"Are you all right?"
She held him tightly.
"I'm fine."
He looked over her shoulder at Alessandro.
"Who is he?"
Elena hesitated.
"Don Alessandro Moretti."
Daniel's expression changed.
"Oh."
Alessandro extended his hand.
"Daniel."
Daniel shook it cautiously.
"Sir."
"I understand you found something belonging to your father."
Daniel looked at Elena.
"Should I show him?"
Elena nodded.
Daniel reached into his backpack and removed a small brown envelope.
Inside were three photographs, a handwritten letter, and a folded sheet of paper covered in faded numbers.
Alessandro took the photographs first.
The first showed Thomas Vale standing beside Vittorio Moretti.
The second showed the two men outside a building.
The third was different.
It showed Vittorio standing beside a younger Salvatore.
Behind them, partially visible near a black car, was another man.
Alessandro recognized him immediately.
Marco's father.
He had died when Marco was seventeen.
Alessandro turned the photograph over.
There was a date written on the back.
November 14.
The night before Vittorio's death.
He opened the letter.
The handwriting was familiar from the old financial records.
Thomas Vale had written it to someone named Clara.
Alessandro read silently.
Then he stopped.
"What is it?" Elena asked.
He looked up.
"Your father believed my father was going to be murdered."
Daniel stared at him.
"What?"
Alessandro unfolded the paper.
"These are not ordinary accounting figures."
"Then what are they?" Elena asked.
"Names. Payments. Dates."
He looked at the final line.
A single sentence had been written beneath the numbers.
IF VITTORIO DIES, DO NOT TRUST THE BROTHER.
Nobody spoke.
Elena looked at Alessandro.
"His brother?"
Alessandro folded the paper.
"Salvatore."
Daniel sat down.
"But why would my father keep something like that?"
"Because he was afraid."
Elena looked at the photographs.
"Did my father know who killed yours?"
Alessandro's expression hardened.
"I intend to find out."
***
Salvatore Moretti arrived at the estate at nine that evening.
He was sixty-one years old, silver-haired, impeccably dressed, and possessed of the kind of charm that made people forget how carefully he watched them.
He had been a father figure to Alessandro.
He had attended every important family occasion, supported every business decision, and personally introduced Alessandro to the men who would eventually become his closest advisers.
He entered the study without knocking.
"I hear you've brought guests."
Alessandro stood behind his desk.
"Who told you?"
Salvatore smiled.
"Must I have a reason to visit my own family?"
"You don't live here."
"I helped build this house."
"You helped inherit it."
Salvatore's smile faded slightly.
Then his eyes moved toward Elena and Daniel.
"Who are these people?"
Elena remained silent.
Alessandro answered.
"Elena Moretti and her brother."
Salvatore looked at her more carefully.
"Moretti?"
"Her father's name was Thomas Vale."
The older man's expression did not change.
But his right hand tightened around the head of his cane.
"Thomas."
He seemed almost amused.
"That is a name I haven't heard in years."
Elena stepped forward.
"Did you know my father?"
Salvatore looked at her.
"Unfortunately."
"Was he a thief?"
The question surprised him.
Then he laughed softly.
"Young woman, your father was a very complicated man."
"That's not an answer."
Alessandro watched his uncle.
Salvatore's eyes narrowed.
"You have your father's courage."
Elena felt a cold discomfort settle in her stomach.
"What happened to him?"
"Thomas made poor decisions."
"Where is he?"
Salvatore looked at Alessandro.
"I assume you haven't told her everything."
"No."
"Perhaps you should."
Alessandro's jaw tightened.
"Leave."
Salvatore did not move.
"You're making a mistake, Alessandro."
"Leave my house."
For several seconds, uncle and nephew stared at one another.
Then Salvatore turned toward the door.
Before leaving, he looked at Elena again.
"Your father should have stayed away from this family."
The door closed behind him.
Daniel released a breath.
"That man is terrifying."
Elena looked at Alessandro.
"Is he telling the truth?"
Alessandro did not answer immediately.
Instead, he walked to the desk and placed the photograph beside the lamp.
"I don't know."
"He's your uncle."
"That doesn't make him innocent."
Elena looked down at the paper.
"Then why did you let him speak to us like that?"
Alessandro raised his eyes.
"Because I needed to see his reaction."
"And?"
He looked at the photograph.
"He recognized something."
"What?"
Alessandro pointed toward the figure standing behind Vittorio and Salvatore.
"That man."
Elena leaned closer.
"Who is he?"
"Someone who was supposed to be dead."
***
At midnight, Elena found herself unable to sleep.
