Chapter 5 - The Woman in the Red Scarf
Clara left the hospital without saying goodbye.
She made it as far as the covered entrance before the first tear fell.
Not because Gabriel might have been alive.
Not because Leonardo's family had entered her marriage like a shadow she could suddenly see.
She cried because Gabriel had apparently been making decisions about her life while she sat beside a hospital bed begging him not to leave.
Leonardo followed but stayed several feet away.
Dante remained near the doors.
Clara wiped her face angrily.
"Don't tell me he did it to protect me."
Leonardo stopped.
"I wasn't going to."
"Good."
"Because everyone keeps using that word like it makes lying noble."
"Protection without consent is just control with better marketing."
Leonardo absorbed the sentence without arguing.
That surprised her.
"You're right," he said.
Clara looked at him.
"Gabriel used to say that too."
"Then he should have remembered it."
A black SUV waited at the curb.
Clara refused to get in until Leonardo told her where they were going next.
"Nowhere unless you choose."
She folded her arms.
"I want to find the woman in the photograph."
Dante joined them.
"We don't have the photograph."
"Then we find the security report."
Within an hour, Leonardo's attorneys obtained a copy of the closed property investigation through Clara's authorization.
The original photograph had never been logged into long-term storage.
However, an intake clerk had scanned both sides before transferring it to hospital security.
The digital image appeared on a laptop in a quiet hotel conference room.
Clara stared at the woman in the red scarf.
She looked about thirty-five in the picture.
Dark hair framed a narrow face.
Her eyes were serious, almost familiar.
Clara could not place why.
Leonardo could.
"Elena."
Dante swore softly.
Clara turned.
"Who is Elena?"
Leonardo sat back.
"Gabriel's mother."
Clara looked from him to the screen.
"You told me she died before your father."
"She did."
"Then why would Gabriel keep an old photograph of her in a hospital bed three years ago?"
Leonardo leaned forward.
"Because that wasn't the original photograph."
He zoomed in on the woman's wrist.
A modern smartwatch was visible beneath the sleeve of her coat.
Dante stared.
"That's not Elena."
"She looks like her."
Clara's pulse quickened.
"A sister?"
Leonardo shook his head.
"Elena had one daughter before she met our father."
"She disappeared when she was a child."
"Our father spent years searching."
Clara felt the story expanding beyond anything she could follow.
"What was the daughter's name?"
"Sofia Maren."
Dante opened a search window and began typing.
Several minutes later, he found a licensing record for a Sofia Maren, age forty-one, working as a private financial investigator in Philadelphia.
The photograph matched.
Clara stared at the screen.
"Gabriel had a half sister."
"Apparently."
"And you didn't know she was alive?"
Leonardo's voice turned bitter.
"There are many things I am discovering I didn't know."
They called the number attached to Sofia's business registration.
Disconnected.
They checked the office address.
Vacant for eighteen months.
Then Dante found an archived professional conference page with Sofia's photograph and a short biography.
One line made Clara sit forward.
Sofia specialized in forensic accounting, shell-company tracing, and financial fraud.
"Gabriel's missing records," Clara said.
Leonardo nodded.
"He may have asked her to help."
Dante searched property records and found a current mailing address in Providence.
Clara stood.
"We're going."
Leonardo studied her.
"You haven't slept."
"Neither has the person who broke into my apartment."
The drive to Providence took less than an hour.
Sofia's address led them to a narrow brick building overlooking the river.
A florist occupied the ground floor.
An apartment sat above it.
Clara climbed the stairs first.
Leonardo did not try to stop her.
She knocked.
Nothing.
She knocked again.
A lock clicked.
The door opened three inches.
A woman's dark eye appeared in the gap.
Then the door slammed.
Clara stared at it.
"Sofia?"
Silence.
Leonardo stepped forward.
"We don't want trouble."
A voice came through the door.
"That's what Falcone men always say before they bring it."
Clara looked at Leonardo.
He almost rolled his eyes.
"I'm Clara Bennett."
The apartment went silent.
Clara raised her hand so the ring was visible through the peephole.
"Gabriel gave me this."
The lock clicked again.
The door opened slowly.
Sofia Maren stood inside wearing jeans, a gray sweater, and no makeup.
She looked older than the hospital photograph but unmistakably the same.
Her eyes dropped to the ring.
Her face crumpled for one second before she recovered.
"He told me you'd come someday."
Clara's breath caught.
"When?"
Sofia stepped aside.
"Three years ago."
Clara did not move.
"Before the crash?"
Sofia looked at Leonardo and then back at Clara.
"After it."
The hallway went completely still.
Clara's fingers tightened around the ring.
"You spoke to Gabriel after the crash?"
Sofia nodded.
"Once."
Clara's voice cracked.
"After they told me he was dead?"
Sofia's eyes filled with regret.
"Yes."
May you like
Clara stepped into the apartment.
"Then start talking."
