Chapter 4 - Uncle Gabriel Comes Home
Gabriel arrived before sunrise.
Nobody had called him.
That was the first problem.
The second was his ring.
Silver.
Heavy.
The Moretti crest cut into the face.
Emma saw it from the landing and hid behind Elena.
Alejandro noticed.
Gabriel opened his arms as if entering an ordinary family breakfast instead of a locked-down mansion after an attempted poisoning.
“You look terrible,” he told Alejandro.
“I almost died.”
“So I heard.”
“From who?”
Gabriel smiled.
“You own half the people in this city and think news travels slowly?”
“I don’t own people.”
Gabriel glanced around the armed foyer.
“Of course not.”
He had helped raise Alejandro and Luca after their father died.
He had taught them to shoot.
To negotiate.
To never sit with their backs to doors.
When Luca died, Gabriel handled the funeral because Alejandro could barely speak.
For years, Alejandro had called him the closest thing he had left to a father.
Now Emma was staring at his hand.
Gabriel noticed her.
His smile vanished for half a second.
Then returned.
“And who is this?”
Alejandro watched every muscle in his uncle’s face.
“Emma.”
“Elena’s daughter?”
“You know Elena?”
Gabriel’s eyes moved toward her.
“Staff lists are my business.”
“No.”
Alejandro stepped closer.
“They are Tomas’s.”
Gabriel shrugged.
“Then perhaps I heard the name.”
Emma whispered, “Mama.”
Elena crouched beside her.
“What?”
Emma pointed at Gabriel.
“Window man.”
Silence swallowed the foyer.
Gabriel laughed.
“I’m sorry?”
“She says she saw you outside the basement window,” Alejandro said.
Gabriel’s expression did not change.
“A four-year-old recognizes everyone in a suit?”
“She recognized your ring.”
Gabriel slowly looked down at his hand.
Then removed it.
“There are six of these.”
“Five,” Tomas said.
Gabriel looked toward him.
Tomas continued.
“Luca’s disappeared after his death.”
Gabriel’s mouth tightened.
Alejandro stepped closer.
“Where were you at nine-forty last night?”
“Dinner at Cicero Club.”
“Witnesses?”
“Thirty.”
“Camera?”
“Several.”
Too easy.
Alejandro knew it.
Gabriel knew he knew it.
“I heard somebody poisoned your wine,” Gabriel said.
“That information has not left this property.”
“You just said attempted poisoning in front of me.”
“No.”
Alejandro’s voice flattened.
“I said I almost died.”
For the first time, Gabriel had no immediate answer.
Elena went pale.
Tomas quietly moved one hand toward his jacket.
Gabriel laughed again.
“Fine.”
“I got a call from Dominic.”
Alejandro looked toward Tomas.
Dominic Shaw was the night security captain.
One of the two guards who had stopped Emma from reaching him.
Tomas’s expression changed.
“Dominic never reported calling anyone.”
Gabriel shrugged.
“Then ask him.”
They did.
Dominic was gone.
His locker had been emptied.
His phone was off.
His car remained in the staff lot.
And the side gate camera showed no one leaving.
Alejandro ordered the property searched.
Gabriel remained perfectly calm.
Too calm.
Twenty minutes later, a guard called from the old greenhouse.
They had found Dominic.
He was alive.
Barely conscious.
And tied to a chair.
Alejandro stared at Gabriel.
Gabriel’s face had finally lost its smile.
Because someone had just destroyed his convenient explanation.
Then Dominic woke long enough to whisper three words.
“Not… Gabriel… ring.”
His eyes rolled shut.
Alejandro looked at the crest ring in his uncle’s hand.
If Gabriel had not poisoned him, someone wanted Alejandro to believe he had.
Which meant the real enemy was not only inside the mansion.
May you like
They were controlling the direction of the investigation.
