Chương 6
“She knew if someone searched her things, they would look for documents.”
He touched the edge of the photograph frame.
“But she also knew nobody would take something from Lucy.”
Raffaele looked at the frame.
The small scratch on the corner.
The same scratch that had been there for years.
“She hid something in the picture.”
Marcus nodded.
“I think so.”
Raffaele carefully removed the photograph from Lucy’s frame.
The back panel looked ordinary.
Until he noticed something.
A small uneven edge.
Something beneath the paper.
His fingers stopped.
For five years, that photograph had sat in his house.
Five years.
And nobody had looked closely enough.
He removed the backing slowly.
Inside was a thin folded piece of paper.
Not a document.
Not a confession.
Just one handwritten sentence.
Raffaele recognized the handwriting immediately.
Elena’s.
The message was short.
“Raffaele, if you are reading this, I was right to be afraid.”
Raffaele read the sentence three times before he allowed himself to look at anything else.
The handwriting was unmistakable.
The slight curve at the end of certain letters.
The way Elena pressed harder when she wrote words that mattered.
He had seen thousands of things she left behind.
Notes on the kitchen counter.
Lists for groceries.
Messages reminding him to call someone back.
Little pieces of ordinary life that had once annoyed him because he was always too busy to appreciate them.
This was different.
This was a message from a woman who knew she might not have another chance.
Celeste watched his face carefully.
“What does it say?”
Raffaele did not answer immediately.
He folded the paper once.
Then unfolded it.
A part of him wanted to protect Elena’s final words from everyone in the room.
Even now.
Even after everything.
“She knew,” he said.
Marcus looked confused.
“She knew what?”
Raffaele looked at him.
“That she was being watched.”
The room became silent again.
Not the heavy silence from before.
Something else.
A silence filled with the uncomfortable reality that the past was no longer buried.
Raffaele continued reading.
The paper contained only a few more lines.
She had not written a full explanation.
Elena never did when she was afraid.
She had always believed too many words created too many ways for someone to misunderstand.
There was a list of names.
A bank account number.
And one final sentence.
“Do not trust the person who brings you this.”
Raffaele stopped.
His eyes moved slowly upward.
Everyone noticed.
“What?” Celeste asked.
He looked at Marcus.
Then at Celeste.
Neither moved.
“What?” Marcus repeated.
Raffaele folded the paper.
“She knew someone would bring this to me.”
Marcus’s face changed.
“That doesn’t mean anything.”
“No?”
“No.”
His voice became defensive.
“It could mean she was suspicious of everyone.”
Raffaele studied him.
“She was.”
The answer surprised Marcus.
Raffaele looked at the photograph.
“She trusted almost nobody.”
A painful smile crossed his face.
“But when she trusted someone, she gave them everything.”
Celeste looked down.
Because she knew what he meant.
Elena had trusted her.
And Celeste had failed her.
“What names are on the list?” Marcus asked.
Raffaele did not respond.
Marcus stepped forward.
“You need to know who is involved.”
“I do.”
“Then show me.”
“No.”
The answer was immediate.
Marcus stopped.
“You think I’m the enemy.”
“I think I don’t know what you are.”
The words hurt Marcus.
That was obvious.
But Raffaele did not soften them.
Five years of silence had consequences.
“You hid this from me.”
“I was trying to protect Lucy.”
“You made that decision alone.”
“Yes.”
“And you decided I could not handle the truth.”
Marcus looked away.
That was the part that bothered him.
Because it was true.
“I was wrong,” Marcus said quietly.
Raffaele had expected anger.
Excuses.
Another attempt to justify everything.
He had not expected an apology.
It did not fix anything.
But it changed something.
A small thing.
A crack in the wall between them.
Celeste stood.
“What are you going to do?”
Raffaele looked at her.
For a moment, he had no answer.
The old version of himself would have moved immediately.
Called people.
Demanded information.
Forced the truth out of anyone standing in his way.
But Lucy’s face appeared in his mind.
The way she asked if he was angry at her.
The way she waited to see whether he was still her father or only the frightening man everyone else saw.
He could not solve this the way he solved everything else.
Not if he wanted to keep the one person Elena had died protecting.
“I’m going to find out who killed my wife.”
Celeste looked at him.
“And then?”
Raffaele looked at the paper in his hand.
“I don’t know.”
The honesty surprised even him.
The answer was not satisfying.
It was not powerful.
It was simply true.
He walked toward the staircase.
Marcus followed him with his eyes.
“Where are you going?”
“To my daughter.”
Marcus nodded.
A small movement.
Almost approval.
Raffaele stopped halfway up the stairs.
Without turning around, he said, “You are not leaving this house.”
Marcus looked at Celeste.
Then back at Raffaele.
“I figured.”
“And you are not contacting anyone.”
“Raffaele.”
“That wasn’t a negotiation.”
Marcus exhaled.
The old Marcus would have argued.
This Marcus just nodded.
Raffaele continued upstairs.
The hallway was quiet.
Family photographs lined the walls.
He had chosen them years ago because he wanted the house to feel warm.
Not like a business.
Not like a fortress.
Now every picture felt like evidence.
Every smile carried questions.
Lucy was sitting on the edge of her bed when he entered.
The bodyguard stood outside the room but looked away when Raffaele walked in.
Lucy held a stuffed rabbit in her lap.
It was missing one ear.
Elena had bought it when Lucy was a baby.
Raffaele had once suggested replacing it.
Elena refused.
“She loves that one,” she had said.
“Even though it’s broken?”
“She doesn’t know it’s broken.”
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He remembered laughing.
Now the memory hurt.
