Chapter 2 - THE KEY IN APARTMENT 3B
By eight the next morning, the engagement dinner looked as if it had never happened.
The crystal had been removed. The flowers had been carried into the breakfast room. Staff moved quietly through the mansion, collecting glasses, folding linens, and pretending they had not watched Luca Moretti accuse his fiancée of lying in front of her father.
Emma sat at the end of the staff table with Marco’s worn binder beside her.
Marco had left it with Luca overnight after Mrs. Carter insisted the exhausted manager go home and sleep.
Vanessa had apparently heard only the word Marco.
She entered the kitchen wearing cream trousers, dark sunglasses, and the diamond engagement ring Luca had not yet asked her to return.
Everyone stopped talking.
Vanessa looked directly at Emma.
“You’re still here.”
Mrs. Carter set down the coffee pot.
“Mr. Moretti asked Emma to help security catalogue the contracts before Marco returns.”
“I wasn’t asking you.”
The head housekeeper’s face did not change.
“That is fortunate. I was answering anyway.”
A dishwasher coughed to hide a laugh.
Vanessa heard it.
Her mouth tightened.
Then she placed a small velvet pouch on the table.
“My grandmother’s sapphire earrings are missing.”
Emma’s stomach turned.
Mrs. Carter folded her arms.
“And?”
“And Emma spent yesterday meddling in family business where she did not belong.”
Emma looked up.
“I never entered your bedroom.”
“No. You contradicted me at dinner, challenged my orders, and handled private papers.”
“Marco handed the binder directly to Mr. Moretti.”
Vanessa smiled.
“According to you.”
Mrs. Carter stepped closer.
“According to thirty witnesses.”
That ended the performance for several seconds.
Then Vanessa opened the velvet pouch and turned it upside down.
Empty.
“Search her room.”
Emma pushed back from the table.
“You can’t be serious.”
“I am the future woman of this house.”
A voice came from the doorway.
“No.”
Luca stood there in a dark sweater and black trousers.
He had not shaved.
He looked more dangerous for it.
Vanessa turned.
“No?”
“You are my fiancée. That is not the same thing.”
Her face hardened.
“The earrings are missing.”
“Then security will review the cameras.”
“She could have hidden them anywhere.”
“And if you accuse one of my employees of theft again without evidence, you can explain to Daniel why your own rooms are being searched first.”
The kitchen went silent.
Vanessa stared at him.
Public rescue could feel almost as humiliating as public accusation when everyone watched you receive it.
Luca noticed her discomfort.
“Emma, come with me.”
Vanessa laughed.
“Of course.”
He looked at her.
“What does that mean?”
“Nothing, darling.”
“Say it.”
She slid the sunglasses onto her head.
“It means she seems to be receiving a great deal of private attention for a housekeeper.”
Emma’s face burned.
Mrs. Carter inhaled sharply.
Luca did not raise his voice.
“Your problem this morning is not Emma’s job title.”
Vanessa’s smile disappeared.
“Your problem is that my father warned me about the Bellinis in a sealed letter, and you knew enough about Evelyn Russo to try buying Marco’s records before I saw them.”
Vittorio entered behind Luca.
He had stayed at the mansion overnight.
“Not here.”
Luca glanced at him.
“I agree.”
He looked at Emma.
“Study.”
Emma followed him out, feeling every pair of eyes on her back.
Clara was already waiting beside the fireplace.
Michael’s letter lay open on Luca’s desk.
Beside it sat the photograph.
Luca shut the door.
“Read the last line again.”
Emma frowned.
“I remember it.”
“There is writing inside the envelope flap too.”
Clara tapped the paper.
“My brother used to hide second instructions there when he thought someone might open his mail.”
Emma leaned closer.
A faded pencil message ran along the inside fold.
If Rosa’s papers are ever needed, begin where the blue room watched over her son. The saint never moved, even when the walls did.
Emma looked at Luca.
“The blue room?”
“My bedroom in apartment 3B.”
Clara nodded.
“Rosa painted it blue when Luca was five. The landlord covered it after the Morettis moved.”
“Where is it?”
“Halsted Street.”
Vittorio laughed from near the window.
“You’re chasing riddles written by a frightened old woman.”
Clara looked at him.
“You seem unusually bothered by riddles you consider meaningless.”
Luca folded the envelope.
“Daniel checked Evelyn’s address.”
“And?”
“She lives in an assisted-living residence outside Milwaukee.”
“Alive?”
“Yes.”
Vittorio looked away.
Emma saw it.
So did Luca.
Vanessa entered without knocking.
“I want Emma searched before she goes anywhere else.”
Luca’s expression did not change.
