Part 5 – The Man Everyone Believed Was Dead Walked Into the Romano Estate Nobody spoke.
Part 5 – The Man Everyone Believed Was Dead Walked Into the Romano Estate
Nobody spoke.
The security image remained frozen on the tablet.
A tall man in black gloves.
And beside him...
An older man with silver hair beneath a black overcoat.
Judge Moretti stared at the screen as though he had seen a ghost.
"I buried him."
His voice trembled.
"I stood beside an empty coffin because the body had been too badly burned to identify."
Carlo answered quietly.
"Then someone wanted the world to believe he was dead."
Alessandro never took his eyes off the image.
"Run facial recognition."
Carlo nodded.
"It won't matter."
"Why?"
"Because Massimo Conti erased every official record twenty years ago."
Alessandro looked toward him.
"Then don't search government databases."
"Search ours."
Carlo understood immediately.
The Romano organization maintained its own archive.
Every ally.
Every enemy.
Every betrayal.
Every photograph.
If Massimo had breathed within a hundred miles of Providence during the last thirty years...
Someone in the Romano files had seen him.
Meanwhile...
Emma quietly tugged Alessandro's sleeve.
"Sir?"
He looked down.
"What is it?"
The little girl hesitated.
"The man wasn't old."
Everyone turned toward her.
Judge Moretti frowned.
"What do you mean?"
Emma pointed toward the tablet.
"His hair was gray."
"But..."
She frowned as she searched for the words.
"His hands weren't."
Silence.
Alessandro enlarged the image.
The face appeared seventy years old.
But the exposed hands...
Smooth.
Strong.
Almost youthful.
Carlo leaned closer.
"She's right."
"No liver spots."
"No arthritis."
"No age swelling."
Judge Moretti whispered,
"That's not an old man."
"It's a disguise."
Before anyone could speak again...
Another guard hurried inside.
"Boss."
"The archive returned a match."
He placed another photograph beside the tablet.
The room froze.
The two men looked almost identical.
Except one picture had been taken eighteen years earlier.
Name:
Luca Ferretti.
Age:
Forty-two.
Occupation:
Professional theatrical makeup artist.
Known associate of the Conti Syndicate.
Specialty:
Creating false identities.
Carlo looked at Alessandro.
"The man on the camera isn't Massimo."
"It's Ferretti."
"Wearing Massimo's face."
Isabella's eyes widened.
"No..."
She grabbed the photograph.
"Luca?"
She looked genuinely shocked.
"He worked for my father."
Judge Moretti immediately noticed her reaction.
"You didn't know."
She slowly shook her head.
"My father always met people alone."
"I never knew their names."
Then something suddenly struck her.
"Oh, God..."
Alessandro looked at her.
"What?"
"The phone call."
"What phone call?"
"Three nights ago."
She swallowed hard.
"I overheard my father."
"He said..."
"'The girl has become unreliable.'"
"'If she won't finish Romano...'"
Her breathing became uneven.
"'We'll activate Lorenzo.'"
Everyone stared.
Carlo frowned.
"Lorenzo?"
"The chef?"
"No."
Isabella looked horrified.
"There was another Lorenzo."
"A code name."
The room fell silent once more.
Judge Moretti slowly opened the last compartment inside the old file.
Hidden beneath decades of documents...
Was a handwritten letter.
The envelope bore only three words.
For Alessandro Only.
His father's handwriting.
Alessandro carefully unfolded the pages.
The ink had faded.
But every word remained legible.
If you are reading this... then I have failed to stop what is coming.
His hands tightened.
The room listened in silence.
Massimo never believed in peace.
He believed only in patience.
One day he would send someone close enough to destroy us without firing a single bullet.
Alessandro continued reading.
Then suddenly stopped.
His expression changed completely.
Judge Moretti noticed.
"What is it?"
Very slowly...
Alessandro lowered the letter.
"My father didn't write Isabella's name."
"Then whose?"
He looked toward Carlo.
"He wrote..."
"'Never trust the one who protects your food.'"
Everyone instinctively turned toward the kitchen corridor.
Chef Lorenzo was dead.
The breakfast had been poisoned.
But Chef Lorenzo had prepared meals for the Romano family for twenty-eight years without incident.
Then Carlo's face went pale.
"Boss..."
Alessandro looked at him.
"What?"
Carlo spoke slowly.
"There is someone else..."
"...who has full access to every kitchen..."
"...every meal..."
"...every medicine..."
"...and every room in this house."
The dining room door creaked open.
Everyone turned.
Standing quietly in the doorway...
Still wearing her black maid's uniform...
Was Emma's mother, Sofia.
She looked terrified.
Not because guns were pointed toward the hallway.
Because she had heard Carlo's final words.
And she whispered the sentence that froze everyone in place.
"No..."
"You've been looking at the wrong servant."
Then she slowly raised a trembling hand...
And pointed past everyone in the room.
Toward the elderly housekeeper, Maria, who had worked for the Romano family for thirty-five years.
"The poison..."
May you like
"Was never put there by Isabella."
"It was Maria."
