Chapter 5 - THE VOICE OF THE DEAD
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A brief hiss of static emanated from the tiny speaker of the microcassette recorder.
Then, a woman's voice filled the greenhouse, clear, melodic, yet weighted with unbearable sorrow.
"If my son Luca is listening to this recording, it means I am gone, and the garden has been disturbed."
Luca lowered his head, a single tear slipping from his eyelashes and dropping into the freshly turned dirt.
Hearing his late mother's voice after fifteen years of silence completely broke the mafia boss's icy armor.
"Luca, my brave boy," Maria's voice continued, her Italian accent soft and comforting against the static.
"Your father believed that loyalty could be bought with fear, but fear only breeds traitors in your own bed."
"Arthur Sterling took Julian, but he did not get the boy he bargained for."
"With Eleanor's help, I intercepted the transport before Sterling's men could take your brother out of state."
"We staged a car fire on Route 66, making Arthur Sterling believe the boy had perished in an accident on the highway."
Vanessa let out a low, terrified whimper, sliding down against the glass wall until she was huddled on the floor.
"I gave Julian to a family whose names are recorded in the back of my ledger," Maria's voice echoed with quiet determination.
"He was given a new name, a clean life, and parents who would never teach him how to hold a gun or bury a man."
"I planted thirty white rosebushes over this box so that I could walk among the truth every single day of my life."
"Every rose represents a year of life I prayed God would grant my stolen baby in peace."
"And I swore an oath that if the Sterling family ever tried to reclaim power, this box would be the weapon to end them."
"Arthur Sterling had a daughter, Luca."
The recording paused as Maria took a trembling breath on the tape.
"Her name is Vanessa."
The entire greenhouse seemed to freeze in absolute, suffocating horror.
I snapped my head toward Vanessa, whose face was buried in her hands, her shoulders shaking violently.
Luca stood up from the trench so slowly that it looked unnatural, like a predator rising from the brush.
He stared down at his young, glamorous bride, the woman he had married after a whirlwind six-month romance.
"You are Arthur Sterling's daughter," Luca whispered, the realization settling into his bones with crushing weight.
Vanessa didn't look up; she merely pressed her forehead against her knees, weeping in frantic terror.
"Arthur Sterling died three years ago," Luca spoke, his voice dropping into a deadly, rhythmic cadence.
"His syndicate was absorbed into mine, and I thought his bloodline had vanished into Europe."
"You changed your surname, created a fake identity as a real estate developer, and bumped into me at the charity gala."
Luca dropped the recorder into his pocket and walked over to where Vanessa was huddled against the glass.
He stopped just inches from her trembling body, looking down at her as if she were a venomous insect.
"You didn't want a spa," Luca stated with absolute certainty.
"You knew my mother buried something under these roses before she died, and your family spent thirty years looking for it."
"You married me to find this box and destroy the evidence that proves your father was a child-stealing coward."
Vanessa slowly raised her tear-streaked face, and the sweet, vulnerable woman we all knew was completely gone.
A bitter, venomous sneer twisted her lips as she glared up at the most dangerous man in Chicago.
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"My father built this city before your father ever held a territory, Luca!" she spat, wiping mascara from her cheeks.
"And you are too late to save anyone."
