Chapter 4 - The Wrong Key
Luca arrived at 1:17 in the morning wearing a cashmere coat over pajama pants and fury on his face.
"You dragged me out of bed because one of your nannies stole my key card?"
I tossed the card onto the dining table.
"Did she?"
He stared at it.
Luca and I had grown up in the same house for seven years. We had broken windows together, buried a dead goldfish under my grandmother's roses, and learned from the same men that family loyalty was sacred right up until money became involved.
He was thirty-seven now, polished and careful, with a smile that made people trust him before they remembered not to.
"That card disappeared three weeks ago," he said.
"You reported it?"
"To your security office."
Marco stood near the fireplace. "No report reached me."
Luca turned. "Then ask your people."
"I am asking you."
Luca laughed without humor. "And I'm telling you I did not crawl inside Adrien's walls to terrorize babies."
"You would benefit if something happened to them," I said.
His face changed.
Our grandfather's trust was ugly, old, and written by men who believed bloodlines mattered more than human beings. If I died without surviving children, control of Moretti Holdings passed to Luca.
The triplets had removed him from that future.
Luca stepped closer. "You really think I'd hurt Theo, Miles, or Nora for a trust?"
"I think money has convinced better men to do worse."
"Then look at your own house before you look at me."
Marco's phone buzzed.
He glanced down, then toward me.
"Leah is awake."
We found her in the downstairs medical room with a bandage around her head.
Her eyes filled with tears when she saw me.
"I'm sorry."
"For what?"
"I saw someone come out of the laundry room wall. I followed them. They hit me from behind."
"Did you see their face?"
"No. Hood up. Gloves."
"The key card?"
She shook her head. "I don't know. It was on the floor when I woke up. I grabbed it because I thought it mattered."
Luca folded his arms. "Convenient."
Leah flinched.
I looked at Marco. "Check the security office. Find out who logged Luca's missing card."
He left.
Ten minutes later he returned with a face I did not like.
"There was a report."
Luca spread his hands.
"But it was closed the same day," Marco continued. "Marked resolved. Replacement issued. Old card deactivated."
"Then how did it open anything?" I asked.
"It shouldn't."
Marco held up his tablet.
"Except someone reactivated it six days ago using an administrator credential."
"Whose credential?"
Marco did not answer.
I stepped closer.
"Whose?"
His eyes met mine.
"Mine."
The room went still.
Luca gave a slow, humorless smile.
"Like I said, cousin. Look inside your own house."
Marco stared at the screen as if it had betrayed him personally.
"I didn't do this."
I believed him.
But belief was not proof.
Then another alert appeared.
A technician upstairs had recovered a deleted file from the hidden device.
One audio clip.
Twenty-three seconds long.
Recorded four nights earlier.
The voice in the recording belonged to someone I knew.
May you like
And the first words were:
"Marco can't find out yet."
