Chapter 5 - THE REPORT THAT NEVER REACHED LUCA|
The next morning, I stood outside Luca's study with my heart pounding.
The anonymous phone call had kept me awake all night.
I had replayed every word until I could no longer ignore what it might mean.
When Luca opened the door, he immediately noticed my expression.
"Claire, what's wrong?"
"Someone called me last night."
I told him everything.
His expression hardened when I mentioned the motorcycle inspection report.
"I hired an independent mechanic after Nico's accident."
"He was supposed to examine the motorcycle before it was taken away."
I swallowed.
"I remember the report, sir."
"I delivered it to Marcus myself."
Luca stepped away from his desk.
"Marcus told me the mechanic found nothing suspicious."
"Did you ever read the report?"
He stopped.
For several seconds, he said nothing.
Then he reached for his phone and called Detective Brooks.
Two hours later, we were sitting inside a small repair shop on Chicago's South Side.
The owner, Arthur Keene, was a sixty-four-year-old mechanic with silver hair and grease permanently embedded beneath his fingernails.
He recognized Luca immediately.
"Mr. Moretti, I wondered when you'd come back about your brother's motorcycle."
Luca looked confused.
"Come back?"
Arthur nodded.
"I sent a report to your security chief nine months ago."
"Afterward, nobody contacted me."
Luca placed both hands on the counter.
"What did you find?"
Arthur's expression became grim.
"The rear hydraulic brake line had been deliberately damaged."
"The cut was too clean to be ordinary wear."
He opened an old electronic file and displayed several photographs.
I couldn't understand every mechanical detail, but I could clearly see the damaged line.
Arthur pointed toward the screen.
"Someone tampered with this motorcycle before your brother rode it."
Luca stared at the photographs.
For nine months, he had believed his brother's accident was a terrible mechanical failure.
Now he was looking at evidence suggesting someone had intentionally caused it.
"Why didn't you report this to the police?" Luca asked.
"I believed your security chief was passing the findings to them."
Arthur shook his head.
"He told me the family wanted to handle the insurance investigation privately."
Detective Brooks, who had accompanied us, requested the original photographs, invoice, and report for examination.
Arthur agreed immediately.
Then he hesitated.
"There's something else you should know."
Luca looked up.
"What?"
"Two days after I delivered the report, Marcus came back."
"He offered me twenty thousand dollars to change my conclusion."
My stomach tightened.
"Did you accept?" Brooks asked.
Arthur shook his head.
"I told him I wasn't interested."
"After that, somebody broke into the shop and destroyed the paper records."
"But I'd saved digital copies."
Luca closed his eyes.
I could almost see the memories moving through his mind.
The hospital waiting room.
Nico lying unconscious.
Marcus standing beside him, promising to find out what had happened.
All the while, Marcus had allegedly been trying to bury the truth.
On our way back to the mansion, Luca barely spoke.
Finally, he turned toward me.
"Claire, why did you keep helping Nico when everyone else seemed to give up?"
The question surprised me.
"Because he was still trying."
I looked out at the passing traffic.
"My father suffered a serious workplace injury when I was younger."
"People kept talking about what he couldn't do."
"But what hurt him most was when they stopped asking what he wanted to do."
Luca listened quietly.
"I couldn't bear watching Nico go through that."
For a moment, his expression lost its usual hardness.
"You've given him something I couldn't buy."
"What's that?"
"Someone who sees him as a person before anything else."
I didn't know how to answer.
When we returned home, Simon Ward was waiting in the study with a thick folder.
His expression told me something was wrong.
"I've identified the transaction Vanessa may have been trying to arrange."
He opened a financial report and pointed toward a highlighted entry.
The document concerned Harbor Point Distribution Center, one of the family's most valuable legitimate business properties.
The property was worth approximately forty-two million dollars.
A company called North Pier Acquisitions had recently offered to purchase it at a suspiciously low price.
Luca frowned.
"I rejected that offer months ago."
"Vanessa knew that," Simon replied.
"She also knew Nico owns half the voting interest required to approve a major sale."
My eyes moved to another document.
North Pier Acquisitions was connected through several companies to an investment account controlled by Vanessa's relatives.
Simon continued carefully.
"If Vanessa could persuade a court to give her authority over Nico's financial affairs, she might try to use that position to push through the transaction."
"Such a sale would face legal scrutiny, but she appears to have been preparing for it."
Luca slowly sat down.
"So she tried to kill my brother."
"And when he survived, she tried to take control of him."
Simon didn't answer immediately.
"The evidence is beginning to support that possibility."
Just then, Nico appeared in the doorway.
He had heard enough.
"Is that why she wanted me to stop therapy?"
Nobody spoke.
He looked at Luca, his face pale.
"She couldn't get rid of me, so she wanted everyone to believe I wasn't capable of making decisions."
Luca approached him.
"Nico—"
But his brother raised his trembling hand.
"No."
For once, his voice was firm.
"I'm not a piece of property she can steal."
"I'm a person."
Luca knelt beside him.
"And I'm going to make sure everyone remembers that."
Then Simon's telephone rang.
He answered, listened briefly, and turned pale.
"The guardianship petition has officially been filed."
Luca stood.
"By Vanessa?"
Simon nodded.
"And she's requesting emergency authority over Nico's financial decisions."
Nico gripped the armrests of his wheelchair.
"Can she actually do that?"
Simon closed the folder.
"She can ask."
"But the judge is going to hear from you."
May you like
I watched Nico straighten his shoulders.
For the first time since the accident, he looked ready to fight for himself.
Related Stories
