Chapter 6 - VICTOR COMES HOMEVictor Moretti disappeared after being removed from Moretti Holdings.
For thirty-six hours, nobody knew where he was.
His apartment remained empty.
Credit cards were useless.
Cars had been returned.
His known associates denied seeing him.
Then at 4:12 a.m., Serafina’s security camera detected movement outside her home.
A man approached the gate on foot.
Victor.
His suit was wrinkled.
His lip was split.
Blood stained one cuff.
He pressed the intercom.
“Serafina.”
She watched through the monitor.
“Why are you here?”
“Because Cross tried to kill me.”
“Convenient.”
“He killed Gabriel.”
“You helped.”
Victor closed his eyes.
“Yes.”
That stopped her.
Not denial.
Not excuses.
“Yes.”
Serafina buzzed him through the first gate but not the second.
She stepped onto the front terrace with Salvatore beside her and two security men positioned behind columns.
Victor stopped fifteen feet away.
Serafina folded her arms.
“Talk.”
Victor looked exhausted.
“I wanted Gabriel scared.”
“I know.”
Michael had been placed under attorney supervision and was negotiating a formal statement with prosecutors.
Victor laughed bitterly.
“Michael broke?”
“He told the truth.”
“He told his version.”
“Give me yours.”
Victor looked past Serafina at the house where Gabriel had lived with his family.
“I hated him.”
There was no drama in the confession.
Only exhaustion.
“He was always better.”
“Gabriel never believed that.”
“I did.”
Victor swallowed.
“Dad trusted him more. The capos respected him. People forgave him things they’d crucify me for because Gabriel could walk into a room and make everyone believe he cared.”
“He did care.”
“That made it worse.”
Victor sat on the low stone wall.
“I spent my entire life thinking kindness was a performance.”
Serafina said nothing.
“Then Gabriel genuinely became the person everyone thought he was.”
Victor looked at her.
“And I couldn’t stand it.”
“You arranged to damage his brakes.”
“Yes.”
“Knowing he could die?”
Victor looked away.
“I told myself he wouldn’t.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
“Yes.”
His voice cracked.
“Yes, I knew.”
Serafina wanted to hit him.
Not dramatically.
Not because it would solve anything.
She wanted one second in which physical pain could equal what he had caused.
But Gabriel’s recorded voice lived inside her mind.
End it.
So she stayed where she was.
Victor continued.
“Cross approached me six months before Gabriel died. Said Gabriel was destroying everything Dad built.”
“And you believed him.”
“I wanted to.”
“Same thing.”
Victor nodded.
“He said we should scare Gabriel. Break his confidence. A crash. Hospital. Nothing permanent.”
“You hired Dugan.”
“Michael arranged the introduction.”
“And Cross added the explosive.”
“I didn’t know.”
“But you followed Gabriel.”
Victor’s eyes filled with shame.
“I wanted to watch.”
Serafina’s face hardened.
“Say that again.”
He stared at the ground.
“I wanted to watch my brother crash.”
Salvatore turned away in disgust.
Victor rubbed both hands over his face.
“When the SUV left the road, I stopped. I was going to call 911.”
“Going to?”
“Then it exploded.”
His voice broke.
“I ran toward it.”
Serafina remembered police notes mentioning an unidentified passerby seen leaving before emergency crews arrived.
“You were there.”
“Yes.”
“Why did you leave?”
“I saw Cross.”
Silence.
“Where?”
“Across the highway.”
“Watching?”
Victor nodded.
“He looked at me. Then drove away.”
“And you said nothing.”
“I knew how it looked.”
“It looked like you helped murder Gabriel.”
“I did help.”
Victor stared at her.
“Just not the way I thought.”
Serafina’s hands were cold.
“You let me bury my husband believing his death was mechanical.”
“I was a coward.”
“Yes.”
“I know.”
“No, Victor. You don’t get to say that like confession turns cowardice into courage.”
He nodded.
“You’re right.”
That answer irritated her more than argument would have.
“What does Cross want?”
“The ledger.”
“We found it.”
Victor looked sharply up.
“You have it?”
“Yes.”
“Then Mia and Leo aren’t safe.”
“They weren’t safe before.”
“No. You don’t understand.”
Victor stood.
“Cross thinks Gabriel encoded the ledger.”
“He did.”
“The key isn’t in the files.”
Serafina narrowed her eyes.
“What key?”
“Cross needs account numbers, names, delivery schedules. Gabriel encrypted them behind something personal.”
“How do you know?”
“Cross tortured Dugan for information.”
Serafina’s face changed.
“Dugan is alive?”
“He was.”
“Was?”
Victor looked sick.
“I saw him yesterday.”
“Where?”
“A warehouse in Newark.”
“Cross has him?”
“Yes.”
“And Nolan?”
Victor’s expression collapsed.
“What about Nolan?”
“You left him.”
“He was with his mother.”
“Not anymore.”
Victor stepped forward.
“What happened?”
“Nolan disappeared six hours ago.”
For the first time, Victor looked like a father rather than a rival.
“No.”
“We assumed he ran.”
“No.”
Victor gripped the gate.
“Cross took him.”
“Why would Cross care about Nolan?”
“To control you.”
Victor whispered something Serafina almost didn’t hear.
“Oh God.”
He reached into his pocket.
Security raised their weapons.
Victor slowly removed a folded paper.
“I found this under my motel door.”
He passed it through the bars.
Serafina unfolded it.
One sentence.
BRING GABRIEL’S KEY OR YOUR SON LEARNS WHAT YOUR BROTHER LEARNED.
Below it was an address.
Newark waterfront.
Midnight.
Serafina looked at the time.
4:29 a.m.
Victor’s voice trembled.
“He has Nolan.”
Serafina remembered the teenager pressing Leo into the grass.
Cruel.
Arrogant.
Remorseless.
She also remembered something else.
Sixteen.
Still sixteen.
A child shaped by adults who taught him cruelty was power.
Victor looked through the gate.
“I know you hate him.”
Serafina folded the note.
“No.”
Victor stared.
“You should.”
“I hate what you taught him.”
She unlocked the second gate.
Victor looked surprised.
“Come inside.”
“Why?”
“Because we’re getting your son back.”
Victor stood frozen.
“After what he did to Leo?”
Serafina looked at him.
“Nolan is sixteen.”
“He hurt your children.”
“Yes.”
“And you’re still going after him?”
Serafina’s eyes hardened.
“My children are going to grow up in a world where adults protect children.”
She stepped closer.
“All of them.”
Victor lowered his head.
For the first time in Serafina’s memory, he began to cry.
Not loudly.
Not theatrically.
He simply covered his face while his shoulders shook.
Serafina did not comfort him.
Forgiveness had not happened.
Maybe it never would.
But mercy and forgiveness were not the same thing.
At sunrise, the Moretti family prepared to retrieve Nolan.
Not with an army.
Not with revenge.
With police.
Federal agents.
Recorded cooperation agreements.
May you like
And enough evidence to ensure that Adrian Cross would lose the one thing he had spent twenty years building.
Secrecy.
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