Chapter 3
We went to Adrian's house before midnight.
Not to search.
To listen.
That distinction matters.
Anyone can tear apart a room.
You learn more from what people tried to hide badly.
Sofia stayed at the Caradonna estate with Noah and a doctor.
She didn't argue.
That told me how exhausted she really was.
Adrian and Evelyn came with us.
They complained the entire way.
Evelyn first.
“This is humiliating.”
I ignored her.
“You're dragging a sixty-three-year-old woman through her son's home like a criminal.”
Still ignored.
Adrian tried something else.
“You're frightening Sofia for nothing.”
I looked at him.
“She's not here.”
“That proves my point. She's too fragile to even face the mess she created.”
One of my men clenched his jaw.
I almost smiled.
Adrian had no idea how close he was to becoming unpopular with men who usually considered domestic problems beneath them.
We reached the lower level.
No dramatic dungeon.
No chains hanging from walls.
Just a finished wine corridor.
Stone floor.
Climate-controlled storage.
A sitting room nobody used.
A locked door.
Adrian stopped.
“That's storage.”
I looked at him.
“You said there was no man.”
He shrugged.
“There wasn't.”
“Then open it.”
“I don't have the key.”
Evelyn spoke quickly.
“Neither do I.”
One of my men tried the handle.
Locked.
I looked at Adrian.
“Break it.”
He laughed.
“This is my house.”
I nodded.
“Yes.”
Then my bodyguard kicked the door open.
The room beyond was small.
No windows.
Single chair.
Thin mattress.
Plastic cup on the floor.
A plate near the wall.
Untouched.
No man.
But blood stained one corner of the mattress.
I walked inside.
Evelyn stayed at the threshold.
Adrian didn't.
He wouldn't cross.
Interesting.
I looked at the plate.
Dry bread.
Nothing else.
A water bottle.
Empty.
Sofia had been in here six hours.
Maybe Gabriel much longer.
I turned.
“You fed my pregnant daughter this?”
Adrian looked annoyed.
“She refused dinner.”
“There was dry bread.”
“She wanted sympathy. I gave her something else to focus on.”
Evelyn smiled coldly.
“Children learn faster when they're hungry. Apparently Sofia never grew out of needing lessons.”
I walked toward her.
She stopped smiling.
Behind me one of my men called:
“Boss.”
I turned.
He was holding a small child's sock.
Blue.
Noah's.
My chest tightened.
Adrian shrugged.
“He wandered downstairs once.”
“What happened?”
“He wouldn't leave.”
“So?”
“I shut the door.”
My voice dropped.
“With him inside?”
“Ten minutes.”
Evelyn laughed.
“He screamed like someone was cutting him open. Ridiculous.”
I stared at her.
She waved one hand.
“We opened it eventually.”
Eventually.
Three years old.
Locked in a room with a bloodied stranger and his pregnant mother.
I imagined Noah crying against that door.
Imagined Sofia trying to comfort him while afraid herself.
Adrian spoke behind me.
“If Sofia hadn't filled his head with fear, he wouldn't behave like that.”
Of course.
Always the victim's fault.
I walked deeper into the room.
The wall behind the mattress had scratches.
Not random.
Four letters.
G.R.
Gabriel Rourke.
Below it:
S.M.
St. Michael.
Then:
E.H.
I looked at Evelyn.
Her maiden name wasn't Hale.
Her married initials were E.H.
She noticed.
“That means nothing.”
I crouched.
Something was wedged beneath the mattress.
A black enamel pin.
Small.
Oval.
No crest.
No marking.
I recognized it anyway.
My father used black pins decades earlier when men needed to identify each other during closed family operations.
We hadn't used them in twenty years.
Adrian looked at it.
Too long.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
I stood.
“Where is Gabriel?”
“I told you—”
“You told me he didn't exist.”
Silence.
“Where?”
Evelyn snapped:
“Maybe he died. Men like him usually do.”
I looked at her.
“You seem very comfortable with that possibility.”
She smiled.
“He betrayed your family.”
“According to whom?”
Her smile faded.
Good.
One of my bodyguards entered from the corridor.
“Boss.”
“What?”
“Garage camera.”
He held up a phone.
Footage.
Adrian's SUV leaving two nights earlier.
3:14 a.m.
Two men carrying something between them.
A body.
Alive or dead, impossible to tell.
They loaded it into the rear.
Adrian watched the screen.
“Could be anyone.”
I zoomed in.
One shoe dragged along the concrete.
Black.
Blood on the heel.
Same blood pattern as the mattress.
I looked at Adrian.
“Where did you take him?”
He smiled.
“Ask Sofia.”
I stepped closer.
“What?”
“She wanted him gone.”
Lie.
Obvious.
But then he added something he shouldn't have.
“She should have kept her mouth shut when he told her about the chapel.”
Silence.
Adrian realized it immediately.
I smiled.
“Thank you.”
His face hardened.
“For what?”
“You just confirmed he spoke.”
I handed the phone back.
Then I looked at Evelyn.
“And you just confirmed you expected him to die.”
For the first time, neither had an answer.
Then another bodyguard called from the garage.
He had found something inside Adrian's SUV.
A torn strip of fabric.
Dark gray.
Gabriel's blood on it.
And stitched into the inside seam were three words.
CARADONNA CARRIAGE HOUSE.
I knew the place.
Abandoned for fifteen years.
Seven miles north.
I looked at Adrian.
May you like
His confidence finally cracked.
Because now I knew where to go.
