Chapter 3 - THE WOMAN IN THE HOSPITAL CORRIDOR|
Luca let the phone ring four times before answering.
"Where are you?"
Vanessa's voice sounded unusually sweet.
"I'm coming to the hospital, darling."
"Don't."
There was a pause.
"Luca, I'm your wife."
"That doesn't give you permission to come near my mother."
"Are you seriously blaming me because an elderly woman couldn't walk down some stairs?"
Luca closed his eyes.
"Vanessa, I heard the recording."
Silence.
Then she laughed.
"What recording?"
"The one where your father talks about my father's death."
Her voice changed instantly.
"You shouldn't believe everything an old woman records."
"Interesting."
"What?"
"I never told you who recorded it."
Vanessa hung up.
Luca stared at the screen.
Then he called Marco.
"Vanessa is not permitted anywhere near my mother's room."
"Understood, boss."
"And I want the construction crew who removed that handrail identified."
Marco hesitated.
"There's something you need to see."
"What?"
"I found the removal order."
Luca put the call on speaker.
"The instruction came from Mrs. Bellini's wedding coordinator, but it carries your electronic authorization."
"I never authorized that."
"I know."
"How?"
"Because the approval was entered at 6:14 this morning, when you were at the church with Father Michael."
Luca went silent.
The morning's schedule gave him a possible alibi.
Someone had used his credentials to approve a dangerous alteration to his own home.
"Preserve the original record," Luca said.
"And send it to my attorney."
He ended the call.
I was sitting across from him, still struggling to understand what I had heard about my father.
"Mr. Moretti, why would someone falsely blame Thomas Bennett?"
Luca looked at me for a long moment.
"I don't know."
"Your family believed he caused that fire."
"Yes."
"And now we know somebody lied."
He lowered his eyes.
"Claire, I owe you an explanation."
Before he could continue, a nurse called him into the surgical consultation room.
I remained in the hallway.
For the first time since joining the Moretti household two years earlier, I felt completely alone.
I had spent most of my childhood watching my mother defend a man everyone else called a killer.
She died three years after my father, still insisting he had never been careless.
I remembered the newspaper photograph of our apartment building after someone had spray-painted MURDERER across the entrance.
I remembered losing friends whose parents refused to let them visit.
And I remembered the letter my father had written shortly before his death.
One sentence had never left me.
Claire, when powerful people tell the same lie long enough, the truth starts to sound like a crime.
I covered my face.
Then a woman's voice interrupted.
"Claire Bennett?"
I looked up.
A young hospital employee stood beside a supply cart.
"Someone left this for you at the reception desk."
She handed me a cream-colored envelope.
My name was written across the front.
Inside was a single photograph.
It showed my father standing beside Frank Moretti outside the warehouse.
Both men were smiling.
On the back, someone had written:
Your father knew what was behind the blue door.
Beneath the message was a warning.
Stay away from Rosa if you want to keep breathing.
I looked up immediately.
"Who delivered this?"
The employee shook her head.
"A blonde woman in a white coat."
My stomach tightened.
I hurried toward the elevators.
Just as the doors began closing, I caught a glimpse of a woman with long blonde hair.
She was carrying a large leather handbag.
"Evelyn!"
The woman turned.
I recognized her instantly.
Evelyn Hart.
Vanessa's personal assistant.
She had spent the previous three months organizing the wedding.
And that morning, she had personally supervised the decorations on the grand staircase.
Evelyn stared at me.
Then the elevator doors closed.
I ran back toward the consultation room.
Luca emerged before I reached it.
"What's wrong?"
I handed him the photograph.
He read the message twice.
"Where did you get this?"
"Evelyn Hart brought it."
"Are you certain?"
"I saw her."
His expression hardened.
He immediately called Marco and ordered him to secure the hospital's visitor and security records.
Then he turned back to me.
"You need protection."
"I need answers."
"Claire, somebody just threatened your life."
"And somebody destroyed my father's name."
Luca had no response.
A surgeon approached us before either could speak again.
"Mr. Moretti, we're taking your mother into surgery."
Luca stepped forward.
"Can I see her first?"
"For a moment."
He followed the surgeon through the double doors.
I stayed behind, staring at the photograph.
My father's face seemed so alive that it hurt to look at him.
Then I noticed something I had missed.
Behind Frank Moretti and Thomas Bennett stood a third man.
His face was partly hidden by the warehouse doorway.
But I recognized the heavy silver ring on his right hand.
I had seen that ring at the wedding.
It belonged to Luca's uncle.
May you like
Dominic Moretti.
And Dominic had told everyone he was in New York the night Frank died.
Related Stories
