Chapter 7 - THE OLD CLINIC
The Lakeshore Medical Clinic had been abandoned for twelve years.
From the outside, it looked dead.
Boarded windows.
Rusting ambulance bay.
A faded blue service door.
Sophia stood across the street beside Marco.
Lorenzo had been furious when he discovered she had left the safe apartment.
He had also stopped arguing the moment she showed him the blue paint on Emma’s broken scissors.
“How could the paint get on them?” Vincent asked.
Sophia explained.
“Emma dropped the scissors after trying to cut Lorenzo free. One half slid underneath the chair.”
Marco understood.
“The chair had been moved.”
“From somewhere painted blue.”
Ricci stared at the scissors.
Lorenzo looked at him.
“Your clinic used those chairs.”
Ricci nodded slowly.
“Yes.”
Matteo had likely prepared Lorenzo’s restraint equipment at the clinic before moving it to the mansion cellar.
The missing button had exposed Ricci’s involvement.
The blue paint revealed Matteo’s second location.
Now Ricci stood beside them wearing no coat.
No authority.
Only regret.
“My daughter may be inside too,” he said.
Lorenzo’s face remained hard.
“Then help us.”
Ricci gave them the floor plan from memory.
Basement treatment rooms.
Old pharmacy.
Underground parking.
Private records archive.
Sophia’s family would most likely be in the basement because the walls were reinforced.
“What about Nico?” she asked.
Vincent checked a tablet.
“His phone stopped moving twenty minutes ago.”
“At the warehouse?”
“Yes.”
Sophia closed her eyes.
“Then he’s still there.”
“We sent two trusted men.”
“Trusted?”
Vincent grimaced.
“Fair question.”
Lorenzo approached Sophia.
“You stay in the vehicle.”
She stared at him.
“Do you enjoy losing arguments?”
“I’ve never had so many.”
“Maybe nobody used to tell you no.”
“Maybe.”
For the first time, his expression softened.
“Please.”
That word did what commands could not.
Sophia nodded.
“Bring my mother out.”
“I will.”
Marco, Vincent, Lorenzo, and Ricci crossed toward the clinic.
Sophia remained in the SUV.
For forty seconds.
Then the rear passenger door opened.
Biscotti jumped onto the seat.
Sophia stared.
“How did you get here?”
The cat meowed.
Apparently Mrs. Bellini’s supervision extended only to human children.
Biscotti jumped down again and ran toward the alley.
“No.”
Sophia followed.
“Absolutely not.”
The cat disappeared through a gap beneath the clinic fence.
Sophia reached the fence.
Then heard something.
A woman crying.
“Mama?”
She pressed closer.
The sound came from the ambulance bay.
Not the main building.
Sophia circled the fence.
A service door stood slightly open.
Blue paint chipped around the frame.
She should have called Marco.
She knew that.
Instead, she heard her mother again.
“Sophia?”
That erased caution.
She entered.
Teresa Rossi sat inside an old ambulance parked in darkness.
Her hands were tied.
No guard.
Sophia ran to her.
“Mama.”
Teresa began crying.
“Emma?”
“Safe.”
“Nico?”
“At another location. Lorenzo is getting him.”
Sophia cut the ties with an old utility knife from the ambulance.
“Can you walk?”
“Yes.”
“Then we’re leaving.”
Teresa grabbed her wrist.
“No.”
“What?”
“There’s another woman downstairs.”
Sophia froze.
“Who?”
“I don’t know. Italian. Maybe forty.”
Ricci’s daughter.
Sophia cursed under her breath.
Of course.
They couldn’t leave her.
Sophia texted Marco.
FOUND MAMA. AMBULANCE BAY. POSSIBLE SECOND HOSTAGE BELOW.
No answer.
She called.
Nothing.
Signal jammed.
Teresa grabbed her.
“You are not going downstairs.”
“Mama—”
“You have a daughter.”
“And somebody else is somebody’s daughter.”
Teresa stared at her.
Sophia hated using the argument because it worked.
They descended together.
The basement smelled of dust and antiseptic.
Half the lights were dead.
At the end of the corridor, a woman sat inside an old examination room.
She stood when she saw them.
“Who are you?”
“Sophia Rossi.”
Her face changed.
“You found Lorenzo.”
“How do you know?”
“My father talks about you.”
“Dr. Ricci?”
The woman nodded.
“Gabriella.”
Sophia opened the door.
It wasn’t locked.
That bothered her.
“Why leave you unguarded?”
Gabriella’s face filled with fear.
“Because they moved everyone upstairs ten minutes ago.”
“Why?”
“To evacuate.”
A voice came from behind them.
“No.”
Sophia turned.
Matteo Duca stood at the bottom of the stairs.
Alone.
He held no visible weapon.
That made him more frightening.
“You misunderstand,” he said.
“They didn’t evacuate.”
He smiled.
“They went to kill Lorenzo.”
Sophia stepped in front of Teresa and Gabriella.
Matteo looked at her with genuine curiosity.
“All of this because a toddler chased a cat.”
“Children ruin plans.”
“I’m noticing.”
He glanced at the broken scissors still sticking from Sophia’s coat pocket.
“Those too.”
Sophia’s stomach dropped.
“You know about the scissors?”
“Ricci told me.”
Gabriella closed her eyes.
Sophia felt cold.
“Your father is still helping him?”
Matteo laughed.
“Of course he is.”
Then gunfire echoed faintly from upstairs.
Sophia flinched.
Matteo looked toward the ceiling.
“Right on schedule.”
Gabriella whispered, “No.”
May you like
Matteo smiled at her.
“Your father just delivered Lorenzo Duca exactly where I wanted him.”
