Chapter 5 - The Voice on the Recording
They reached the Fulton warehouse eleven minutes later.
Marco was alive.
Barely.
The bullet had hit his shoulder.
The shooter was gone.
Dante’s men spread through the building while an emergency medic worked on Marco behind an overturned table.
Clara stayed beside Sophia in the armored SUV.
Dante had refused to leave his daughter at home.
Sophia had refused to stay anywhere without Clara.
The arrangement suited nobody except Sophia.
Clara watched through the tinted window as Dante knelt beside Marco.
Ten minutes later he returned.
His expression told her very little.
“Is Marco okay?”
“He’ll live.”
“Did he see the shooter?”
“No.”
“Did he finish what he was saying?”
Dante looked at Sophia.
“No.”
Clara knew he was lying.
Not maliciously.
Protectively.
“What did he tell you?”
Dante lowered his voice.
“Later.”
“Dante.”
It was the first time she had called him by his first name.
He noticed.
So did she.
Neither acknowledged it.
“Not in front of her.”
Sophia narrowed her eyes.
Dante almost smiled.
“She understands more than you think,” Clara said.
“That is exactly what I’m afraid of.”
Back at the Vancini residence, Luca began working on Elena’s recorder.
The device was old but undamaged.
By sunrise, he recovered three files.
Two were ordinary.
Elena reminding herself to call a caterer.
Elena recording Sophia singing when she was four.
The third file lasted nine minutes and fourteen seconds.
Dante sat at the dining table.
Clara sat opposite him.
Sophia was upstairs with the nanny.
Luca placed the recorder between them.
“Ready?”
No one was.
He pressed play.
At first there was static.
Then Elena’s voice.
“I’m recording this because Thomas was right.”
Clara closed her eyes.
Hearing her father’s name in the voice of a dead woman made everything suddenly real.
Elena continued.
“Julian has been moving money for at least five years. But I was wrong about why.”
Papers rustled.
“He isn’t stealing from Dante.”
Dante frowned.
“He’s building something.”
Elena’s breathing became audible.
“Accounts. Judges. Police. Politicians. Men inside our own organization.”
A door opened somewhere in the recording.
Elena whispered.
“He’s here.”
Footsteps.
Then Julian’s voice.
Even through old electronics, Clara recognized the calmness.
“Elena.”
“What are you doing here?”
“You asked to meet.”
“I asked Dante.”
“He sent me.”
“He would never send you.”
Pause.
Julian laughed softly.
“You always were difficult.”
“What are you planning?”
“Nothing you need to worry about.”
“I have the accounts.”
A longer silence.
“What accounts?”
“Thomas Hale found everything.”
Clara’s throat tightened.
“You should be careful with accountants.”
“You threatened him.”
“I warned him.”
“He was afraid for his daughter.”
“Then he should have remembered he had one.”
Clara pressed both hands against the table.
Dante looked at her.
She did not look back.
On the recording, Elena said, “I gave copies to someone you will never find.”
Julian’s voice changed.
“Who?”
“No.”
“Elena.”
“No.”
A sharp sound.
The slap Sophia had remembered.
Dante surged to his feet.
Clara grabbed his wrist.
“It already happened.”
His chest rose heavily.
He forced himself to sit.
The recording continued.
Elena sounded breathless.
“If you touch me again—”
“What? You’ll tell Dante?”
“Yes.”
“You think he’ll believe you?”
“He’s my husband.”
“And I’m his blood.”
Elena gave a bitter laugh.
“I’m the mother of his child.”
Julian said nothing.
Then footsteps approached.
Another man.
Unknown voice.
“We have a problem.”
Julian: “What?”
Unknown man: “The car downstairs. Vancini security.”
Elena: “Dante is here?”
Unknown man: “No. Just a driver.”
Julian swore.
Then Elena spoke.
“She’s here.”
Julian: “Who?”
Elena’s voice cracked.
“My daughter.”
Everything stopped.
Dante stared at the recorder.
On the recording Julian whispered, “Sophia?”
Elena began moving.
A door slammed.
Footsteps.
Then the recording became muffled.
Voices.
Distant.
A child crying.
And then another voice entered.
A woman.
“Stop.”
Clara looked at Dante.
He did not recognize it.
The woman continued.
“You were supposed to scare Elena. Nothing more.”
Julian answered.
“I know.”
“You hit her.”
“She threatened us.”
“She threatens everybody.”
“She has evidence.”
“We’ll take it.”
Elena shouted from farther away.
“You stay away from my daughter!”
Then the woman’s voice again.
“Julian, handle the child.”
Sophia screamed.
Dante’s face drained.
Clara could barely breathe.
Then Julian said something very quietly.
“I’m not killing a child.”
The unknown woman answered.
“Nobody said kill her.”
A pause.
“Make sure she never tells Dante what she saw.”
The recording ended.
Nobody moved.
Clara looked at Dante.
“Marco was right.”
Julian had not been alone.
Dante replayed the final twenty seconds.
Again.
And again.
Trying to recognize the woman.
Nothing.
Then the dining room door opened.
Sophia stood there.
She had heard.
Dante immediately switched off the recorder.
Too late.
Sophia stared at it.
Her eyes filled with terror.
Clara stood.
“Sophia.”
The girl took one step backward.
Then another.
“No,” Dante said softly. “It’s okay.”
Sophia shook her head violently.
She pointed at the recorder.
Then she pointed toward the front of the house.
Dante frowned.
“What?”
Sophia ran.
They followed.
She crossed the foyer and stopped in front of a framed photograph.
A Vancini family portrait.
Twenty people.
Parents.
Cousins.
Aunts.
Uncles.
Sophia reached up.
Her finger landed on a woman standing beside Dante’s late father.
Elegant.
Dark-haired.
Around sixty.
Dante stared.
“No.”
Sophia tapped the face again.
Clara looked at him.
“Who is she?”
Dante’s voice became almost inaudible.
“My mother.”
Isabella Vancini.
The woman who had embraced Elena at her wedding.
The woman who had cared for Sophia after Elena died.
The woman who currently lived in Rome.
The woman Dante trusted more than anyone alive.
His phone began ringing.
He looked at the screen.
MOTHER.
Dante stared at it.
Then answered.
“Hello.”
Isabella’s voice came through clearly.
“Dante, darling.”
Pause.
“I heard Sophia started talking.”
Dante’s eyes lifted slowly toward his daughter.
“How?”
May you like
Isabella laughed softly.
And then she said, “Because Julian just arrived at my house.”
