Chapter 19 #2
My feet carried me down the familiar hallway before I could talk myself out of it. Past the formal dining room where we'd hosted Sunday dinners. Past the sitting room where Papa would read the paper every morning. Past all the spaces that held memories of a man who was gone.
The office door was closed.
I hesitated, my hand on the handle. Behind this door, my father had died. Bled out on his favorite Persian rug while his killer—whoever they were—walked away.
You can do this. You have to do this.
I pushed the door open.
The office looked untouched. Papa's desk still neat, papers stacked precisely how he'd left them.
His chair pushed back slightly, as if he'd just stepped away for a moment.
The only evidence that anything had happened was the missing rug—removed for forensic analysis—and the faint discoloration on the hardwood beneath where they couldn't quite scrub away all the blood.
I swallowed hard and forced myself to step inside.
Focus. You're here to investigate, not fall apart.
I moved to his desk first, running my fingers along the smooth mahogany surface. What would Papa have been working on before he died? What papers had he last touched?
The top drawer held the usual—pens, business cards, a leather-bound notepad with Papa's initials embossed on the cover. I flipped through it. Mostly business notes, phone numbers, reminders about meetings. But on one of the last pages with writing, something caught my eye.
"F – 9 p.m. Tuesday. Wine. Talk."
Tuesday. That was the night he died.
F could be anyone—Frankie, one of his captains. Federico from the construction company. But my mind immediately went to Filomena. She'd mentioned stopping by that evening, hadn't she? Said she'd had a glass of wine with him before she left.
I kept flipping. A few pages earlier: "Situation escalating. Can't ignore it anymore. Time to make the hard call."
What situation? The hard call about what?
I photographed both pages with my phone and kept searching.
The side drawers held files—business documents, real estate holdings, investment portfolios. All things Carlo would have already reviewed. Nothing new there.
I closed the drawers and moved to the bookshelf. The books were alphabetized—Papa's obsessive organization on full display. But one spine was pushed in slightly further than the others. I pulled it out.
The Count of Monte Cristo.
A slip of paper fell out, fluttering to the floor. I picked it up.
It looked like a phone number. No name, no context. Just ten digits written in Papa's handwriting.
I photographed it and slipped the paper back into the book.
Then I noticed the security panel by the door. A small red light blinked where there should have been green. I moved closer, examining it.
The system had been manually overridden the night Papa died. I'd seen the police report—they'd noted the front window in the upstairs guest room had been left open. Professional hit, they'd assumed. Someone came in through the window.
But the security panel told a different story. The system hadn't been bypassed from outside. It had been disarmed from inside. By someone with the code.
My stomach dropped.
Only family had the code. Carlo. Filomena. Dominic. Angelo. Me.
Not Quentin Vanetti.
I pulled out my phone and took photos of the security panel display, zooming in on the timestamp and the override notation.
My hands were shaking now.
If the system had been disarmed from the inside, that meant someone Papa knew—someone he trusted enough to let into his home—had either killed him or helped his killer get access.
But who? And why?
I stood in the office, surrounded by my father's things, and felt the careful certainty I'd been clinging to start to crumble.
Quentin's name was on everyone's lips. The family had decided he was guilty. Filomena had "sources" that confirmed it. We were moving toward war with the Vanettis because we all believed he'd ordered the hit.
But the evidence in this room—the security override, the cryptic notes, the mysterious meeting—told a different story.
Someone in the family was lying.
Someone in the family had secrets.
And maybe—just maybe—someone in the family had killed my father.
My phone buzzed. A text from Carlo: Where are you?
I typed back quickly: Had to pick up something from my apartment. Then I’m headed to the airport.
Be careful, Sorella. Situation dangerous. Watch your back.
Will do.
I couldn't tell him I was here. Not yet. Not until I understood what I'd found. Not until I knew who to trust.
I took one last look around the office, committing every detail to memory. Then I slipped out, reset the alarm, and stepped back onto the street.
A chill wind cut through my jacket as I walked, but I barely felt it.
All I could feel was the weight of what I'd discovered pressing down on me.
The weight of doubt.
The weight of betrayal.
The weight of knowing that the truth—whatever it was—was going to destroy everything I thought I knew about my family.