Chapter 4 - The Priest Who Buried A Living Woman
Father Adrian had aged badly.
His once-black hair had turned white. His face looked thinner, carved by guilt rather than years. A burn covered his left forearm, and blood soaked one side of his shirt.
Yet when he saw Salvatore, he managed to smile.
“I wondered how long it would take.”
Salvatore walked toward him.
“You buried Elena.”
“Yes.”
“She wasn’t dead.”
“No.”
Carmine stepped back as though giving Salvatore room to kill him.
Father Adrian did not resist.
Salvatore stopped inches from his face.
“Why?”
“Because she begged me.”
The answer made Salvatore angrier.
“You let me stand over an empty coffin.”
“It wasn’t empty.”
Salvatore’s expression darkened.
“Whose body?”
“A woman from the city morgue. Similar height. Similar age. No family.”
The room went silent.
“You let me mourn a stranger.”
“I helped Elena survive.”
Salvatore grabbed the priest by the collar.
“You helped her disappear from me.”
Father Adrian’s eyes hardened.
“She was terrified of someone inside this house.”
Leo stood halfway down the staircase.
Salvatore released the priest.
“Name him.”
“I don’t know.”
“Then you’re useless.”
“I know what Elena believed.”
Salvatore waited.
Father Adrian looked around at the guards.
“Not here.”
Five minutes later, they were inside Salvatore’s private library.
Leo refused to leave.
Salvatore allowed him to stay.
Father Adrian sat carefully.
“Elena discovered financial transfers through the Moretti Foundation.”
Salvatore frowned.
“My mother’s charity?”
“Yes.”
“For what?”
“Weapons.”
Carmine swore quietly.
The Moretti Foundation funded hospitals, schools and shelters.
Salvatore’s mother had created it twenty-five years earlier.
“She found millions moving through false humanitarian accounts,” Adrian continued. “Money being sent to people your family officially considered enemies.”
“Who controlled those accounts?”
“She never told me.”
“Why not?”
“Because she didn’t know whom she could trust.”
Salvatore paced.
“Why fake her death?”
“Because someone tried to kill her.”
Leo stared.
Salvatore stopped.
“When?”
“The night before she came to me.”
Adrian swallowed.
“She was pregnant.”
Salvatore slowly looked toward Leo.
The room disappeared around him.
Pregnant.
Elena had been pregnant when she left.
He looked at the boy’s age.
Eight.
Something was wrong.
“Elena disappeared twelve years ago.”
Adrian nodded.
“Leo is eight.”
“Yes.”
“Then he isn’t my son.”
Leo lowered his eyes.
Father Adrian looked at him.
“No.”
The word hurt more than Salvatore expected.
Leo flinched.
Salvatore noticed.
“Who is his father?”
Adrian’s expression changed.
“That is where things become dangerous.”
“Everything is already dangerous.”
“Leo’s biological father was a federal agent.”
Carmine stared.
“What?”
“Elena spent three years hiding under federal protection.”
Salvatore’s jaw hardened.
Adrian continued.
“His name was Daniel Mercer. He was assigned to investigate the financial network Elena discovered. They became close.”
Salvatore’s face became stone.
Leo looked uncomfortable.
“He was killed before I was born,” the child whispered.
Salvatore glanced at him.
“You knew?”
“Mama told me he was brave.”
Something ugly and childish moved through Salvatore—jealousy of a dead man.
He crushed it.
“What happened to Mercer?”
Father Adrian answered.
“Car accident.”
Carmine laughed without humor.
“Of course.”
Adrian nodded.
“Elena knew it wasn’t an accident. That was when she disappeared again.”
Salvatore sat.
“So why send Leo to me?”
“Because before she died, Elena learned the conspiracy had started again.”
“What conspiracy?”
“The same network.”
Adrian leaned forward.
“Someone has been using your organization to finance something even you don’t know exists.”
Salvatore’s eyes narrowed.
“What?”
“A private alliance of five families preparing to remove you.”
Silence.
Carmine stared at him.
Father Adrian continued.
“They call it the Crown.”
Salvatore had heard whispers.
A loose group of younger captains, politicians and businessmen who believed the old mafia families were becoming too cautious.
He had dismissed them.
Perhaps that had been a mistake.
“The Ledger proves who belongs to it,” Adrian said.
“And Elena had it?”
“She had part of it.”
“Where?”
“I don’t know.”
Leo suddenly spoke.
“I might.”
Everyone turned.
Leo swallowed.
“Mama had a music box.”
Salvatore’s chest tightened.
“What kind?”
“Wood. Little dancer inside.”
Salvatore knew it.
He had bought Elena that box in Vienna.
“What about it?”
“She told me never to open the bottom.”
“Where is it?”
Leo looked terrified.
“At the orphanage.”
Carmine cursed.
“If the fire didn’t destroy it—”
A guard rushed into the library.
“Boss.”
“What?”
“We found something outside the east gate.”
He handed Salvatore a phone.
On the screen was a photograph taken only minutes earlier.
A small wooden music box sat in the center of Salvatore’s driveway.
Beside it was a dead guard.
May you like
And carved into the man’s chest were two words.
WELCOME HOME.
