🥂 The Bruised Collar That Exposed His Best Friend and Fiancée

Chapter 05 - The Best Man in the Trunk

Anthony was found two hours later in the trunk of a silver Mercedes behind a shuttered church in Bridgeport.

Alive.

Barely.

That was what Daniel said when he entered the safehouse kitchen where Luca had taken me after the warehouse ambush.

I was sitting at a square wooden table with my mother’s letter folded beside a cup of coffee I could not drink.

Safehouse was too generous a word.

It was a narrow brick building above an old bakery, with bars on the windows and a front door heavy enough to survive things doors should not have to survive.

Luca stood by the sink, sleeves rolled to his forearms, staring at nothing.

Daniel stepped in. “They beat him badly enough to scare him, not kill him.”

Luca turned. “Where is he?”

“Private clinic.”

“Conscious?”

“Sometimes.”

“Vanessa?”

“No sign.”

I looked up. “Did she do it?”

Daniel hesitated.

Luca noticed. “Say it.”

“There was a message left with him.”

He placed a small evidence bag on the table.

Inside was a strip of red silk.

Vanessa’s scarf.

A note was tied around it.

I already knew the handwriting before Luca unfolded it.

Not because I had seen much of Vanessa’s writing.

Because women like Vanessa signed cruelty with perfect penmanship.

Luca read aloud.

You always wanted the truth, darling. Ask Anthony what he let your father do.

The room went silent.

Luca’s face emptied.

Daniel looked away.

I should have stayed quiet. I had already carried too much of other people’s secrets in one night.

But the question left me before fear could stop it.

“What did your father do?”

Luca did not answer.

Daniel did.

“Salvatore Moretti made people disappear.”

Luca’s eyes cut toward him.

Daniel held his ground. “She deserves to know what kind of ground she’s standing on.”

I looked at Luca.

For once, he looked like a man caught between defending the dead and despising them.

“My father believed loyalty was something you tested until it broke,” he said. “Margaret Voss worked in his accounts. If she found evidence of a betrayal, he would have used it.”

“Against who?”

“Everyone.”

That was when I understood.

My mother’s files were not about one affair, one betrayal, or one dead bookkeeper.

They were leverage.

Enough to make Vanessa lie.

Enough to make Anthony shake.

Enough to bring shooters into an old warehouse.

Enough to make a man like Luca Moretti afraid of what his own father had buried.

At noon, Luca took me to the clinic.

I did not want to go.

He did not ask.

Anthony lay in a private room behind two locked doors. His face was swollen, one eye nearly shut, his lower lip split. He looked less like a best man and more like a boy who had finally reached the edge of a lie and found nothing beneath it.

When he saw Luca, tears filled his eyes.

That shocked me more than the bruises.

“Brother,” he whispered.

Luca stood at the foot of the bed. “Do not call me that unless you are ready to tell the truth.”

Anthony’s eyes moved to me.

“I didn’t know about Sarah until after Vanessa found the file.”

“You said that already,” Luca replied.

“It’s true.”

“Then tell me something useful.”

Anthony closed his eyes.

“Vanessa didn’t start this.”

Luca went still.

“She wanted power. Money. The wedding. The name.” He swallowed painfully. “But the files? The warehouse? Margaret Voss? That came from someone else.”

“Who?”

Anthony’s face crumpled.

“My father.”

Luca’s jaw tightened. “Your father is dead.”

“No.” Anthony’s voice cracked. “That’s what they told everyone.”

Daniel muttered something under his breath.

I gripped the chair beside me.

Anthony turned his head toward Luca. “Gabriele Marino is alive.”

The name meant nothing to me.

It meant everything to Luca.

His entire posture changed.

“No.”

Anthony began to cry silently. “I found out eight months ago. Vanessa found out before I did. She said if we helped him recover the ledgers, he would clear my debts. Make me legitimate. Make me more than the boy your family took in out of pity.”

Luca looked as if Anthony had struck him.

“You were my brother.”

“I know.”

“No,” Luca said quietly. “You don’t.”

Anthony sobbed once.

It was ugly.

Human.

“I was jealous of you before I was old enough to know what jealousy was. You had the name, the house, the fear, the loyalty. I had your mother’s kindness and everyone whispering charity case.”

“You had me.”

Anthony looked away.

The silence that followed felt like the end of something that had been dying for years.

I asked, “Why did Vanessa hurt me?”

Anthony looked at me with the shame of a man who had run out of rooms to hide in.

“Because she thought you heard the name Gabriele.”

“I didn’t.”

“I know.”

“Then why threaten me?”

“Because Vanessa never wastes an opportunity to make someone afraid.”

There it was.

The plainest truth in the room.

Luca turned away.

For a second, I thought he was finished with Anthony.

Then Anthony whispered, “There’s more.”

Luca stopped.

“The wedding isn’t the target.”

“What is?”

Anthony’s breathing became shallow.

“They’re moving something through the ceremony.”

“Money?”

“No.”

“Guns?”

Anthony shook his head.

“People.”

Daniel stepped closer.

Anthony stared at Luca.

“Your father’s old enemies aren’t coming to kill you. They’re coming to take back what Salvatore stole from them.”

“What did he steal?”

Anthony’s eyes found mine again.

“Children.”

My stomach turned.

Luca’s face went white beneath his olive skin.

Anthony continued, voice breaking.

“Margaret discovered a trafficking route hidden inside legitimate import paperwork. Your father shut it down after she threatened to expose it. But he kept the ledgers. Gabriele wants them destroyed because his name is everywhere.”

I could not breathe.

My mother had died for children she did not know.

Luca turned to Daniel.

“Get the church guest list.”

Anthony grabbed at the bed rail. “Luca.”

Luca did not look at him.

“He’ll come through the people you trust.”

That made Luca turn back.

Anthony’s mouth trembled.

“And Vanessa knows one person you will never search.”

Before he could say more, his heart monitor began shrieking.

The room erupted.