Chapter 10 - The Bride Was Never the Bargaining ChipNico arrived voluntarily.
That worried Mateo more than if he had run.
He entered the safe house wearing jeans and a university sweatshirt.
Twenty-six years old.
Mateo had paid for his education.
Given him a job.
Treated him like a younger brother.
Nico looked terrified.
“I didn’t know they were going to blow up the chapel.”
Mateo sat across from him.
Kora remained near the door.
“Start at the beginning,” Mateo said.
Nico swallowed.
“Leo contacted me eight months ago.”
“Why?”
“He knew I owed money.”
Mateo’s jaw tightened.
“How much?”
“Two hundred thousand.”
Gino muttered something.
Nico looked ashamed.
“Gambling.”
Mateo closed his eyes.
Leo had found weakness.
Then purchased it.
“What did you give him?”
“Schedules. Security rotations.”
“And the video?”
“After the fire, he told me to create it.”
Kora stepped forward.
“Why me?”
Nico looked at her.
“That was always the plan.”
The room became quiet.
Kora’s voice changed.
“What plan?”
Nico looked toward Mateo.
“Leo never wanted the marriage.”
“That’s obvious.”
“No.”
Nico shook his head.
“I mean the wedding itself was bait.”
Kora stared.
“For Mateo?”
“For both of you.”
He explained.
Dominico had learned Elena Bell had left evidence.
He believed Kora possessed it.
At the same time, Mateo had started auditing old financial records from Victor’s era.
Two problems.
One solution.
Put them in the same building.
Create a public event with controlled security.
Kill them both.
Blame the violence on old family tensions.
Leo’s marriage proposal had never been about peace.
Kora had never been a bargaining chip.
She was a target.
Her entire engagement had been a death sentence dressed in white.
Mateo’s expression became cold.
“And Dominico?”
Nico looked down.
“Leo said his father approved.”
Kora remembered Dominico calling her harmless.
“He thought I didn’t know anything.”
“Yes.”
“And when I survived?”
“They panicked.”
Nico wiped his face.
“I’m sorry.”
Mateo stood.
Kora watched him.
She had seen angry men before.
Mateo was different.
The more furious he became, the quieter he got.
“What else?”
Nico looked toward the floor.
“There’s going to be another attempt.”
“When?”
“I don’t know.”
“Where?”
“I don’t know.”
Mateo stepped closer.
Nico flinched.
Kora touched Mateo’s arm.
He stopped.
Not because she forced him.
Because he listened.
Nico looked at Kora gratefully.
She didn’t return it.
“Give us something useful.”
Nico swallowed.
“Leo keeps everything.”
“What?”
“Records. Insurance. Blackmail.”
“Where?”
“He has an office under Vale Urban Demolition.”
Gino looked at Mateo.
“We can get a warrant through Olivia.”
Mateo shook his head.
“By the time a warrant arrives, it’ll be empty.”
Kora said, “Then we don’t go after Leo.”
Both men looked at her.
“We make Leo come after us.”
Mateo frowned.
“How?”
Kora lifted Victor’s key.
“We tell him we found locker seventeen.”
Silence.
Gino slowly smiled.
Mateo did not.
“No.”
Kora raised an eyebrow.
“You just said I don’t take orders.”
“This isn’t an order.”
“What is it?”
“A desperate request for you to stop volunteering as bait.”
Kora stepped closer.
“I already am bait.”
Her voice softened.
“The difference is whether we control the hook.”
Mateo stared at her.
Then, reluctantly, he nodded.
But neither realized someone outside the safe house was listening.
May you like
And twenty minutes later Leo received a message.
SHE FOUND THE KEY.
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