Chapter 12 A Notary’s Confession, Half-True #3
A voice drifted closer - male, calm, too close to the notary’s age to be a stranger. “Is he… finished?”
Valentina went still beside him. Her breath slowed, controlled again. Enzo felt her readiness like heat.
Enzo didn’t open the door. He spoke through it, voice low. “You’re late.”
Silence on the other side. Then a soft laugh that didn’t reach the humor in the sound. “Late for what?”
Enzo’s gaze stayed fixed on the knob. “For your cleanup.”
Valentina’s hand slid to Enzo’s wrist, not grabbing - anchoring. Her fingers pressed lightly, a reminder that she was here, that she chose to stand in danger with him.
The voice outside shifted, becoming quieter. “You don’t understand. The notary was supposed to answer her questions.”
Valentina’s eyes flashed at that. She mouthed, Don’t let him.
Enzo didn’t move. “He answered enough.”
A pause. Then, with deliberate clarity, the voice outside added, “Enough to make you think you’re in control.”
Enzo felt a cold line of fury cut through him. That voice - the calm cruelty - didn’t sound like an accomplice. It sounded like someone who believed the mastermind’s plan was already done.
Enzo leaned closer to the door and lowered his voice further. “Who are you.”
The answer came too quickly. “Someone who doesn’t need a name.”
Valentina’s lips pressed together hard enough to whiten. She looked like she wanted to punch the door until the man behind it bled.
Enzo stopped her with a look. Not now. Not when the room had already become a kill zone.
The footsteps moved away, then returned, closer. The knob turned slightly - testing, not forcing. The person on the other side knew the door lock and how to get around it if they wanted.
Enzo’s mind raced. The consultation room was locked from their side. If the attacker forced entry, Valentina would be trapped in a room with a dead man and a doorway that didn’t open fast enough.
He made a choice in the space of one breath.
He turned to Valentina. “Stay behind me.”
Valentina’s eyes cut to his. “I’m not your client.”
Enzo didn’t flinch. “You’re my obsession.”
The word slipped out before he could stop it, a truth he’d been holding back since the first time he’d seen her determined to walk into danger without needing permission. It landed between them like a confession and a threat at the same time.
Valentina stared at him, stunned, and then her expression hardened again - because vulnerability always did that to her. It made her want to control the outcome.
“Then protect me with your brain,” she said, voice tight. “Not with your command.”
Enzo’s mouth twitched once, humorless. “Deal.”
He drew his pistol fully and positioned himself near the desk, using the chair and the lamp’s stand as partial cover. He kept his body angled so Valentina could move past him if she needed to. He didn’t give her a cage. He gave her options.
The knob turned again. A click. The lock resisted for a second and then gave way with a quiet, ugly sound - like a promise breaking.
The door swung inward.
A man stood in the opening, dressed in dark suit and clean shoes, his face half shadowed by the corridor light.
He wasn’t wearing gloves this time, but his hands were still bare, still wrong - too clean for a warehouse.
His eyes went straight to the notary’s body, then to Enzo’s pistol, and finally to Valentina. He looked pleased.
“Still alive,” he said.
Valentina didn’t flinch. “You’re the one who poisoned him.”
The man’s smile sharpened. “I’m the one who ensures problems don’t spread.”
Enzo kept the pistol steady. “Where is Donato Greco’s intermediary.”
The man tilted his head. “If I say, will you put that gun down?”
Enzo didn’t answer. His silence was an answer.
The man’s gaze flicked to Valentina again. “She shouldn’t have been able to interrogate him. But you always show up when the plan needs a correction.”
Enzo felt heat crawl up his throat. “You knew I was guarding.”
The man’s smile faded into something more honest. “Of course. The mastermind anticipated your instincts.”
Valentina’s voice turned razor-thin. “You’re working for him.”
The man shrugged slightly. “I work for the outcome.”
Enzo’s mind snapped to the gloved man’s earlier line - Vito is where he’s useful. This wasn’t just a one-off. It was an ecosystem. People placed where they’d be needed to keep the conspiracy moving.
Enzo stepped forward half a pace, aiming the pistol toward the man’s chest but not firing. Not yet. He wanted information. He wanted to keep Valentina safe.
“You came to silence a notary who talked,” Enzo said. “You’ll do it to her too.”
The man’s eyes glittered. “Maybe.”
Valentina moved then - fast, purposeful. She reached down and grabbed the folded transfer authorization from beneath the stack of papers. Enzo saw her fingers pause for half a second over the fresh smudge - the ink residue that matched the smear they’d found in the chain-of-custody binder.
