THE MAFIA BOSS’S LEDGER

“Matteo, please!” Celeste shrieked, falling to her knees among the scattered toys. “Don't do this!”

Matteo’s face was carved from stone. His dark eyes were empty, reflecting none of the warmth I’d seen when he looked at the photograph of the boy. The heavy suppressor on the end of his pistol didn't waver.

“Where is he?” Matteo demanded, his voice a lethal whisper.

“I don't know!” Celeste sobbed. “We just got here! The door was broken—”

“Don't lie to me anymore, Celeste.” Matteo stepped further into the room, kicking a wooden block out of his way. “I tracked your phone. I watched you leave the warehouse with Ellen. I know you’ve been siphoning my money for six years to fund this place.”

I stood up slowly, keeping the blue toy train visible in my hand. “Mr. Rinaldi. Mercer beat us here. He took the boy.”

Matteo’s eyes snapped to me. “Mercer doesn't know about this place. Only Paul knew. And Paul is dead.”

The words hit the room like a physical shockwave.

“Dead?” I breathed.

“I found his car at the bottom of the harbor an hour ago,” Matteo said coldly. “Mercer tied up loose ends. But Mercer doesn't have Leo.”

“How do you know?” I asked.

Matteo lowered the gun slightly, reaching into his coat pocket with his free hand. He pulled out a heavy, gold pocket watch on a thick chain. It was scratched and ancient.

“Because this was on the kitchen counter,” Matteo said, his voice cracking just a fraction. “My father’s watch. I gave it to Leo on his first birthday. I told his caretaker to make sure he always had it.”

Celeste looked up, her tear-streaked face contorting in genuine confusion. “You... you gave him the watch? But you didn't know where he was.”

Matteo finally looked at her, his expression a mix of rage and profound exhaustion.

“You stupid woman,” Matteo said, the fight suddenly draining from him. He lowered the gun completely. “Did you really think you could hide my own son from me in my own city? I’ve known where he is since the day you moved him here.”

Celeste stared at him, paralyzed. “You knew? But... the dummy accounts. The money I stole—”

“I let you steal it,” Matteo said. “Because it kept him safe. It kept him off my official books. My enemies look at my ledgers. They don't look at the money my fiancée supposedly embezzles for her shopping habits. You thought you were outsmarting me, Celeste. I was using you as a shield for my son.”

I stood frozen, processing the magnitude of the lie. The $90,000 dispute, the blackmail, the entire dinner party—Matteo had orchestrated the chaos to expose Paul, yes. But he had been protecting Leo the whole time.

“Then who took him?” Celeste whispered, horror dawning on her face. “If Paul is dead, and Mercer doesn't know…”

A sudden, sharp realization hit me. I thought back to the leather journal. To the newspaper clipping from seventeen years ago.

“It wasn't Paul who betrayed you,” I said, my voice cutting through the heavy air.

Both Matteo and Celeste looked at me.

“Mr. Rinaldi, you said you hired me because I caught the flaw your people missed all those years ago,” I said, my mind racing through the financial web I’d seen on Paul’s laptop. “But Paul wasn't stealing for himself. The money he took from Celeste wasn't going to a bank account in his name.”

“Where was it going?” Matteo asked sharply.

“I didn't trace it all the way. But the shell company that received the blackmail money… the LLC that bought the house in Elm Creek… it wasn't Westbridge Legal.” I looked at Matteo. “It was Westbridge Holdings.”

Matteo’s face went pale.

“Westbridge Holdings,” I continued, “is the parent company of the commercial kitchen supplier I used to work for. The one that was bought out after I was fired.”

Matteo gripped the gold watch so tightly his knuckles turned white. “Thomas Mercer owns Westbridge Holdings.”

“Mercer didn't just find out about Leo,” I said. “He’s known for years. He used Paul to blackmail Celeste, forcing her to siphon your money directly into his own development project. And when you forced the audit at dinner last night, Mercer realized his cash cow was dead. He didn't just take Paul out.”

I looked at the open front door.

“He took Leo to guarantee his exit.”

Before Matteo could speak, a bright beam of light swept across the front windows. Then another. And another.

The heavy crunch of tires on gravel echoed through the silent woods. Dozens of vehicles.

“They’re here,” Celeste whimpered.

Matteo moved with terrifying speed. He grabbed Celeste by the arm, hauling her to her feet, and shoved her behind the heavy oak bookcase in the corner of the room. He turned to me, his eyes burning with a cold, desperate fire.

“Ellen. Under the floorboards in the hallway, there’s a steel lockbox. Open it. The code is Leo’s birthday.”

“What’s in it?” I asked, my heart pounding against my ribs.

“Leverage,” Matteo said, raising his gun and stepping toward the window.

A megaphone crackled outside.

“Matteo!” Thomas Mercer’s voice boomed through the trees. “Come out! We have a lot of accounting to discuss. And bring the waitress. She has my money.”

Matteo looked back at me. “Go.”

I ran into the hallway, dropping to my knees. I felt along the hardwood floor until I found the loose plank. I pried it up, revealing a heavy digital safe.

I didn't know Leo’s birthday.

Panic seized my throat. I looked back toward the playroom. Matteo was taking cover by the window frame.

Think. Think.

The photograph in the journal. It was dated August 2024. He looked about four years old in the picture.

I punched in 0-8-2-0. Red light. Incorrect.

Outside, the sound of car doors slamming echoed like gunshots.

“Matteo, you have sixty seconds!” Mercer yelled. “Or I put the boy in the trunk and you never see him again!”

I stared at the keypad. What was the code?

Then I remembered the gold watch. Matteo said he gave it to him on his first birthday. But the watch was engraved. I had seen the scratch marks on the back when Matteo held it.

11-04.

I typed 1-1-0-4.

The light flashed green. The heavy steel door popped open.

Inside wasn't a weapon. It wasn't cash.

It was a thick file of documents. And sitting on top of them was a worn, child’s drawing of a blue train, with a message scrawled in clumsy crayon.

For Daddy. From Leo.

But as I pulled the file out, a single piece of paper slipped from the stack and landed on the floor. It was a birth certificate.

I stared at it, the breath leaving my lungs.

The mother was listed as Celeste Vance.