Chapter 13 - MATTEO’S SECRET
Elena stepped back.
Lorenzo did not.
He simply stared at Matteo.
“You told me you were in Boston.”
“I lied.”
The room seemed to shrink.
“Why?”
Matteo looked at the flash drive.
“Because Lucia asked me to.”
Lorenzo’s jaw tightened.
“Tell me everything.”
Matteo sat slowly.
“Lucia contacted me six weeks before the crash.”
“About Gabriel?”
“About your father’s network.”
“My father was already dead.”
“His system wasn’t.”
Matteo looked at Gabriel.
“She thought Gabriel controlled it.”
Gabriel nodded.
“That was what I wanted people to think.”
Matteo continued.
“Lucia discovered financial transfers that happened after Vittorio died.”
“Meaning someone continued the operation.”
“Yes.”
“Who?”
“I didn’t know.”
“And the night she died?”
“She asked me to meet her in Brooklyn.”
“Where?”
“The Red Hook warehouse.”
Elena’s stomach tightened.
Everything returned there.
“What did she show you?” Daniel asked.
“A server backup.”
“Where is it?”
“I never got it.”
Lorenzo’s patience thinned.
“Why?”
“Lucia left before giving it to me.”
“Why?”
“She received a call.”
“From whom?”
“I don’t know.”
“She left alone?”
“Yes.”
“And you let her?”
Matteo looked at him.
“That question has kept me awake for eleven months.”
Lorenzo turned away.
Elena could see his anger.
But beneath it was grief.
Matteo continued.
“I followed five minutes later.”
“Then?”
“I found the crash.”
Lorenzo closed his eyes.
“You were there.”
“Yes.”
“You saw her?”
“Yes.”
“And you never told me.”
“She was alive when I reached the car.”
Lorenzo turned back.
“What?”
The room went silent.
“She spoke?”
“Yes.”
Lorenzo crossed the space between them.
“What did she say?”
Matteo’s voice broke.
“She said, ‘Protect Sofia from the crown.’”
Elena frowned.
“The crown?”
Gabriel’s expression changed.
Daniel noticed.
“You know what it means.”
Gabriel nodded slowly.
“Vittorio used symbols.”
“The lion and dagger,” Elena said.
“Yes.”
“That was the Moretti family emblem.”
“And the crown?”
Gabriel looked at Lorenzo.
“Vittorio called his private council the Crown.”
Lorenzo stared.
“What council?”
“Five people.”
“Names.”
Gabriel hesitated.
“Vittorio.”
“Dead.”
“Anthony.”
“Alive.”
“Me.”
“Alive.”
Gabriel continued.
“Jonathan Pierce.”
Lorenzo frowned.
“My family attorney.”
“And Evelyn Crane.”
Matteo whispered.
“Board chair.”
Elena looked around.
“Five people.”
Gabriel nodded.
“When Vittorio died, the Crown was supposed to dissolve.”
“But it didn’t,” Daniel said.
“No.”
Lorenzo looked at Matteo.
“You thought I was involved?”
Matteo shook his head.
“No.”
“Then why keep Lucia’s final words from me?”
“Because she said something else.”
Lorenzo waited.
Matteo swallowed.
“She said, ‘Don’t trust the heir.’”
The room went silent.
Lorenzo almost laughed.
“I’m the heir.”
“Yes.”
“You thought Lucia was warning you about me.”
“I didn’t know what she meant.”
“So you lied for eleven months.”
“I investigated you for eleven months.”
Lorenzo looked hurt in a way Elena had never seen.
Matteo continued quickly.
“And I found nothing.”
“Congratulations.”
“Lorenzo.”
“You suspected I killed my own wife.”
“I suspected everyone.”
“Including me.”
“Yes.”
Elena stepped forward.
“That may be the reason Lorenzo is still alive.”
Both men looked at her.
“If Matteo had trusted blindly, whoever was behind this would have known.”
Matteo nodded.
“I kept the investigation private.”
Gabriel looked at Elena.
“You think clearly.”
“She cleaned hotel rooms for rich people.”
Daniel said it before thinking.
Elena glared.
“What is that supposed to mean?”
He smiled faintly.
“It means you learned to notice what arrogant people think nobody sees.”
The tension broke slightly.
Then Lorenzo inserted the flash drive into an isolated laptop.
Documents appeared.
Meeting records.
Security logs.
Payments.
Encrypted messages.
One file was labeled CROWN SUCCESSION.
They opened it.
Vittorio had designated a successor to the private council.
Not Lorenzo.
The name had been redacted.
But beneath it was an authorization code.
EC-01.
Everyone turned toward the same person.
Evelyn Crane.
Lorenzo’s board chair.
The woman who had hugged him at Lucia’s funeral.
The woman who had held Sofia at her baptism.
The woman who had helped Lorenzo manage the company after his father died.
Elena remembered the gray sedan outside her apartment.
“Were those her men?”
Matteo checked the company registration.
The sedan belonged to a Moretti subsidiary administered by the board chair’s office.
“Yes.”
Lorenzo stared at the screen.
Evelyn.
Not Gabriel.
Not Anthony.
Evelyn.
Then another file opened automatically.
A video.
Lucia appeared on screen.
The date was three days before her death.
Lorenzo stopped breathing.
Lucia looked tired.
Afraid.
But determined.
“If Lorenzo is watching this, then I failed to tell him myself.”
Lorenzo moved closer.
Lucia continued.
“Evelyn Crane controls the Crown.”
No one spoke.
“She has been using the old network to manipulate contracts, officials, charities, and board votes.”
Lucia looked directly into the camera.
“She believes Sofia is the future legal heir to everything Vittorio built.”
Lorenzo’s face hardened.
“She will either control my daughter.”
Lucia paused.
“Or make sure my daughter never inherits.”
The video glitched.
Then Lucia said one final sentence.
“And Lorenzo, if Elena Reyes ever appears in your life, trust her.”
Elena’s heart stopped.
Lorenzo turned toward her.
Lucia continued.
“Her mother was the first person brave enough to tell the truth.”
The video ended.
Nobody moved.
Elena stared at the black screen.
Lucia had known her name.
She had known Elena might someday become part of this.
Then Sofia began crying upstairs.
May you like
Lorenzo looked toward the sound.
And at the same moment, every light in the townhouse went out.