She lifted it like a weapon.
The man’s eyes widened slightly, the first real crack in his composure. “You - ”
Valentina snapped, “You thought he’d only confess enough to stall us. But he didn’t die with nothing. He died with the transfer authorization you thought you’d already removed.”
Enzo’s heart slammed. She’d done it - she’d grabbed the one piece of paper the mastermind didn’t want them to see. And it meant she was holding the exact link to Greco’s political intermediary transfer.
The man’s gaze moved to Enzo’s pistol, then to Valentina’s hands. He made a decision.
He stepped into the room, fast enough that Enzo’s aim had to adjust. The corridor behind him looked dark and narrow, but it also looked like a funnel - like more trouble could follow.
Enzo fired.
The shot cracked the air, loud and brutal in the small room. The man jerked back, a sharp sound escaping him. Blood bloomed at his shoulder, dark against the suit fabric. He didn’t fall immediately, but his posture changed - instinctive pain, anger, and surprise mixed together.
Valentina didn’t scream. She moved. She shoved the transfer authorization into her inner coat pocket and backed toward the consultation room’s second door.
Enzo didn’t give the man a chance to recover. He advanced, pistol still trained, and the man backed toward the corridor with a hiss through his teeth.
“You’ll regret - ” the man started.
Enzo cut him off. “I already do. Keep talking.”
The man’s eyes darted to Valentina, then away. He was assessing. He was figuring out which angle would cost them less time.
Then he did something worse than threaten - he reached toward his jacket pocket.
Enzo shot again, this time aiming low, hitting the pocket area instead of the head or chest. The man shouted and clutched himself, breath tearing.
The sound brought movement from outside - - and Enzo’s pulse spiked in the same instant the hinges outside the notary office complained. Someone was coming fast. Not footsteps, not a cautious approach - an intentional arrival, timed to the moment the notary’s room went loud.
Enzo kept the pistol up and shoved the man back with his shoulder as the consultation room’s side door rattled.
Valentina was already moving, her body angled between the wounded man and the drawer stack that held the sealed files.
She didn’t look afraid; she looked furious, like she couldn’t decide whether to hate the mastermind or herself for trusting the wrong chain of command.
“Don’t,” the man wheezed, pressing a hand to his jacket where Enzo had hit him. His suit fabric soaked dark. “You think you’re stopping - ”
Enzo leaned closer, muzzle inches from the man’s sternum. “You’re protecting a transfer. That means you know who got it.”
The man’s laugh was wet and ugly. “Greco doesn’t need paperwork. Greco needs leverage.”
Valentina’s head snapped toward Enzo. “Donato Greco,” she said, the name landing like a verdict. “That’s who the mastermind wants us to point at.”
Enzo didn’t take his eyes off the attacker. “You said the documents were for destroying criminal empires and political elites.”
The man’s gaze slid toward Valentina’s pocket. “They’re not for paper cuts. They’re for bodies.”
The drawer stack vibrated as Valentina yanked a panel open. The sound was sharp, metal on metal, and it pulled Enzo’s attention for half a heartbeat - long enough for the man to twist and lunge his free hand toward the consultation room’s lock.
Enzo reacted without thinking. He grabbed the man’s wrist, twisted hard, and felt the bones resist. The man screamed - high, furious, not the kind of sound a man made when he was only pretending.
Valentina slammed the open drawer shut again, then reached for the sealed folder that should have been inside the consultation room’s locked compartment. It wasn’t there. Of course it wasn’t. The mastermind had already swapped it once.
The realization hit Enzo like cold water: the transfer authorization wasn’t the only thing missing. The notary’s office was a stage designed to funnel them into the wrong kind of truth.
The door handle outside jostled again. The notary’s office wasn’t large, but it had angles - angles that meant someone could appear from behind a filing cabinet and surprise them in the last second.
Enzo kept the attacker pinned against the wall and spoke low to Valentina. “We’re out of time.”
Valentina’s eyes flashed. “He’s bleeding and talking.”
“He’s buying time,” Enzo said. “For the next body.”
Valentina swallowed. Enzo saw it - saw the way her throat tightened like she was swallowing a scream she didn’t have permission to release.
“If the mastermind wanted Greco to receive the documents through a political intermediary, the notary would have been the clean link. The paper trail is the weapon.”
Enzo heard the logic. He also heard the danger in it. She was still trying to understand. Still trying to build a map out of an ambush.
The lock outside clicked.