Chapter 5: The Morning Vanessa Didn't Expect
I woke up on a narrow bed in one of the mansion's spare staff rooms.
Morning light came through a gap in the curtains.
For a moment I lay still and tried to remember the order of the previous night — the dinner table, the study, Elena's kitchen, the drive back through the empty city.
Someone had left a glass of water and two pain tablets on the bedside table.
I didn't know who.
I dressed and went downstairs.
The house was quiet.
The dining room had been cleared.
The chandeliers were off.
Mrs.
Carter was in the kitchen with coffee.
"Mr.
Moretti wants you in the study at nine," she said, not looking up from her cup.
"Sit down.
Eat something first."
"Where is Miss Bellini?"
Mrs.
Carter set her cup down.
"Still in her room, far as I know." She paused.
"She came down at seven asking for her usual breakfast tray.
I told her the kitchen wasn't running service this morning." Another pause.
"She didn't like that."
I sat down.
Mrs.
Carter put toast in front of me without being asked.
At five minutes to nine, I knocked on the study door.
"Come in."
Luca was at his desk.
Daniel stood near the window.
A third man I didn't recognize sat in the chair across from Luca — older, gray suit, reading glasses pushed up on his forehead.
"Olivia," Luca said.
"This is Arthur Reyes.
He's my attorney."
Arthur Reyes nodded at me.
"Sit down, please," Luca said.
"I need you to repeat what you told Elena last night.
Exactly as you told her."
I sat.
I told it again.
The guest room.
The conversation.
Mercer's instructions.
The photographs.
The clause.
Arthur Reyes wrote without looking up.
When I finished, he said, "And you can identify the man you saw with Miss Bellini?"
"I saw him clearly before he saw me."
"Would you recognize him in a photograph?"
"Yes."
Arthur Reyes looked at Luca.
"Then we have a witness to the conspiracy.
Combined with the camera footage and the financial documents, that's enough to take to the state attorney's office today."
"What about Coates?" Luca asked.
"Elena called him at midnight.
She told him she knew about the clause and that she'd be seeking new legal counsel immediately.
He called me at six this morning trying to distance himself from Vanessa." Arthur's expression was dry.
"He's already talking."
Luca leaned back in his chair.
"And the package?"
"Elena has it.
She didn't open the photographs.
She's agreed to hand everything over to my office as supporting evidence."
The room was quiet for a moment.
Then Daniel's phone buzzed.
He looked at it.
His expression didn't change, but he glanced at Luca.
May you like
"She's awake," he said.
"And she's not in her room."
