Chapter 3 - The House with Too Many Locks
Dominic Moretti’s house did not look like a home.
It looked like a place built by a man who expected war.
Stone walls rose behind iron gates on the edge of Lake Michigan.
Cameras watched the driveway from three angles.
Men in dark coats checked the car before it was allowed through.
The front doors were thick enough to belong on a courthouse.
Lily pressed her face to the window.
“Do you live in a castle?”
“No,” Dominic said.
Anna looked at the turrets along the roofline.
“He absolutely lives in a castle.”
Lily grinned.
Dominic gave Anna a sideways glance.
“You’re enjoying this too much.”
“I’ve had a bad night.”
“You insult people when you’re stressed?”
“Only men who kidnap me politely.”
“I didn’t kidnap you.”
“You surrounded my apartment with armed men and said I was coming with you.”
“That was an invitation with excellent security.”
Anna almost laughed again and hated him a little for making it possible.
Inside, the house was warmer than she expected.
Not cozy exactly, but lived in.
Books on tables.
A pair of reading glasses beside an armchair.
A ceramic bowl filled with wrapped peppermints.
There were family photographs along the hallway instead of expensive art.
One picture stopped her.
Dominic stood beside a younger man with the same dark eyes and crooked smile.
The younger man leaned on a cane.
Michael.
Anna stared.
“You knew him?” Dominic asked behind her.
“No.”
“You recognized him.”
“From Noah’s photograph.”
“That’s not what your face said.”
Anna turned.
“My face is none of your business.”
“Tonight everything in your life appears to be my business.”
“That is exactly the problem with men like you.”
Before Dominic could answer, an older woman entered from the kitchen.
She was in her sixties, silver hair twisted into a low knot, cardigan buttoned neatly over a dark dress.
“Dominic,” she said, “you brought home a child.”
He looked almost embarrassed.
Anna blinked.
The woman’s gaze moved to Lily.
“Thank God. I was beginning to think this house would die of seriousness.”
Lily held up Rosie, the torn rabbit.
“She had an accident.”
The woman crouched.
“Then she came to the right place. I have been repairing Moretti men for thirty years. Rabbits are easier.”
Dominic sighed.
“Anna, Lily, this is Teresa Marino. She raised me after my mother died.”
Teresa looked at Anna for one careful second.
“You need tea,” she said.
“I need to leave.”
“No, dear. You need tea first. Then you can make poor decisions with proper hydration.”
Lily followed Teresa immediately.
Anna watched her daughter disappear toward the kitchen.
“She trusts strangers too easily.”
“No,” Dominic said. “She chooses people quickly. Different thing.”
Anna looked at him.
“You think she chose you?”
“She borrowed me.”
“That is not the same thing.”
His expression changed, just slightly.
“I know.”
They moved into Dominic’s study while Carlo coordinated security.
Dominic placed Noah’s photograph and the strip of paper heart on the desk.
“Tell me everything about the week your husband disappeared.”
Anna folded her arms.
“You first.”
“What?”
“You keep asking questions like you’re the only person who lost someone. Tell me why Michael was with Noah.”
Dominic leaned back against the desk.
For several seconds, he said nothing.
Then he began.
Michael Moretti had never wanted the family business.
He studied architecture, loved motorcycles, and had an irritating habit of believing every problem could be solved if people sat down and told the truth.
“He was terrible at being a Moretti,” Dominic said.
Anna heard affection beneath the words.
“Then why was he at a warehouse with Noah and Victor?”
“Because six months before Noah disappeared, Michael started auditing our legitimate companies. He said money was vanishing.”
“How much?”
“Millions.”
“And you didn’t know?”
“I knew numbers were wrong. I didn’t know who was moving them.”
“Victor handled the foundation accounts.”
“And twelve other companies.”
Anna stared at him.
“You trusted him.”
“I did.”
“What changed?”
“Michael died.”
The answer was simple enough to hurt.
Anna sat down.
“Noah changed the month before he disappeared,” she said. “He checked the windows twice every night. He stopped parking in front of our building.”
Dominic listened.
“He told me a man at work had discovered something dangerous. I assumed he meant you.”
“Reasonable.”
“You’re not offended?”
“I know my reputation.”
“He said the dangerous thing wasn’t what his boss did. It was what his boss didn’t know was being done in his name.”
Dominic went very still.
A knock sounded at the study door.
Carlo entered carrying a laptop.
“We traced the numbers on the heart.”
Anna stood.
Dominic moved beside him.
“They aren’t a locker,” Carlo said. “They’re coordinates.”
A map appeared on the screen.
A point blinked near the lakefront, forty miles north of Chicago.
Dominic recognized the area.
“No,” he said.
Anna looked at him.
“What?”
“That land belonged to my father.”
“Belonged?”
“We sold it fifteen years ago.”
Carlo enlarged the satellite image.
A shuttered summer camp sat among bare trees near the water.
Dominic stared at the main building.
Michael and he had spent summers there as boys.
Then Lily appeared in the doorway wearing an oversized kitchen apron.
“Mr. Dominic?”
He turned.
She held Rosie, now stitched awkwardly but whole.
“What is it?”
“Miss Teresa says I can have hot chocolate if Mommy says yes.”
Anna looked at the clock.
After midnight.
“One small cup.”
Lily beamed.
Then her eyes fell on the laptop map.
She walked closer.
“I know that place.”
Anna’s skin prickled.
“No, you don’t, sweetheart.”
“Yes, I do.”
Lily pointed at the lake.
“Daddy took me there.”
Anna stared at her daughter.
“Lily, you were two when Daddy disappeared.”
“I know.”
“You can’t remember that.”
Lily frowned.
“Not Daddy-Daddy.”
The room went silent.
Dominic crouched in front of her.
“What do you mean?”
“The man Mommy said wasn’t Daddy.”
Anna’s heart hammered.
“When?” she whispered.
Lily looked at her as if the answer were obvious.
“Last winter.”
Anna grabbed the edge of the desk.
“What man?”
“The man at the park.”
Dominic’s entire body tightened.
“What did he look like?”
Lily looked at the family photograph on the wall.
Then she pointed.
At Michael Moretti.
“Him.”
Dominic turned toward the picture of his dead brother.
May you like
Lily hugged Rosie to her chest.
“He told me not to tell Mommy,” she said. “He said bad people were listening.”
