Chapter 4 - The Doctor's Car
The blood in Victor Hale’s car was fresh.
Not much. A smear on the steering wheel, another on the pale leather seat, and three drops on the gravel beneath the open door.
No Victor.
His phone lay crushed under the rear tire.
“Call the police,” Alessandro said.
Marco hesitated. “Your uncle will hate that.”
“My uncle doesn’t own the police.”
“No. But he owns half the people who will hear about this before lunch.”
Alessandro looked at him. “Call anyway.”
Isabella stood ten feet away, hugging herself against the cold. “Victor came because I asked him to. If something happened to him, you need to believe me—I didn’t know.”
“Believe you?” Alessandro asked. “You wouldn’t eat the butter.”
Her face tightened. “Because a frightened child accused me of poisoning you in front of three employees.”
“You looked terrified before I said why.”
“I was terrified because you were testing me.”
There it was again: a reasonable answer wrapped around a terrible fact.
Detectives arrived within the hour. The butter, bread, utensils, and a white powder found beneath a pantry shelf were sealed into evidence bags. Isabella asked for a lawyer. Alessandro did not stop her.
Then Detective Leah Grant asked Emma to describe the man at the back door.
Emma repeated the black-stone ring.
Enzo Romano arrived forty minutes later wearing one.
He walked into the library with his cane, saw the detectives, and exploded.
“What have you done?”
“I called the police.”
“You invited strangers into this family over the word of a child?”
Emma flinched from the doorway.
Alessandro’s voice went flat. “Watch yourself.”
Enzo saw her and softened too late. “I didn’t mean—”
“Yes, you did.”
Detective Grant asked to see his ring.
Enzo laughed in disbelief, then removed it.
Emma stared.
“That’s the ring,” she whispered.
Isabella inhaled sharply.
Enzo’s face drained.
Then Emma added, “But he wasn’t wearing it.”
Everyone turned toward her.
“The man had it on his right hand,” she said. “Mr. Enzo has his on the left.”
Detective Grant leaned forward. “Are you sure?”
Emma nodded.
Enzo slowly looked at Alessandro.
“There are only two rings like this,” he said.
Alessandro felt his stomach tighten.
May you like
“One is mine.” Enzo’s voice became quiet. “The other belonged to your father.”
His father had been dead for eleven years.
