Chapter 6 - SAINT ORSIN
Adriano went to Saint Orsin before sunrise.
He took Lucian.
Not Victoria.
Not Salvatore.
Not Anthony.
Lucian noticed.
“You trust me?”
“No.”
“Then why me?”
“Because you tried hardest to stop me opening the doll.”
Lucian almost smiled.
“Interesting logic.”
“If you’re lying, I want you close.”
The abandoned chapel stood in woodland forty miles north.
Its stone walls had blackened with age.
The bell tower was partially collapsed.
Old Bellacorte men avoided the place.
Not because it was haunted.
Because families created ghosts more efficiently than buildings did.
The black key opened nothing on the main floor.
Lucian moved toward the altar.
“There.”
A carved serpent circled the base of a wooden saint.
Adriano pressed it.
Stone shifted.
A staircase descended.
Cold air rose.
Lucian whispered:
“Victoria never knew this part.”
“How did you?”
“Elena.”
Adriano stopped.
Lucian continued before being asked.
“She brought me here once.”
“When?”
“Eight months before the ambush.”
Adriano looked at him.
“Were you sleeping with my wife?”
Lucian’s face hardened.
“No.”
“Good.”
The danger in Adriano’s voice was obvious.
Lucian held his gaze.
“She needed someone inside the family who knew how to keep a secret.”
“Apparently she chose well.”
The bitterness struck.
Lucian accepted it.
At the bottom of the stairs was a narrow corridor.
Three doors.
The first held old furniture.
The second held crates of religious objects.
The third had no handle.
Only a keyhole.
The black key fit.
Inside was a room without windows.
A bed.
A table.
Wall markings.
Someone had lived there.
Years.
Adriano touched one carved date.
Twenty-seven years earlier.
Nico.
Lucian found letters scratched into the stone.
Not words.
Initials.
N.B.
G.V.
M.V.
Adriano recognized Nico Bellacorte.
Gabriel Voss.
Margaret Vale.
Margaret had been involved before Elena.
Before Sophia.
Long before Adriano understood any of it.
On the table sat another broken silver bell.
Adriano placed Elena’s beside it.
The halves fit.
A complete bell.
Inside the bell was a tiny metal cylinder.
Lucian stared.
“Elena knew.”
Adriano opened it.
No paper.
A strip of old photographic film.
They held it toward Lucian’s flashlight.
Faces.
Six people outside Saint Orsin.
Young Nico.
Gabriel Voss.
Margaret Vale.
Mariano.
Adriano’s father.
And—
Salvatore.
Adriano stared.
His uncle had lied again.
“Salvatore said he watched the Custodian.”
Lucian studied the film.
“Maybe he did.”
“He was in the room.”
“That doesn’t prove what side.”
Adriano looked at him.
“You’re becoming annoyingly reasonable.”
Lucian almost smiled.
“Victoria says the same.”
They searched farther.
Behind the bed was a narrow tunnel.
It ended beneath the old bell tower.
Someone had escaped.
Nico.
Maybe others.
On the wall near the tunnel entrance was one sentence carved deep:
THE FAMILY LIES BEST WHEN IT CALLS IT LOVE.
Adriano stood in silence.
His father told him Nico betrayed Bellacorte.
Salvatore told him Elena died.
Lucian hid Elena’s investigation.
Victoria hid Nico.
Every lie had been justified with love, loyalty, survival.
The same poison in different bottles.
A sound came from the tunnel.
Lucian raised his weapon.
Footsteps.
Slow.
Adriano stood still.
A man appeared from the darkness.
Seventy perhaps.
Tall.
Thin.
White hair pulled back.
Gabriel Voss.
Alive.
He looked at Adriano.
“You have your father’s face.”
Adriano’s expression hardened.
“Everyone who says that eventually regrets it.”
Gabriel smiled.
“Elena said exactly that.”
Adriano crossed the room.
“Where is she?”
“Alive the last time I saw her.”
“When?”
“Four months ago.”
Adriano stopped.
“Where?”
Gabriel shook his head.
“You’re still asking the easiest question.”
“It is the only question keeping you alive.”
Gabriel looked toward Lucian.
“Elena trusted you.”
Lucian said nothing.
“She was wrong.”
Lucian’s face changed.
Adriano noticed.
“What does that mean?”
Gabriel looked back at Adriano.
“The Custodian knew Elena was coming here because Lucian told Victoria.”
Lucian immediately said:
“That is not what happened.”
Gabriel continued.
“Victoria told someone else.”
Adriano stared at Lucian.
“You told your wife.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because Elena was asking about Nico and Victoria knew him.”
Adriano’s eyes hardened.
“And Victoria told who?”
Lucian looked away.
Gabriel answered.
“Her father.”
Adriano frowned.
Victoria’s father had been dead fifteen years.
Gabriel smiled faintly.
“Another Bellacorte grave without a body.”
Adriano’s blood turned cold.
May you like
“How many dead relatives are alive?”
“More than your family can afford.”
