Chapter 9 - The Man Who Watched Her LiveElias had kept the original clinic warning.
Anna had never known.
He removed it from a locked box beneath his bed.
WE KNOW YOU AND THE BOY LIVED.
Vincent compared the handwriting with the message attached to Dominic’s photograph.
Same slant.
Same unusual capital W.
“You kept this for three years?” Anna asked.
Elias looked ashamed.
“I was protecting you.”
“Everyone says that right before admitting they lied.”
Vincent glanced at her.
He recognized the sentence.
Elias sighed.
“The warning came from someone who later contacted me privately.”
“Who?”
“A man named Thomas Vale.”
Vincent frowned.
“I know that name.”
Anna did too.
Thomas Vale had served as Moretti Holdings’ head of security before retiring shortly before the plane crash.
“He told me Carlo’s people were searching for Anna,” Elias said.
“Why didn’t you tell me his name?”
“Because Vale said there was another threat.”
Vincent leaned forward.
“From whom?”
Elias looked at Anna.
“Marcus Bennett’s partner.”
Anna stared.
“My father didn’t have a partner.”
“In the investigation, he did.”
“Raymond Carter?”
“No.”
Elias placed another photograph on the table.
Dominic Russo.
Twenty years younger.
Anna whispered, “Dominic?”
Vincent shook his head.
“He would have been barely twenty.”
“He was Marcus’s accounting assistant.”
Elias nodded.
“Marcus trained him.”
Vincent sat back.
Dominic had joined Moretti Holdings at twenty-three.
Carlo had presented him as a promising financial analyst.
No one mentioned Marcus Bennett.
Elias continued.
“Vale believed Dominic helped Marcus hide the trust records.”
“That doesn’t make him dangerous,” Anna said.
“No. But after Marcus died, Vale discovered Dominic had been transferring money from Carlo’s shell companies.”
Vincent frowned.
“Stealing from Carlo?”
“Or moving evidence.”
Anna looked at Dominic’s photograph.
“Maybe he was still helping my father.”
Vincent pointed to the ransom note.
“Then who abducted him?”
Elias shook his head.
“I don’t know.”
Sophia arrived with Helen Park.
Helen examined both notes.
“These weren’t mailed.”
“No,” Anna said. “Hand-delivered.”
Helen turned toward Elias.
“Thomas Vale is dead.”
Everyone went silent.
“When?”
“Two years ago. Apparent suicide.”
Elias looked stunned.
“He contacted me six months ago.”
Helen frowned.
“That’s impossible.”
Elias took out an old prepaid phone.
“The messages are here.”
Helen read them.
Short instructions.
KEEP ANNA HIDDEN.
CARLO IS WATCHING.
DO NOT TRUST DOMINIC.
The last message came six months earlier.
THE BOY MUST NEVER ENTER MORETTI CUSTODY.
Vincent’s face darkened.
Helen checked the number.
“It could have been anyone using Vale’s identity.”
Anna whispered, “Someone has been directing Elias.”
Elias looked sick.
“I thought I was protecting you.”
“You were,” Anna said.
She meant it.
Whatever the deception, Elias had saved her life.
Helen asked to see Marcus’s drive.
Anna hesitated.
Vincent noticed.
“You still don’t trust her.”
“I don’t know who compromised the original investigation.”
Helen accepted that.
“Fair.”
Sophia suddenly said, “The pendant.”
She removed Marcus’s memory card.
“We never opened this.”
Anna looked toward the laptop.
“Maybe it contains the encryption key for the drive.”
They inserted the card.
One file.
A text document containing a series of numbers.
Dominic’s employee identification number appeared first.
Vincent whispered, “He is the key.”
Anna entered the number into Marcus’s encrypted drive.
It opened.
Hundreds of files appeared.
Financial records.
Audio recordings.
Photographs.
Then one folder.
FLIGHT.
Anna’s hands trembled.
Inside was an audio recording dated twelve days before the crash.
Marcus’s voice.
Then Dominic’s.
Marcus said, “If Carlo discovers Anna’s pregnancy secures the trust, he will move.”
Dominic answered, “Then we move first.”
“What are you proposing?”
“Force Vincent to see what his uncle is.”
“How?”
“We create evidence Carlo cannot bury.”
Marcus’s voice sharpened.
“No operations involving my daughter.”
“I would never hurt Anna.”
The recording ended.
Vincent replayed the final sentence.
“I would never hurt Anna.”
Anna whispered, “But Rebecca heard his voice.”
Sophia opened another file.
A photograph.
Dominic meeting Thomas Vale at the private airport forty-eight hours before the crash.
Vincent’s jaw tightened.
“So Dominic was there.”
Another audio file.
Vale’s voice.
“The sensor is disabled.”
Dominic replied, “Good.”
Anna’s breath caught.
Vale continued.
“The aircraft will be forced into emergency landing.”
Dominic said, “That’s all. Nobody gets hurt.”
Vincent slammed his fist against the table.
“They caused the emergency.”
Anna stared at the screen.
“Why?”
Sophia whispered, “To expose Carlo.”
The next recording answered.
Dominic said, “Carlo’s men will move when the aircraft lands. Federal agents will be waiting.”
Marcus replied, “And Anna?”
“She’ll evacuate with Vincent.”
Anna almost laughed.
The cruelty of the assumption.
She looked at Vincent.
Instead of evacuating with her, he had chosen Sophia.
Their plan had depended on his loyalty.
His failure changed everything.
Helen looked horrified.
“The emergency landing was staged.”
“But the explosion wasn’t,” Vincent said.
Anna nodded slowly.
Someone had turned a controlled trap into attempted murder.
A final file appeared.
Recorded minutes before takeoff.
Dominic speaking alone.
“Carlo discovered the operation. Abort everything. Do not disable the sensor.”
Vincent stared.
“So Dominic tried to cancel it.”
Helen said, “But someone proceeded anyway.”
Anna looked at the maintenance records.
“Using Dominic’s credentials.”
A telephone rang.
Not anyone’s mobile.
The townhouse landline.
Anna answered.
Silence.
Then Dominic’s voice.
Weak.
“Anna?”
“Dominic?”
Vincent grabbed another receiver.
“Where are you?”
“I don’t know.”
“Who has you?”
Dominic coughed.
“He wants the drive.”
“Who?”
A sound of impact.
Dominic groaned.
Then another man took the phone.
His voice was distorted.
“Bring the drive to the old Moretti slaughterhouse at midnight.”
Vincent said, “Let Dominic go.”
The man laughed.
“You still think this is about Dominic?”
Anna’s hand tightened around the receiver.
“What do you want?”
The distorted voice answered.
“The truth Marcus Bennett stole from me.”
Then the line disconnected.
Elias stared at Anna.
Sophia looked frightened.
Vincent asked Helen, “Who would say Marcus stole the truth?”
Helen was silent.
Anna suddenly remembered her father’s photograph.
Antonio.
Marcus.
Raymond.
Three men.
But every picture had been cropped strangely on the left side.
She pulled up the original digital scan.
There was part of another shoulder.
Another person had been standing beside them.
Someone had been cut out.
Anna enlarged the image.
A fourth man appeared.
Young.
Smiling.
Vincent stared.
“No.”
He recognized him.
Anna did too.
It was Carlo’s younger brother.
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