Chapter 3 - THE DEVIL IN THE ROOM
The dining room erupted into absolute pandemonium.
Several female guests screamed, pushing their chairs back so violently they crashed to the hardwood floor. A wealthy shipping tycoon at the far end of the table grabbed his wife’s arm and bolted for the arched doorway, desperate to escape the madness.
“Nobody leaves!” Vincent Bellini roared.
He snapped his fingers. Immediately, the two massive men in dark suits who had escorted Arthur into the room pulled heavy, matte-black handguns from beneath their jackets. They pointed the weapons at the ceiling, their faces stone-cold.
The guests shrieked, diving under the mahogany table or pressing their backs against the expensive silk-lined walls.
I stood frozen in the center of the chaos, unable to process what I had just heard.
He’s not Thomas Carter.
The words echoed in my brain, bouncing around like shattered glass. The hazel eyes, the facial structure—how could he not be my father?
“You’re lying,” I breathed, staring at the scarred old man holding the silver pocket watch. “You look exactly like him. The photo…”
Arthur Bellini looked at me with immense, agonizing pity.
“I don’t look like him, Emily,” Arthur whispered, his scarred cheek twitching. “He looked like me. Thomas Carter was my half-brother. Our father had an affair with a maid… a lot like you. Vincent and I never claimed him. But when the warehouse fire happened, Vincent saw an opportunity.”
My stomach heaved. I felt physically sick.
Vincent Bellini stepped forward, buttoning his charcoal suit jacket as if he were preparing to give a corporate presentation rather than holding thirty-four people hostage at gunpoint.
“It was a stroke of genius, really,” Vincent said, smiling at Luca. “The police were looking for an arsonist. The Moretti family was looking for someone to blame for the loss of their precious imported cargo. Arthur here got a little too close to the blast radius when he set the fire for me. He was horribly burned. His face was ruined.”
Vincent walked over to Arthur and callously patted the scarred side of the old man’s face. Arthur flinched, looking at the floor.
“So,” Vincent continued casually, “we simply swapped their identities. Thomas Carter—the loyal, stupid chauffeur who discovered I was skimming off the top of the Moretti shipments—was thrown into the flames. Arthur, burned beyond recognition, was sent to the hospital under Thomas’s name. A few well-placed bribes to the medical examiner, and voila. Thomas Carter took the fall, and my brother got to hide in the shadows for nearly three decades.”
Teresa Moretti was shaking uncontrollably. She held onto Luca’s arm for support, her eyes fixed on the silver pocket watch in Arthur’s trembling hand.
“My husband,” Teresa choked out. “My husband died of a heart attack eleven years ago.”
“Did he?” Vanessa mocked, her sweet, refined fiancée persona completely vanished. She stood beside her father, her eyes flashing with venom. “Your husband was a dinosaur, Teresa. He refused to expand the waterfront territory. He refused to work with the cartels. He was holding us back.”
Luca’s expression was terrifying. I had worked for him for four years, and I had always known him as a quiet, intense, but fundamentally fair man. I had never seen the mafia boss underneath. Until tonight.
His eyes were pitch black, empty of any human emotion.
“So you had your brother kill my father,” Luca said, his voice softer than a whisper, yet it cut through the room like a blade. “And you stole his watch as a trophy.”
“Not a trophy, Luca,” Vincent corrected, stepping closer to the head of the table. “Insurance. You see, Arthur is a coward. He’s been threatening to go to the police for years. The guilt over killing your father was eating him alive. So, I kept the watch. I told him that if he ever breathed a word, I’d hand this watch to the police with his fingerprints all over it.”
Vincent sighed dramatically.
“But then, my brilliant daughter Vanessa came up with a much cleaner solution. Why fight the Moretti family when we could simply marry into it? Once she was your wife, she would have access to the trust. But that stubborn old bat—” Vincent pointed a thick finger at Teresa “—refused to yield her voting rights.”
I looked at Vanessa. She was adjusting her diamond engagement ring, looking incredibly bored by her father’s monologue.
“The wedding was a sham,” I said, the words tumbling out of my mouth before I could stop them. “You never loved him.”
Vanessa laughed. It was a sharp, ugly sound.
“Oh, Emily. You sweet, pathetic little peasant. Of course I didn’t love him. Luca is weak. He runs this family like a legitimate corporation. No blood, no violence, no real money. The Bellinis are built for war. This marriage was a hostile takeover.”
She turned to Teresa, pointing at the forged document still sitting on the table next to the spilled champagne.
“Sign the paper, Teresa,” Vanessa ordered. “You sign the paper transferring the voting rights to me, and we walk out of here. If you don’t, my father’s men will start putting bullets into the heads of your wealthy friends. And we’ll start with the help.”
Vanessa’s cold eyes locked onto me.
Luca shifted smoothly, stepping between me and Vanessa. The protective gesture made my breath hitch.
“You think you can walk into my house, hold my guests hostage, confess to my father’s murder, and walk out alive?” Luca asked, his tone dangerously calm.
“I don’t think it, Luca, I know it,” Vincent sneered. He pulled a small remote control from his pocket. “Because my men aren’t just at the doors. I paid off your perimeter security. I have ten men outside with automatic rifles. You have no one.”
Vincent pushed a button on the remote. A heavy, metallic CLANG echoed through the house, followed by the electronic whir of the steel security shutters descending over the dining room windows, plunging the room into artificial light and locking us in a vault.
“Sign the paper, Teresa!” Vincent roared, raising a hand to strike the elderly woman.
“Don’t touch her!” I screamed, grabbing the heavy silver serving tray I had dropped and swinging it wildly.
The edge of the tray clipped Vincent’s wrist. He howled in pain, stumbling backward.
“You stupid bitch!” Vanessa shrieked. She reached into her elegant red silk evening bag and pulled out a small, silver derringer pistol. She pointed it directly at my chest.
“I’ve wanted to put a bullet in you since the day I moved in,” Vanessa hissed, her finger tightening on the trigger.
“Vanessa, wait!” Arthur Bellini suddenly shouted, stepping forward with his cane.
Vanessa didn’t lower the gun. “Stay out of this, Uncle Arthur. You’re a liability.”
“Look at her neck, Vanessa!” Arthur cried out, his scarred face pale with a new, distinct terror. “Look at what she’s wearing!”
Vanessa frowned, her eyes darting to my throat.
During the struggle with the heavy tray, the top button of my maid’s uniform had popped open. Resting against my collarbone was a small, intricately carved wooden pendant on a cheap leather string. I had worn it under my clothes every day of my life. My mother had tied it around my neck the day before she died in the car crash. She told me it was the only thing my father had left behind for me.
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Vincent Bellini looked at the wooden pendant. The color drained completely from his arrogant face.
“Where did you get that?” Vincent demanded, his voice suddenly shaking. “That’s impossible. We burned that coat with the body! We searched his pockets! We searched the ashes! How do you have the key to the Geneva vault?!”
