Chapter 3 - The Ledger of Betrayal
The sheet of paper trembled in Luca Moretti’s hand as he traced the faded graphite marks his mother had risked everything to record.
Eleanor reached out, her frail, paper-thin hand resting atop his broad knuckles.
She looked at me, her eyes pleading for a voice, and her fingers began to dance in the chilled air of the room.
I could not hold a pen for months, she signed, each gesture filled with the heavy weight of preserved agony.
When the feeling returned to my fingers, I stole a pencil from the night nurse’s cart.
I marked down every stranger who walked into this room while my son was away.
I translated her words in a low, measured voice, ensuring every inflection of her silent heartache was delivered clearly to her son.
Luca’s jaw clenched so hard that a muscle ticked wildly along his cheekbone.
"The first name," Luca read aloud, his eyes burning into the paper. "Julian Vance... Chief Neurologist at Northwestern Memorial."
Eleanor signed rapidly, her face twisting with bitter resentment.
He increased my sedatives, I translated as Eleanor's hands moved.
Every time you scheduled a visit outside of Thursdays, Vance came twenty minutes prior and injected my IV line with liquid diazepam.
He made me sleep so heavily that my chin hung upon my chest whenever you opened that door.
They told you I was slipping away into a vegetative state.
A strangled gasp escaped Patricia from where she huddled against the armchair, her fingers clawing at the upholstery.
Luca did not look at her; his terrifying focus remained locked entirely upon the paper.
"The second name," he whispered, his voice trembling with a deadly rage. "Marcus Moretti."
The silence that followed that name was deafening.
Marcus was Luca’s younger cousin, the man who managed the logistics and legitimate real estate portfolio of the Moretti family empire.
Eleanor nodded frantically, tears streaming freely down her wrinkled cheeks.
Marcus comes here at midnight, she signed, her hands moving with frantic panic as if the ghost of her nephew was standing in the shadows.
He brings documents.
He forced my thumb onto stamp pads smeared with blue ink.
He whispered in my ear that Luca was going to be indicted by the federal grand jury, and that the assets needed to be transferred before the government seized everything.
"That son of a bitch," Luca roared, his control suddenly shattering as he slammed his fist into the mahogany nightstand.
The wood splintered under the ferocious impact, sending a crystal water carafe crashing onto the hardwood floor.
I flinched, stepping back toward the wall, but Eleanor remained completely calm, her eyes never leaving her son's face.
She had lived among dangerous men her entire life; violence did not scare her—abandonment did.
Eleanor reached out, gently touching the sleeve of Luca’s suit jacket, pulling his attention back to her silent hands.
Look at the bottom, my boy, she signed softly.
Look at the final name.
Luca lowered his gaze to the final, jagged entry at the bottom of the folded page.
His eyes narrowed into terrifying slits of obsidian glass.
"Why is Salvatore Rossi’s name on this paper, Mom?" he asked, his voice suddenly void of all emotion, which was infinitely more frightening than his roar.
Salvatore Rossi was the patriarch of the rival syndicate controlling the south side of Chicago, a ruthless man with whom the Morettis had maintained a bloody, fragile truce for over a decade.
Marcus brought Salvatore into this bedroom three nights ago, Eleanor signed, her movements tight and deliberate.
They stood right there, by the window overlooking the lake.
They thought because I could not speak, my mind was dead.
They laughed about you, Luca.
Marcus said the shipment arriving at the Calumet Harbor tonight would be your final mistake.
He told Salvatore that the warehouse guards were already bought and paid for.
And then... Eleanor paused, her hands trembling so severely that she had to lock her fingers together for a second to steady herself.
What did they say, Mom? Luca demanded, his voice thick with agony. Tell me.
Marcus told Salvatore that once you were eliminated tonight at the docks, this house and the family trust would fall completely to him.
And the very next morning, they were going to suffocate me with a pillow in this bed and claim my heart finally gave out from grief.
I finished translating the final sentence, my own voice breaking at the sheer monstrosity of the plot.
Eleanor looked at Patricia, whose face was completely gray, devoid of any color or life.
Patricia was in the room, Eleanor signed, pointing an accusatory finger at the trembling head housekeeper.
She held the flashlight so Marcus could read the dock manifests.
She took a stack of hundred-dollar bills from Salvatore Rossi's coat pocket.
Luca slowly rose from his knees, his towering silhouette blotting out the morning sunlight streaming through the windows.
He reached inside his tailored suit jacket, pulled out an encrypted satellite phone, and pressed a single speed-dial button.
"Matteo," Luca spoke into the receiver, his voice flat, chilling, and merciless.
"Lock the front gates of the estate immediately."
"Disarm every security guard on the perimeter and confiscate their communication devices."
"If anyone attempts to jump the perimeter fence, shoot them in the legs."
He paused, his cold eyes drifting slowly across the room until they pinned Patricia to her seat like an insect under glass.
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"And bring two zip-ties and truth serum up to my mother's bedroom right now."
"We have a traitor in the house."