“Why?”
“My earrings.”
Daniel appeared behind her.
He held the sapphire earrings between two gloved fingers.
“I found them.”
Vanessa turned.
“Where?”
“In the pocket of the coat you wore yesterday.”
The silence that followed was exquisite.
Mrs. Carter, standing behind Daniel, did not smile.
She did not need to.
Vanessa reached for the earrings.
Daniel did not hand them over.
“Mr. Moretti asked me to log them first.”
Vanessa’s cheeks reddened.
“You searched my coat?”
Luca looked at her.
“You wanted a search.”
Emma lowered her eyes before Vanessa could see the relief on her face.
Luca turned toward the hall.
“We’re going to Halsted Street.”
The old apartment building looked smaller than Luca remembered and older than Emma expected.
The lobby tiles were cracked now.
Marco’s brass key opened apartment 3B after two stubborn turns.
Clara walked slowly into the empty front room.
“Your bed was there.”
She pointed toward the narrow wall beside the radiator.
“Rosa’s chair was by the window. And the Madonna hung above your pillow.”
“What Madonna?” Emma asked.
“A small porcelain relief. White ceramic. Blue veil.”
Luca searched the wall.
Nothing.
Marco asked the building manager to check the basement inventory.
“The landlord boxed religious fixtures during the renovation twenty-six years ago.”
Vanessa spoke from the doorway.
“This is absurd.”
Everyone turned.
Luca’s gaze sharpened.
“How did you know we came here?”
She folded her arms.
“I followed my fiancé.”
“No,” Clara said. “You followed the papers.”
Vanessa ignored her.
“Luca, your board is waiting. Your wedding is in two days. And you are searching a condemned basement because an longtime manager brought you riddles in a binder.”
Luca did not.
“Daniel, basement.”
The storage basement smelled of rust, stone, and old paint.
Rows of shelves held broken radiators, brass numbers, abandoned mailboxes, and boxes from decades of renovations.
Daniel found the porcelain Madonna in a crate marked THIRD FLOOR.
Marco touched it gently.
“That’s her.”
The figure was smaller than Emma expected.
A woman in a blue veil holding a sleeping child.
Luca turned it over.
Vanessa exhaled.
“There. Mystery solved.”
Emma studied the back.
“There’s fresh dust around the edge.”
Luca looked closer.
A narrow wooden backing had been screwed behind the porcelain.
The screw heads were scratched.
Daniel removed them.
Behind the panel was a shallow compartment.
Empty.
Except for a second brass key.
And a torn strip of blue paper.
Luca picked up the paper.
On it, in Rosa’s handwriting, were three words.
MARINO LEDGER. BOX 17.
Clara gripped her cane.
Vittorio, who had followed them downstairs, went pale.
Luca saw him.
“What is the Marino ledger?”
Vittorio answered too quickly.
“Nothing.”
Clara turned toward him.
“That is a remarkable answer for a man who supposedly has no idea what any of this means.”
Emma looked at the second brass key.
A number had been stamped into its head.
17.
Luca handed it to Daniel.
“Find every box, safe, deposit room, and archive connected to that number.”
Vanessa stepped forward.
“You are not postponing the wedding over this.”
Luca faced her.
“I haven’t decided what I’m postponing.”
Her expression cracked.
“You embarrass me in front of staff, let her accuse me, search my clothes, and now threaten our wedding because of a dead woman’s paperwork?”
Emma could feel the cruelty gathering before Vanessa aimed it.
“She wants this, Luca.”
He frowned.
“What?”
Vanessa pointed at Emma.
“She wants you to think she saved your precious family history. She wants sympathy. She wants access. Look at her. She earns barely enough to pay rent, and suddenly she’s in private rooms discussing family shares.”
Emma’s throat tightened.
Clara stepped forward.
But Luca spoke first.
“Her bank account has nothing to do with whether you lied.”
Vanessa laughed.
“You always did enjoy rescuing broken things.”
Luca’s face changed. “Leave.”
Vanessa stared at him, then walked upstairs with Vittorio.
Clara touched the brass key. “Marino kept the private books when the Bellinis borrowed against Rosa’s shares.”
Luca looked at her. “And somebody replaced the page where she refused the debt?”
“Yes.”
Daniel’s phone rang. He listened, then raised his eyes.
“We found Box 17. The key belongs to a private vault company downtown.”
Luca stood.
Daniel did not move.
“There’s a problem. Someone opened that box yesterday.”
Emma felt the basement suddenly become colder, though no door had opened behind them.
“Who?”
Daniel turned his screen around.
Emma.
May you like
The access record showed one authorized visitor.
VANESSA BELLINI.
