Chapter 4 - Mateo’s Last Delivery
The safe room was built beneath the east wing of the Duca estate.
It had reinforced steel doors, independent cameras, medical supplies, food, water, and enough surveillance equipment to monitor the entire property. Alessandro had created it after an attempted kidnapping years ago.
He had never expected to use it for a maid and her daughter.
Sophia sat on a leather couch with Emma in her lap. The little girl had fallen asleep, still clutching the gray rabbit.
Her cheeks were damp with tears.
Alessandro stood near the door, watching them in silence.
Sophia finally looked up.
“Why are you helping us?”
He considered the question.
“Because someone tried to use your child’s memory to kill me.”
“That is not the same thing.”
“No,” he admitted. “It isn’t.”
Sophia’s eyes narrowed slightly.
She was afraid, but she was not weak.
“Mateo was afraid of people connected to this house,” she said. “He wanted to tell someone. But every time he tried, he said it was too dangerous.”
“What did he see?”
“He never told me everything.”
“Tell me what he did say.”
Sophia looked toward her sleeping daughter.
“He drove delivery trucks for Duca Urban Development. He transported supplies from the river warehouses to construction sites. Mostly cement, tools, permits, invoices.”
Alessandro listened closely.
“Then, one night, he came home late. He had dirt on his clothes. He said he took a wrong turn because a road was blocked. He saw men unloading boxes from a blue truck into an empty warehouse.”
“Where?”
“Near the old steel yards.”
“Which warehouse?”
“I don’t know. He said there was a big painted number on the side. Maybe thirteen.”
Marco, standing near the surveillance desk, looked at Alessandro.
“Warehouse Thirteen,” he said. “It belonged to one of our old subcontractors. We shut it down last year.”
Alessandro’s eyes darkened.
“Not ours anymore?”
“Technically, it was sold.”
“To whom?”
Marco checked his tablet.
“A company called Harborline Logistics.”
“Owner?”
“Anonymous LLC.”
Alessandro gave a humorless smile.
“Of course.”
Sophia continued. “Mateo said the boxes had medical symbols. He thought they were stolen drugs. But then he saw documents. Ledgers. Envelopes full of cash. He recognized a man in a blue uniform.”
“The security uniform?” Alessandro asked.
Sophia nodded.
“He said the man had a ring with a black stone.”
Marco went still.
Vittorio Vescari.
Or someone trying very hard to point toward him.
“What happened after Mateo saw this?” Alessandro asked.
“He came home shaking. He told me he wanted to go to the police.”
“Did he?”
“He tried.”
Sophia looked down.
“But the officer he spoke to said there was no report without proof. Mateo was scared. He said he would get proof the next day.”
Her voice broke.
“He never came home.”
Alessandro felt a familiar cold anger settle beneath his ribs.
Not loud anger.
Not reckless anger.
The kind that made him precise.
“His death certificate says accidental overdose,” Marco said quietly.
Sophia looked at Alessandro.
“I knew it was wrong. Mateo hated taking medicine. He hated how it made him feel. But after he died, people came to our apartment.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know. Two men in suits. They told me Mateo had made bad choices. They said I should be grateful they were helping with hospital costs.”
“And you believed them?”
“I had a baby. No money. No family in this country.” Sophia’s eyes filled with shame. “I believed whatever I needed to believe so Emma and I could survive.”
Alessandro nodded once.
“There is no shame in surviving.”
Sophia stared at him, perhaps surprised by the softness in his voice.
Then Emma stirred.
“Mommy?”
“I’m here, baby.”
Emma sat up slowly and looked around the safe room.
“Is the bad man gone?”
Sophia pulled her close.
“Yes.”
Emma shook her head.
“No. He’s in the house.”
Alessandro crouched beside her.
“Which bad man?”
“The blue man.”
“Did you see him today?”
Emma nodded.
“Where?”
She pointed upward.
“By the big picture room.”
The library.
Alessandro looked at Marco.
Luca and Bianca were still in the library.
“Show me,” he said gently.
Emma climbed down from Sophia’s lap. Marco opened a digital map of the estate on a large screen.
Emma pointed at the library.
Then, unexpectedly, she pointed at a small room behind it.
“That room,” she said.
Marco frowned.
“That’s the old archive.”
The archive had not been used in years. It contained property records, family documents, and boxes left from Alessandro’s father’s time.
Alessandro rose immediately.
“Lock down the library. No one enters or leaves.”
They moved fast.
Marco led two guards through the east hall while Alessandro followed. The archive door stood slightly open.
That was wrong.
The estate staff knew better than to leave doors open in restricted areas.
Inside, documents had been pulled from shelves and scattered across the floor. An old safe stood open against the far wall.
Luca was in front of it.
He turned when Alessandro entered.
His face was tense.
“You need to explain why you are in here,” Alessandro said.
Luca held up a folder.
“I found this in Father’s records.”
Alessandro’s gaze dropped to the papers.
The folder was labeled:
DUCA URBAN DEVELOPMENT — OFF-BOOK CONTRACTS
Marco took it and opened it.
Inside were invoices tied to Warehouse Thirteen.
Payments had been made through shell companies.
One signature appeared repeatedly.
Not Alessandro’s.
Not Luca’s.
Marco’s.
The room went silent.
Luca looked at Alessandro.
“I told you this was bigger than me.”
Marco’s jaw clenched.
“These are forged.”
“Are they?” Luca asked.
Marco stepped toward him. “You think you can come back after years away and frame me?”
“I think you are afraid.”
Alessandro held up a hand.
Both men stopped.
He studied the documents.
The signatures looked real.
The authorization codes were old, but valid.
And beneath the contracts was something worse.
A payment record from the week Mateo Alvarez died.
A transfer labeled:
CLEANUP / DRIVER INCIDENT
Sophia’s husband had been murdered.
The evidence lay in Alessandro’s own family archive.
Someone had wanted it found.
But why?
Then the lights went out.
The archive fell into darkness.
A woman screamed from the library.
Bianca.
Alessandro reached for his weapon.
In the darkness, someone whispered from behind him.
“Trust no one.”
Then a hand struck the back of his head.
The world tilted.
And before Alessandro could turn, the archive door slammed shut.
May you like
Locked from the outside.
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