Chapter 6 - THE RETURN TO BELLADONNA
The drive back to Belladonna House felt twice as long. Vincent’s convoy moved fast despite the storm, but every mile gave Carlo more time. Salvatore tried repeatedly to contact the house through secure channels. Most failed. Finally one guard answered with a whisper from a locked pantry and confirmed the worst: Carlo’s men had entered through an old service tunnel connecting the west grounds to the mansion. Several guards were injured. Elena and Maria had been taken from the hidden chapel room.
Vincent’s anger became frighteningly quiet. Isabella had expected shouting, threats, perhaps reckless speed. Instead he opened the notebook from Teresa’s trunk and began studying the coded entries with the concentration of a man forcing fury into purpose. “Carlo wants the tape,” he said. “That means he doesn’t know how much other evidence exists.”
“He may think the tape is enough to convict him,” Isabella replied.
“Or enough to destroy his alliances,” Salvatore said. “Old partners will tolerate rumors. They will not tolerate proof that Carlo murdered Antonio with Matteo’s help.”
Vivian sat in the front passenger seat of the second vehicle, separated from them by a security panel. She had followed because her father had contacted her directly, and because she insisted she could get close enough to distract him. Vincent trusted her less than ever. Isabella did not trust her either, but she believed Vivian was finally afraid of the same man they were.
At the edge of the Moretti property, the convoy stopped. Belladonna House glowed beyond the trees, every ballroom window lit. Carlo had turned on the mansion as though another party were beginning. Vincent divided the team. Some men would enter through the east kitchens. Others would circle the service tunnels. Vincent, Isabella, Salvatore, and Vivian would approach the main entrance with the cassette.
“You stay behind me,” Vincent told Isabella.
She met his gaze. “I’m not carrying the tape.”
Vincent looked down. The cassette case in his hand was empty.
Isabella had removed the tape itself and hidden it inside the lining of her coat at Saint Gabriel’s. “If Carlo searches you, he finds plastic. If he searches me, he may find the real thing. But he doesn’t expect the maid to be holding the leverage.”
Vincent stared at her, then gave the smallest nod. “Your mother taught you well.”
“No,” Isabella said. “She taught me to pay attention. I’m only now understanding why.”
They entered through the front doors.
The grand foyer was empty except for two armed DeMarco men standing beneath the staircase. They collected Vincent’s visible weapon and escorted the group toward the ballroom. The same chandeliers that had glittered over Isabella’s humiliation now illuminated a very different scene.
Carlo DeMarco stood near the fireplace.
He was in his late sixties, silver-haired, perfectly dressed, and almost disappointingly ordinary. Elena sat in a chair beside him, wrists bound in front. Maria was tied near the piano. Mrs. Bell and several staff members knelt against the far wall under guard.
Carlo smiled at Vivian first. “You disappointed me.”
Vivian lifted her chin, but Isabella saw her hands shaking. “You taught me to survive.”
“I taught you obedience.”
“No. You taught me what happens to people who confuse obedience with love.”
Carlo’s smile vanished.
Vincent held up the empty cassette case. “Release them.”
Carlo laughed. “You think this is a negotiation?” He glanced at Isabella. “And there she is. Teresa’s daughter.” His eyes moved over her uniform beneath Vincent’s borrowed coat. “Your mother spent twenty-eight years pretending poverty was dignity.”
Isabella felt the insult land where Carlo intended, but she refused to show it. “She spent twenty-eight years alive. That seems to have bothered you.”
Carlo’s gaze sharpened. “She was lucky.”
“She was careful.”
“She was afraid.”
“Yes,” Isabella said. “And she survived anyway.”
The words changed something in Elena’s face. She sat straighter. Maria smiled despite the bruise on her cheek.
Carlo demanded the tape. Vincent tossed him the case. Carlo opened it and found nothing.
For one second, silence.
Then his face transformed.
He drew a pistol and pointed it at Vincent.
“Where is it?”
Before anyone moved, Vivian stepped between them.
Her father stared at her.
“Move.”
“No.”
Carlo’s voice softened. “Vivian.”
She flinched at the false tenderness.
“Move.”
She shook her head.
The man who had controlled her entire life looked at her as if seeing a stranger. “You would choose him over your family?”
Vivian’s eyes filled, but her voice held. “I’m choosing myself over you.”
Carlo struck her across the face with the back of his hand.
Isabella moved instinctively, but a guard grabbed her arm. The motion pulled her coat open. The hidden cassette slipped from the torn lining and hit the marble floor.
Everyone saw it.
Carlo smiled.
“There you are.”
He moved toward Isabella.
Vincent stepped in his path.
Carlo raised the pistol again.
Then the ballroom lights went out.
Salvatore had reached the electrical panel.
In darkness, the room exploded into motion.
Isabella dropped to the floor as shouting filled the ballroom. Someone fired toward the ceiling. Glass shattered. Vincent tackled Carlo. Guards crashed into furniture. Vivian crawled toward Elena and began cutting her restraints with a shard from a broken decorative vase.
Isabella found the cassette by touch and pushed it beneath the heavy base of the piano.
A flashlight beam swung across the room.
One of Carlo’s men saw her.
He lunged.
Maria stuck out one bound foot and tripped him.
The man hit the floor hard enough to lose his weapon.
Isabella kicked it away.
The emergency lights flickered on.
Vincent had Carlo pinned near the fireplace, but another DeMarco guard aimed at Vincent from across the ballroom.
Isabella shouted.
Salvatore fired first, striking the guard’s weapon from his hand and sending it skidding across the marble.
Within seconds, Moretti security flooded the room from three entrances.
Carlo looked around and realized the balance had shifted.
He smiled anyway.
“You still think this tape ends anything?”
Vincent pulled him to his feet.
“No,” Vincent said. “But it starts something you can’t control.”
Carlo’s eyes moved to Isabella.
“You have no idea what Teresa hid.”
Isabella retrieved the cassette.
Carlo laughed.
“She never told you about Samuel Price.”
“I know his name.”
The laugh stopped.
Carlo stared at her.
Isabella understood she had touched the real nerve.
Samuel Price was not merely an accountant.
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He was the key to the part of the story Carlo feared most.
And whatever Teresa had left behind, it was still out there.
