Chapter 6 - The Gates of Romano Estate
The photograph arrived five minutes later.
Elena stared at it on the library table.
Her father stood beneath a streetlight beside his car.
The timestamp showed 10:43 p.m.
Eight years ago.
Forty-seven minutes before police estimated the accident occurred.
Daniel Carter looked frightened.
Elena remembered his face from that week.
He had been distracted.
He had called her twice in one afternoon just to ask whether she was home.
At the time, she had thought it sweet.
Now it felt like a warning she had failed to understand.
“Who took this?” she asked.
“We don’t know,” Luca said.
“Where was it?”
“Inside the abandoned vehicle following you.”
“So they wanted us to find it.”
Mateo looked at her sharply.
Elena pointed to the photograph.
“If someone wanted to hide their surveillance, they would take everything from the car.”
Luca nodded slowly.
“She’s right.”
Mateo’s attention stayed on Elena.
“What?”
She frowned.
“You’re looking at me strangely.”
“You noticed it immediately.”
“Should I apologize?”
“No.”
Something like admiration entered his eyes.
That irritated her almost as much as his secrets.
Adrienne arrived twenty minutes later.
She rushed into the room holding her phone.
“What happened?”
Mateo’s expression hardened.
“You tell me.”
Adrienne stopped.
He slid the photograph showing her beside Victor across the table.
Color drained from her face.
“Oh.”
“That isn’t an answer.”
“It was dinner.”
“When?”
“Wednesday.”
“You told Victor about the bet.”
“Yes, but—”
“Why?”
“He heard us talking about it.”
“You gave him Elena’s name?”
Adrienne looked toward Elena.
“I don’t remember.”
Elena’s stomach twisted.
“That would be useful information to remember.”
“I’m sorry.”
Mateo stepped toward his cousin.
“What exactly did Victor ask?”
“Whether Elena was the woman from the publishing fundraiser.”
Mateo went still.
“He already knew her?”
“I thought he recognized the name.”
“Adrienne.”
“I didn’t think it mattered!”
“You don’t think anything matters until it explodes.”
Her face crumpled.
The anger went out of Mateo almost instantly.
He turned away.
Elena watched the family dynamic carefully.
Adrienne was reckless.
But she looked genuinely terrified.
Not guilty.
At least not guilty of knowing what this had become.
Elena picked up the photograph of Victor.
Something bothered her.
She leaned closer.
Victor was facing Adrienne, but his eyes were angled slightly past the camera.
No.
Not past it.
At it.
“Wait.”
Everyone turned.
Elena pointed.
“The man beside Adrienne.”
“Victor,” Mateo said.
“He knows he’s being photographed.”
Mateo frowned.
“What makes you think that?”
“He isn’t looking at her.”
Luca stepped closer.
Elena tapped the image.
“He’s looking directly toward whoever took this.”
Silence.
She grabbed another surveillance photograph.
Then another.
A dark sedan appeared reflected in a storefront.
Same shape.
Same damaged left headlight.
She found it again in another image.
“Same car.”
Luca took both photographs.
His expression changed.
Mateo asked, “What?”
“The vehicle isn’t registered to Victor.”
“Then who?”
“We’ll check.”
Elena examined timestamps.
Her editorial brain did what it had always done with manuscripts.
Sequence.
Continuity.
Details.
Something was wrong with the order.
“This photo was taken at 3:14.”
“Yes,” Luca said.
“But Adrienne told me yesterday that Mateo wouldn’t arrive until four.”
Adrienne blinked.
“I did.”
Elena looked at Mateo.
“When did your security team receive today’s itinerary?”
“Seven this morning.”
“What time did it say you’d meet me?”
Mateo understood first.
“Eight thirty.”
Elena pointed at the photograph.
“Then whoever was following me had different information.”
Luca immediately called one of his analysts.
Mateo looked at Elena with open intensity.
She felt self-conscious.
“What?”
“You found that in three minutes.”
“I edit complicated books for people who change character names halfway through a manuscript.”
Adrienne whispered, “I knew I liked her.”
Mateo ignored his cousin.
“What different information?”
Elena replayed the conversations.
Adrienne had originally told her four o’clock as a joke, then corrected it later.
Victor might have heard one version.
Mateo’s team might have received another.
If someone inside the organization wanted to test which schedule leaked...
She looked up.
“Plant another itinerary.”
Luca’s eyes narrowed.
“A false one.”
“Yes.”
“Send different destinations to different groups.”
Mateo completed the thought.
“See who follows which version.”
Elena nodded.
No one spoke for a moment.
Then Luca smiled faintly.
“I like her.”
Mateo’s gaze remained on Elena.
“So do I.”
The words escaped before he could stop them.
Adrienne’s eyebrows climbed.
Elena stared.
Mateo looked away.
“Prepare the false itinerary.”
Luca left quickly, possibly to avoid laughing.
Elena’s cheeks were warm.
“This doesn’t mean I’ve forgiven you.”
“I didn’t assume it did.”
“Good.”
“But you’re staying here tonight.”
“No.”
“Yes.”
“There’s the dictatorship again.”
“There is somebody outside who knows your father and has followed you for an unknown period.”
“I heard you.”
“And until we understand why—”
“I’ll stay.”
Mateo stopped.
Elena exhaled.
“I’m not stupid.”
“I never thought you were.”
“Plenty of people do.”
“Then they aren’t paying attention.”
For the first time since seeing the photographs, Elena’s fear loosened.
Only slightly.
But enough.
Ten minutes later, Luca returned.
“We sent three itineraries.”
Mateo looked at him.
“And?”
“One got activity almost immediately.”
“Which?”
Luca’s expression turned grim.
“The itinerary sent only to internal senior staff.”
Someone inside Mateo Romano’s organization had betrayed him.
May you like
And whoever it was had known Elena Carter would be standing beside him.
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