
May you like
And Lily Carter had destroyed both plans with one tiny hand.
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