Chapter 6
The library bylaws contained the answer.
An emergency operational clause.
If the chairman left during a verified security crisis involving family members, control of restricted vault access temporarily passed to the senior operations director until the chairman formally returned.
Damian.
Adriano looked up from the document.
“Who wrote this?”
Charlotte hesitated.
“Your father originally approved the structure.”
Twenty years earlier.
Long before Damian held the position.
But someone had amended the clause six months ago.
The temporary authority window had been expanded from ten minutes to one hour.
Approval signatures:
Bernadette.
Damian.
Two trustees.
Bernadette’s breathing changed.
“I thought that was for fire evacuation.”
Damian looked away.
She saw it.
Her hands flattened against the table.
“You told me the old rule was impractical.”
“It was.”
“You never mentioned this.”
Damian exhaled through his nose.
“Because you didn't need the details.”
Bernadette stared at him.
That sentence cut deeper than he intended.
For years she had protected him because he was her only son.
Now he had spoken to her like an employee.
Adriano watched silently.
No violence.
No interruption.
Let the wound open itself.
Charlotte explained what Damian could have done during the sixty-minute emergency window.
Alter vault access.
Cancel shipment holds.
Authorize emergency removal of endangered materials.
Change temporary security assignments.
Enough to erase evidence connecting him to the missing Psalter.
But Adriano noticed something else.
“Why an emergency vote?”
Counsel pulled the amendment history.
A second clause allowed trustees present on-site to appoint an acting security chair if the family head appeared unable to manage an active crisis.
Damian needed Adriano absent.
Or unstable.
Ideally both.
Bernadette looked at him.
“You said Theo would be returned before midnight.”
Damian’s eyes narrowed.
“He would.”
“How?”
“The driver brings him back.”
“What driver?”
Silence.
Bernadette’s face changed.
She looked toward Adriano.
“I was told Lisa would be with him.”
Lisa was a retired Carbone nanny.
Adriano immediately called.
She answered from Cape Cod.
She had never been asked to come to Boston.
Bernadette’s hand rose to her mouth.
Damian closed his eyes.
Too late.
Adriano’s voice dropped.
“Who was taking my son?”
Damian said nothing.
Enzo entered with a phone recovered from the fake restoration jacket.
One outgoing message had been sent at 8:48.
Child moves alone. No family escort.
Bernadette read it.
Her knees nearly gave.
May you like
The plan she believed was a temporary hiding place had never included the trusted nanny Damian promised.
Theo was supposed to leave with a stranger.
