Chapter 4 - ISABELLA’S CAR
The car had been hidden under a gray tarp for four years.
Detective Vargas sent photographs before she returned.
Black Mercedes.
Front end crushed.
Passenger side damaged.
Driver’s airbag deployed.
Brown stains still visible on the upholstery.
Vincent stared at the images without speaking.
Anthony Moretti arrived twenty minutes later.
He did not look like his brother.
Vincent was broad, dark, controlled.
Anthony was leaner, lighter in expression, with an easy charm that probably explained why Lucas and Leo called him nicer.
That charm disappeared the moment he saw the photographs.
“You found it.”
Vincent stood.
“You knew it existed.”
Anthony looked at me.
Then the twins.
“Not here.”
Vincent’s face hardened.
“My sons are here because someone has been poisoning them in their bedrooms.”
Anthony froze.
“What?”
“You heard me.”
“Vincent—”
“Why did you hide Isabella’s car?”
Anthony looked at his nephews.
“Boys, why don’t you—”
“No.”
Vincent stepped closer.
“They’ve spent eighteen months surrounded by adults lying to them.”
Lucas and Leo looked frightened.
I disagreed with his choice but understood it.
Anthony rubbed both hands over his face.
“Because the accident didn’t make sense.”
Vincent went still.
“You told me it did.”
“I told you what you needed to hear.”
“Don’t.”
Anthony’s jaw tightened.
“You were destroying people.”
Silence.
Vincent’s voice became dangerously soft.
“What does that mean?”
“You remember the first forty-eight hours?”
I did not.
Vincent did.
His face said so.
Anthony continued.
“You put three men in the hospital because you thought they might have followed her.”
Vincent said nothing.
“You nearly shot a state trooper.”
“He lied to me.”
“He was twenty-six and terrified of you.”
Vincent looked away.
Anthony lowered his voice.
“You were grieving and armed and looking for somebody to blame. So when the police said accident, I let you believe them.”
“You didn’t believe them?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because Isabella called me twenty minutes before the crash.”
Everything stopped.
Vincent stared at him.
“She called you?”
“Yes.”
“What did she say?”
Anthony swallowed.
“That she felt strange.”
Vincent’s face drained.
Anthony continued.
“She said her hands were shaking. She said the road looked blurry.”
I closed my eyes.
Sedatives.
“She asked me to come get her.”
Vincent whispered, “Why didn’t you?”
“I was in Queens.”
“Why didn’t you call me?”
Anthony’s expression broke.
“She told me not to.”
Vincent stepped back as if hit.
“Why?”
Anthony looked at him.
“Because she was afraid of you.”
Lucas whispered, “Dad?”
Vincent flinched.
I immediately turned to the boys.
“Come with me.”
This time Vincent let me take them.
I led them outside onto the terrace.
Leo sat on a stone bench.
Lucas looked toward the closed office doors.
“Was Dad bad to Mom?”
Children do not ask easy questions.
I sat beside him.
“Your parents had problems.”
“That means yes.”
“No.”
I chose carefully.
“It means adults sometimes scare each other without wanting to.”
Leo frowned.
“Dad scares everybody.”
“That doesn’t mean he wanted your mom afraid.”
Lucas stared at the ground.
“He doesn’t scare us.”
I looked at both boys.
“No.”
That was true.
Whatever Vincent had been to the world, his sons did not fear him.
That mattered.
Inside, voices rose.
Anthony.
Vincent.
Then something hit a wall.
I stood.
“Stay here.”
I returned to the office.
A glass had shattered near the fireplace.
Vincent’s knuckles were bleeding.
Anthony stood across from him.
“You should have told me.”
“I was trying to keep you from killing someone before we knew anything.”
“You had four years.”
“And after six months, you stopped asking.”
That landed.
Vincent’s face changed.
Anthony continued.
“You buried yourself in business.”
“I had two children.”
“You had nannies.”
“I had enemies.”
“You always had enemies!”
Anthony finally shouted.
“Isabella died and instead of becoming the father she wanted you to be, you became more of the man she was trying to escape.”
Silence.
Vincent looked like he might hit him.
He did not.
I respected that more than Anthony seemed to realize.
Anthony lowered his voice.
“I kept the car because I thought one day you would be ready.”
Vincent laughed bitterly.
“My sons had to be poisoned first?”
“No one knew.”
“Someone did.”
We all thought of Blake.
Detective Vargas called.
Forensic technicians had discovered something in the car.
A prescription bottle under the driver’s seat.
Label damaged.
But a pharmacy imprint remained.
Clonazepam.
Issued to Isabella Moretti.
Prescriber: Dr. Harrison Blake.
Vincent whispered, “She never took it.”
Vargas continued.
The bottle contained someone else’s fingerprints.
