Chapter 7 - The Heiress Who Wanted Nothing
“No.”
It was the only word Chloe could manage.
Thomas lay on the church floor with blood soaking through Dean's jacket pressed against his shoulder.
Sirens approached in the distance.
Gabriel stood several feet away holding the third flash drive.
“Thomas,” he said, “explain.”
“Leo knew Vincent was moving money through Costa companies.”
Thomas struggled for breath.
“He didn't trust Antonio to act quickly enough.”
“My father?”
“Your father loved his sons. He also loved the empire.”
Gabriel's face hardened.
“So Leo moved control.”
“To a trust.”
“For Chloe.”
Thomas nodded.
“She wasn't born yet.”
“He named Evelyn as trustee until the child turned twenty-five.”
Chloe shook her head.
“This is insane.”
Thomas looked at her.
“You don't understand what Leo was trying to do.”
“I understand enough. I don't want any criminal empire.”
“It isn't the criminal side.”
Gabriel glanced at the drive.
Thomas explained.
“Restaurants. Shipping companies. Real estate. Construction. Warehouses. Hotels. Legitimate businesses worth hundreds of millions.”
Chloe almost laughed.
She had twelve dollars in her checking account.
Her mother had medical debt.
Her apartment radiator barely worked.
Now a bleeding man in an abandoned church was telling her she owned hotels.
“Where has the money been?”
Thomas closed his eyes.
“Blocked.”
“By Vincent?”
“Yes.”
Gabriel's expression grew colder.
“Using my authority?”
Thomas looked at him.
“Using forged authorization.”
The implications landed immediately.
Vincent had not merely killed Leo.
He had been quietly stealing from both Costa brothers for more than a decade.
And from Chloe.
The ambulance arrived.
Thomas was taken to a secure hospital under an alias.
By sunrise, Gabriel's lawyers had confirmed enough of the documents to make Chloe nauseous.
The trust existed.
The signatures appeared legitimate.
Leo Costa had created it months before his death.
Evelyn Mercer was listed as guardian.
Chloe, identified only as “E.M.'s biological child,” was the beneficiary.
At twenty-five she had legally gained control.
Nobody had told her.
Two years had passed.
Gabriel sat across from Chloe in the library of the Lake Forest house.
“There are two ways this goes.”
“I choose the third.”
“There isn't a third.”
“Then invent one. Rich criminals are supposed to be creative.”
He gave her an exhausted look.
“Option one: you accept the trust and everything attached to it.”
“No.”
“Option two: you sign control temporarily to an independent board while we expose Vincent.”
“That sounds suspiciously like option one wearing glasses.”
Gabriel almost smiled.
“You can't ignore it.”
“I've ignored plenty of bills.”
“This isn't a utility bill.”
“I don't want your money.”
“It isn't mine.”
“That doesn't make it better.”
He leaned forward.
“Chloe, Vincent has killed people for less than a fraction of what legally belongs to you.”
“So I give it away.”
“To whom?”
“Charity.”
“And when Vincent uses forged documents to take it first?”
She went silent.
Gabriel continued.
“Until this is resolved, owning it makes you dangerous.”
“To him.”
“Yes.”
“And valuable to you.”
His expression changed.
“No.”
“You're telling me hundreds of millions belong to me and you don't care?”
“I care that my brother tried to protect something decent before he died.”
“What?”
“His daughter.”
The words landed harder than Chloe expected.
Gabriel looked away.
“I won't steal from Leo.”
She studied him.
Everything she had heard about Gabriel Costa suggested he was ruthless.
Yet his anger never seemed directed at what he could take.
It was directed at what had already been stolen.
Mia entered carrying a drawing.
“I made us.”
She placed it on the table.
Five stick figures stood beneath a giant yellow sun.
Chloe pointed.
“Who's that?”
“You.”
“And that?”
“Me.”
“Grandma.”
“Yes.”
She pointed to a tall figure in black.
“Mr. Scary.”
Gabriel sighed.
“And the last person?”
Mia smiled.
“Grandpa Thomas.”
Chloe's chest tightened.
“You just met Thomas.”
“He cried when he saw Mommy.”
Children's logic.
Simple.
Unfairly accurate.
Mia turned to Gabriel.
“You need a happier shirt.”
He looked down at his black clothes.
“I own other colors.”
“What colors?”
“Gray.”
Mia looked disappointed.
Chloe laughed.
It was the first genuine laugh she had managed in days.
Gabriel stared at her.
Something shifted.
Not romance.
Not yet.
Recognition.
As though he had forgotten people could laugh inside his house.
Dean entered before the moment became uncomfortable.
“Vincent called.”
