THE MAFIA BOSS WATCHED HIS MAID STRUGGLE WITH A HEAVY MIRROR... UNTIL HIS FIANCÉE'S LIE LED HIM TO A HIDDEN LISTENING DEVICE

Chapter 05 - The Fiancée's Other Secret

Celeste did not ask to sit. She stood beside the desk with her hands clasped around the strap of her handbag, as if she expected someone to take it from her. The emerald gown was gone, but the arrogance Nora had seen in the hall had not entirely vanished. Fear had simply pushed it aside.

“Your sister is alive?” Dante asked.

“Her name is Lily. She lives in a flat Enzo pays for outside the city. He says he’s helping her, but he controls her appointments, her money, even who can visit. She has a heart condition. When our father died, we were left with debts we couldn’t pay. Enzo offered to help. At first, I thought he was being generous.”

“And then he asked for something.”

“He asked me to tell him when you planned to travel, who you met, which accounts you were moving. He said it was only to protect the family from a rival group. When I refused, he showed me photographs of Lily leaving her doctor’s office.”

Dante’s face was unreadable. “So you agreed to spy on me.”

“I agreed to keep my sister alive.”

Celeste told them that Lily had been diagnosed with a heart condition at twenty-one. Their father had left debts and a stack of unpaid bills, and Celeste had been working two jobs when Enzo first offered to help. He paid for a specialist, found Lily a safe apartment, and made himself indispensable. Only later did Celeste realize that every favor came with a quiet condition attached. Enzo never threatened her in public. He simply mentioned Lily’s next appointment, the name of her doctor, or the route she took home, and Celeste understood what would happen if she disappointed him.

“I kept telling myself I could manage him,” Celeste said. “That if I gave him little things, I could keep the important things out of his hands. Then I looked back and realized I’d given him a map of your life.”

“No. I found one in the library three weeks ago. I took it apart and started recording the people who came to collect the data. I thought if I had proof, I could make Enzo leave us alone.”

“You thought you could blackmail my uncle?”

“I thought I could survive him.”

Nora watched Celeste’s hands. The fingers were trembling. It did not erase the way she had grabbed Nora’s wrist, or the way she had lied without hesitation. But it explained why Celeste had looked at the camera before she acted: she knew the room was being watched, and she had been trying to make the recording show a servant damaging a mirror rather than a woman removing evidence.

“Why did you hurt Nora?” Dante asked.

Celeste looked at Nora for the first time. “I panicked. She saw the device and reached for it. I thought she would tell you, and Enzo would know I’d been trying to collect evidence. I grabbed her. I didn’t mean to bruise her that badly.”

“You don’t get to decide how badly someone is hurt,” Nora said.

Celeste’s eyes filled, but Nora did not soften. “You could have told me the truth. You could have asked for help. Instead, you made me carry a mirror that could have crushed me and lied while I was standing there bleeding.”

“I know.”

“Do you?”

Celeste had no answer.

Dante picked up the smaller recorder. “What did you capture?”

“Enzo talking to Silas. They discussed the camera logs, the mirror, and a shipment scheduled for Friday. I don’t know what’s in it. Enzo said the house would be empty when it arrived.”

Silas’s name settled over the room like dust. Dante did not move, but Nora saw his jaw tighten. The security chief had been beside him for fifteen years. He had taught Dante how to recognize a tail, how to change routes, how to spot a weapon beneath a coat. The thought that he might be helping Enzo would have seemed impossible yesterday.

“Where is the recording?” Dante asked.

“On a drive. I hid it in the lining of my suitcase.”

“Where is the suitcase?”

“In my room.”

Dante called Silas to bring the suitcase, then immediately stopped himself. He looked at Nora, and she understood the question before he asked it.

“Who can we trust to retrieve it?”

“Not Silas,” Nora said.

Dante nodded once. He sent Agnes instead, with a guard who had no direct connection to the family. When they returned, the suitcase was untouched. The drive was still hidden in the lining, wrapped in a piece of tissue paper.

They listened together.

The recording was faint at first, filled with the rustle of clothing and the click of a door. Then Enzo’s voice came through, clear enough to make Nora’s skin tighten.

“The girl is back in the house,” he said. “Samuel’s daughter. If she finds the ledger, everything we did will come apart.”

Silas answered, “She doesn’t know where it is.”

“She knows enough to be dangerous. Keep her busy. If necessary, let the mirror fall. An accident is an accident.”

Nora stopped breathing.

Dante’s hand closed around the edge of the desk. Celeste covered her mouth. The recording continued with Enzo discussing Friday’s shipment, the listening devices, and a list of names he wanted moved out of the city before the end of the month.

Then Silas said something that made Dante go completely still.

“What about the boy?”

Enzo replied, “He’s old enough to understand what his father did. If he chooses to become his father, he’ll have to be dealt with the same way.”

The recording ended with a burst of static.

Nora looked at Dante. “He means you.”

Dante did not answer. His eyes were fixed on the blank screen of the recorder. His uncle had not merely been watching him. He had been preparing for the possibility that Dante might uncover the truth and refuse to protect the family name.

Celeste sat down, finally. “I can help you find Lily. But you have to promise Enzo won’t know I gave you this.”

Dante looked at her. “I won’t promise something I can’t guarantee.”

She nodded, almost relieved. “At least that’s honest.”

Nora picked up the recorder and turned it over. The casing was scratched near the battery cover. A tiny label had been placed beneath it, handwritten in blue ink.

CRESCENT—ROOM 12.

She had seen the same notation on her father’s page. Room 12 had been circled three times.

“Where is Room 12?” she asked.