The guest bedroom was beautiful, but the silence made her uncomfortable.
She walked into the corridor and followed the faint light coming from the library.
Alessandro was inside.
He sat behind a large desk, surrounded by documents.
A glass of untouched whiskey stood beside his hand.
He looked up.
"Can't sleep?"
"No."
"Neither can I."
She hesitated at the doorway.
"May I come in?"
He gestured toward the chair opposite him.
Elena sat.
For a while, neither spoke.
Then she noticed a framed photograph on the desk.
A woman with dark hair stood beside a younger Alessandro.
She was smiling.
"Your mother?"
He followed her gaze.
"Yes."
"She's beautiful."
"She was."
Elena looked at him.
"I'm sorry."
He nodded.
"My mother died two years after my father."
"What happened?"
"She stopped believing that there was anything left to save."
The words were quiet.
Elena looked at the photograph again.
"Did you love her?"
"More than I knew how to tell her."
He picked up the frame.
"She used to tell me that power was the loneliest room a man could enter."
Elena considered that.
"Perhaps she was right."
Alessandro gave a faint smile.
"Perhaps."
She looked around the library.
"Do you ever get tired of everyone being afraid of you?"
He studied her.
"People are not afraid of me all the time."
"Only most of the time?"
This time, he actually smiled.
It changed his face.
For a brief moment, he looked younger.
Less like a Don.
More like a man who might have been happy in another life.
"You're unusually honest."
"I'm usually unemployed when I am."
"You're still employed."
"That remains to be seen."
He looked at her.
"Not if I have anything to say about it."
Elena lowered her eyes.
"I don't want special treatment."
"Why?"
"Because I don't want to owe anyone."
Alessandro leaned back.
"Everyone owes someone something."
"That's a terrible way to live."
"It is the only way I know."
She looked at him.
"Then perhaps you should learn another."
For several seconds, he said nothing.
Then he asked, "Do you think people can change?"
Elena considered the question.
"I think they can choose differently. Whether they deserve another chance is something else."
Alessandro watched her.
Outside, rain began to strike the windows.
The sound reminded him of another night.
A night when his father had left the house and never returned.
He closed the photograph and placed it back on the desk.
"Get some rest, Elena."
She stood.
"Goodnight, Mr. Moretti."
"Alessandro."
She paused.
"Goodnight, Alessandro."
When she left, he remained seated for a long time.
He had spent years building walls around himself.
Yet a woman who had entered his life because of three broken glasses had already found a way to speak through them.
***
The following morning, Marco arrived with new information.
"Thomas Vale may still be alive."
Alessandro looked up.
"Where?"
"An old medical facility outside the city. The records are incomplete, but someone has been paying for a private room under another name."
"How long?"
"Eleven years."
Alessandro stood.
"Why wasn't this found earlier?"
"Because the payments were authorized through an account belonging to your father."
Alessandro's expression changed.
"That account was closed."
"Officially."
"Who maintained it?"
Marco placed a document on the desk.
"Salvatore."
Silence.
Alessandro walked toward the window.
For eleven years, he had believed his father was dead and the man responsible had escaped justice.
Now he was beginning to understand that the truth had been hidden inside his own family.
"Prepare a car."
"Where are we going?"
"To find Thomas Vale."
Marco hesitated.
"There's something else."
Alessandro turned.
"Speak."
"Last night, someone accessed the security system at the Belladonna."
"Who?"
"An employee with administrative privileges."
"Bellini?"
Marco nodded.
"And the footage from the evening Elena dropped the glasses has been deleted."
Alessandro's eyes hardened.
"All of it?"
"Except for the backup stored in the private archive."
"Get it."
Marco nodded.
Then he added, "Alessandro, there is a reason I haven't told you something."
The Don regarded him.
"What?"
"Your father didn't die in a random attack."
Alessandro said nothing.
"Someone gave the attackers his schedule."
"Who?"
Marco looked down.
"We're still investigating."
"Who, Marco?"
His consigliere met his eyes.
"Someone inside the family."
Alessandro looked toward the photograph of Vittorio on the wall.
Then he turned away.
"Find them."
***
Elena discovered the first real clue in the most ordinary place.
The laundry room.
She had gone downstairs to retrieve her uniform when she noticed a small envelope tucked beneath a basket.
Her name was written on the front.
She opened it.
Inside was a photograph of her father.
He was standing outside a hospital.
Beside him was a little girl.
Elena.
She was perhaps six years old.
On the back of the photograph, someone had written:
YOUR FATHER DID NOT ABANDON YOU.
Beneath the sentence was an address.