Gabriel's expression changed immediately.
“What does he know?”
“He wants a meeting.”
“Where?”
“Costa headquarters.”
“When?”
“Tonight.”
Chloe stood.
“It's a trap.”
Gabriel looked amused.
“Thank you, detective.”
“Don't go.”
His smile faded.
“I have to.”
“No, you don't.”
“If I refuse, he knows I'm moving against him.”
“He already sent people to shoot us.”
“We cannot prove those were his.”
“We heard his voice on recordings.”
“Twelve-year-old recordings.”
“So?”
“So the men loyal to him need present-day proof.”
Chloe crossed her arms.
“You plan to walk into a building full of people who might work for the man who killed your brother?”
“Yes.”
“That is stupid.”
Dean cleared his throat.
“I've mentioned this.”
Gabriel ignored him.
“I've controlled this organization for twelve years.”
“Then order Vincent to come here.”
“He won't.”
“Why?”
“Because he's afraid.”
Chloe blinked.
“Of you?”
Gabriel's eyes went cold.
“Finally, something sensible about him.”
That evening Gabriel prepared to leave.
He wore a dark suit.
No tie.
The gold ring remained on his hand.
Chloe found him near the front door.
“What happens if you don't come back?”
He looked at her.
“Dean gets you and your family out.”
“Where?”
“You won't know until you're there.”
“That seems to be your answer to everything.”
“It works.”
She hesitated.
Then handed him Thomas's ring.
Gabriel stared at it.
“Why?”
“The split runs left.”
“So?”
“Thomas said that's how you know which one is real.”
Gabriel looked at his own.
Right.
He removed it.
For twelve years, he had worn a copy.
A counterfeit symbol.
Maybe Vincent had arranged that too.
Chloe placed Thomas's ring in his palm.
“If you need people to choose who they're loyal to, give them the original.”
Gabriel studied her.
“You're better at this than you think.”
“Don't insult me.”
A faint smile.
“I'll try.”
He started toward the door.
“Gabriel.”
He stopped.
Chloe struggled to find the right words.
“Come back.”
His face softened.
“I intend to.”
At Costa headquarters, forty men waited around a long conference table.
Vincent Marchetti sat at the far end.
He was sixty-two, silver-haired, elegant and smiling.
He stood as Gabriel entered.
“My boy.”
Gabriel hated when he called him that.
“Vincent.”
They embraced.
Neither trusted the other.
Vincent noticed the ring immediately.
His smile faltered.
“New jewelry?”
“Old.”
Gabriel sat.
The meeting began.
Shipping disputes.
Construction bids.
A city contract.
Ordinary business spoken by extraordinary men.
Then Gabriel placed Thomas's ring on the table.
Silence spread.
Vincent looked at it.
“Where did you find that?”
Gabriel watched him carefully.
“A waitress.”
Vincent's left eye twitched.
Barely.
But enough.
“Interesting.”
“You know her?”
“No.”
“Chloe Mercer.”
Nothing.
Then:
“Should I?”
Gabriel leaned back.
“No.”
The meeting continued.
Twenty minutes later, Vincent excused himself.
Dean's surveillance team followed.
Vincent drove directly to a private airfield.
There, hidden cameras captured him meeting a man Gabriel had not seen in fifteen years.
A former Costa bomb maker.
The man who had built the device that killed Leo.
Back at Lake Forest, Chloe was putting Mia to bed when her phone rang.
Gabriel.
“Did you get him?”
“Not yet.”
“But?”
“We got enough.”
She exhaled.
“Come home.”
There was silence.
Chloe realized what she had said.
Home.
Gabriel noticed too.
“I'll be there soon.”
Before he could hang up, the security alarm screamed.
Chloe ran to the window.
Flames rose from the guardhouse.
Men shouted downstairs.
Mia sat up crying.
Gabriel's voice snapped through the phone.
“Chloe?”
“Someone's here.”
“How many?”
“I don't know.”
“Take Mia and Evelyn to the safe room.”
Chloe ran.
Gunfire erupted outside.
She reached Evelyn's bedroom.
Empty.
“Mom?”
No answer.
The back door stood open.
Evelyn was gone.
On the kitchen floor lay her medication bag.
And beside it, written on a torn piece of cardboard:
BRING THE DRIVE OR THE OLD WOMAN DIES.
Chloe stared at the message.
Then another realization hit her.
The third flash drive had been in Gabriel's office.
She ran there.
The drawer was open.
The drive was gone.
Someone had already taken it.
And from behind her came Mia's frightened voice.
“Mommy?”
Chloe turned.
Her daughter held the missing flash drive in her hand.
May you like
“Grandma gave me this before she went outside.”
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