Chapter 5
Even now.
Even here.
I forced myself to sit again.
“Explain.”
Sophia watched me for a moment.
“Luca believed there was going to be an attempt on your life eleven years ago. Mateo showed him documents, recordings, names. He convinced Luca that the people involved would target anyone close to you.”
“I remember.”
“You do?”
“There were rumors. Nothing happened.”
“Because Luca disappeared.”
I frowned.
Sophia continued.
“Mateo convinced him the threat was connected to him. That if Luca vanished, the people behind it would believe your family had fractured and back away.”
“That makes no sense.”
“It did to a frightened twenty-six-year-old who thought his brother was about to be killed.”
I looked again at Luca’s photograph.
I remembered the last conversation we had before his supposed death.
He had called me from a pay phone just before midnight.
Asked if I trusted Mateo.
I had laughed.
Luca had gone quiet.
Then he said, “You trust people like locks, Dom. Once they work, you stop checking the door.”
I had told him he sounded drunk.
Three days later, police found a burned car near the river.
Luca’s watch was inside.
So was blood matching his type.
No body was ever recovered.
For years I had told myself the river had taken him.
Now the memory felt different.
Arranged.
Prepared.
“Mateo staged Luca’s death.”
“That’s what Luca believes.”
“Why?”
“He thought it was to protect you.”
“And now?”
Sophia lowered Elena into the crib.
“Now he thinks Mateo needed him gone.”
I stared at her.
“Why?”
“Because Luca knew about something called Northstar.”
I frowned.
“What is Northstar?”
“I don’t know.”
“Sophia.”
“I don’t.”
She stood again.
“That is the part Luca refused to explain. He said Northstar was older than Harbor Relief. Older than your marriage. He said if Mateo realized he had contacted me, Gabriel would be in danger.”
“So Luca vanished again?”
“No.”
Sophia looked at me.
“He went to find proof.”
“And left his wife and son alone?”
“He believed they were safe.”
“But Gabriel disappeared.”
“Yes.”
“Then Mateo came here.”
“Yes.”
I looked at the photograph message.
Your brother wants his daughter back.
The words suddenly seemed wrong.
Not just threatening.
Deliberately wrong.
I read them again.
“Luca doesn’t have a daughter.”
Sophia’s gaze sharpened.
“No.”
“Then why would Mateo send this?”
“That’s what frightened me.”
I stood.
This time slowly.
“Maybe Mateo didn’t send it.”