Daniel Mercer.
Systems manager.
My pulse raced.
Blake and Daniel.
Connected four years earlier.
Then Vargas delivered another detail.
“There were also tool marks on the brake line.”
Anthony sat down.
Vincent stopped breathing.
“What kind?”
“The line appears to have been partially cut.”
The accident had not been an accident.
Isabella had been drugged.
Her brakes sabotaged.
And the same two men connected to poisoning the twins had touched the evidence around her death.
Vincent’s grief turned into something terrifying.
“Where is Daniel?”
Rafael answered from behind us.
“Missing.”
Vincent turned.
“What?”
“He didn’t report to work this morning.”
“Find him.”
“We are.”
“No.”
Vincent picked up his coat.
“I’ll find him.”
I stepped in front of him.
He stared at me.
“Move.”
“No.”
“Claire.”
“Your sons are on the terrace.”
“I know.”
“They need you.”
“My wife was murdered.”
“Four years ago.”
His eyes flashed.
“Don’t you dare—”
“And your sons are alive now.”
Silence.
I kept going.
“That’s exactly what Blake wants.”
Vincent froze.
“Think about it.”
I pointed toward the photographs.
“You find out Isabella was murdered. Daniel disappears. Blake sits in jail waiting for you to explode.”
His jaw tightened.
“What happens if you do?”
“I kill Daniel.”
“No.”
I held his gaze.
“You leave your sons without a father.”
The room became quiet.
Vincent stared at me.
I knew I was pushing too far.
I did not care.
“Is that what Isabella wanted?”
He turned away.
His shoulders rose and fell.
Anthony looked at me as if he had never seen anyone stop his brother mid-rage.
Eventually Vincent said, “Rafael.”
“Yes.”
“You find Daniel.”
Rafael nodded.
“Alive.”
Another nod.
Vincent added, “And you call Vargas before you touch him.”
Anthony almost smiled.
Vincent saw it.
“Don’t.”
Anthony raised both hands.
“Nothing.”
That night, Lucas and Leo slept in a hotel suite near the hospital.
No mansion.
No vents.
No medical drinks.
For the first time in eighteen months, they woke before I did.
At six thirty, Lucas was sitting on the floor building a tower from room-service sugar packets.
Leo stood by the window.
“Claire.”
I opened my eyes.
“What?”
“The sun.”
I looked outside.
Pink light over New Haven.
“What about it?”
“I’m not tired.”
I sat up.
Lucas grinned.
“Me either.”
Something warm moved through my chest.
Twenty-four hours away from the estate.
Twenty-four hours without exposure.
Improvement could happen quickly once certain toxins stopped entering the body.
Not recovery.
But improvement.
I called Dr. Shah.
She was cautious but encouraged.
Vincent entered while I was talking.
He stopped when he saw the boys awake.
Lucas ran toward him.
Actually ran.
Not fast.
Not far.
But ran.
“Dad!”
Vincent dropped the coffee he was holding.
The cup hit the carpet.
He did not notice.
Lucas reached him.
Vincent crouched and caught him.
Leo joined them.
I watched Vincent close his eyes.
His face broke.
Not dramatically.
Just enough.
He pressed his forehead against Lucas’s hair.
“You ran.”
Lucas laughed.
“It was like six feet.”
“I know.”
Vincent looked at me.
There was gratitude in his eyes.
And something else I pretended not to see.
Then Rafael called.
They had found Daniel Mercer.
At a marina in Stamford.
Trying to board a private boat registered to a company controlled by—
Anthony Moretti.
The room went silent.
Vincent slowly turned toward his brother, who had just entered behind Rafael.
Anthony’s face changed.
“That isn’t mine.”
Rafael held up his phone.
“Registration says otherwise.”
Anthony stared.
“That company was dissolved.”
“Apparently not.”
Vincent stepped toward him.
“You told me you hid Isabella’s car.”
“I did.”
“You knew Blake.”
“So did half this family.”
“And now Daniel is escaping on your boat.”
“It’s not my boat.”
Vincent’s fists closed.
“Explain.”
Anthony looked genuinely stunned.
Then he said the one thing nobody expected.
“I can.”
He reached inside his jacket.
Rafael immediately drew his weapon.
Anthony stopped.
Slowly.
“Easy.”
He pulled out a folded photograph.
Placed it on the table.
Vincent picked it up.
His face went white.
I looked.
The photograph showed Isabella.
Alive.
Standing beside Daniel Mercer.
Date stamp:
Three weeks before her death.
Beside them was Anthony.
And on the back, in Isabella’s handwriting, were six words.
If anything happens, trust Anthony first.
May you like
Vincent stared at his brother.
Anthony whispered, “She knew someone was trying to kill her.”
