Chapter 8 - The Name Written in Red
The research company occupied the third floor of a building that looked deliberately forgettable.
Gray concrete.
Mirrored windows.
No large sign.
No patients entering.
No reception desk downstairs.
Companies that wanted attention invested in entrances.
Companies that wanted privacy invested in anonymity.
Marco and I arrived with an attorney.
That surprised him.
“You're bringing a lawyer?”
“Yes.”
“You feeling okay?”
“I've decided breaking doors creates paperwork.”
“You've matured.”
“Don't spread it around.”
The joke died quickly.
We had enough documentation linking the company to financial transfers from my accounts to force a conversation without forcing a door.
The office manager was a woman named Claire Haskins.
She denied recognizing Lila's name.
Then we showed her the reference code.
L-07.
Her face changed.
“We have client confidentiality obligations.”
“She's seven,” I said.
Claire looked at our attorney.
“I'm not authorized—”
“My daughter is the subject attached to that code.”
“I don't know that.”
“I do.”
She looked at me.
Then at Marco.
Then at the attorney.
“What exactly do you want?”
“Every record associated with L-07.”
“I can't.”
“Then tell me who can authorize it.”
Silence.
Finally:
“Dr. Whitmore.”
“Where is he?”
“Not here.”
“Call him.”
“He resigned yesterday.”
Of course he did.
“Address?”
“I don't have one.”
Marco slid a photograph across the desk.
Daniel Voss.
The scarred man.
Claire went pale.
“You know him.”
“No.”
“You just reacted.”
“I've seen him.”
“Where?”
“He met with Dr. Whitmore.”
“How often?”
“Several times.”
“Did he bring a child here?”
“No.”
“Samples?”
“I don't know.”
“Records?”
“Possibly.”
I leaned forward.
“Claire, I'm not interested in destroying your career.”
That was true.
“I am interested in finding out what happened to my daughter.”
Something in my voice reached her.
She looked at the door.
Then lowered her voice.
“There is a backup archive.”
Marco straightened.
“Where?”
“Off-site.”
“What contains?”
“Research files.”
“L-07?”
“Yes.”
“What was the research?”
“I wasn't clinical staff.”
“But you saw invoices.”
“Yes.”
“And?”
Her face tightened.
“They were monitoring prolonged exposure to an unapproved compound.”
I felt physically sick.
“On children?”
“I don't know who L-07 was.”
“You do now.”
She looked away.
“Was Whitmore aware?”
“Yes.”
“Voss?”
“Yes.”
“Salvatore DeLuca?”
That name scared her more.
“I've never met him.”
“Have you heard the name?”
Claire didn't answer.
“Where's the archive?”
She wrote an address.
A secure storage facility north of the city.
Then she did something unexpected.
She opened a drawer and removed a paper folder.
“This was left behind yesterday.”
“By Whitmore?”
“I think so.”
The front had no label.
Inside were six pages.
On the first was a chart of Lila's symptoms.
On the second were photographs.
On the third was a handwritten note.
Subject experiencing progressive reduction in visual acuity. Neurological impact appears at least partially reversible after discontinued exposure.
Partially reversible.
I read it twice.
Then a third time.
Hope is dangerous when you've lived without it.
It enters too quickly.
Marco pointed lower on the page.
Sponsor insists protocol continue despite recommendation to terminate.
“Who was sponsor?” I asked.
Claire shook her head.
“Not listed.”
The fourth page contained initials.
DV.
Daniel Voss.
SD.
Salvatore DeLuca.
AR.
Adrian Russo.
I stared at the last one.
“Adrian participated?”
Claire looked confused.
“I don't know.”
Could Adrian be behind this?
Maybe the kidnapped-brother story was theater.
Maybe he had helped design the entire thing.
On the final page was a handwritten word circled in red.
ANTONIO.
My father.
Underneath:
Ledger location remains unresolved. Pressure must remain on V.M. until recovery.
They expected me to find it.
But I didn't even know what it looked like.
That was when I remembered the photograph Bianca had shown me.
Our fathers standing beside a metal case.
If Antonio stole the Ledger, he had hidden it somewhere.
And whoever was behind this believed I had inherited the knowledge.
I hadn't.
I left the office with the files.
Outside, Marco called the storage facility.
No answer.
“We should go now.”
“Yes.”
My phone rang.
Unknown number.
I answered.
A man's voice.
Not distorted this time.
“Vincent Moretti.”
“Voss?”
He laughed softly.
“You've been busy.”
“Where's Adrian?”
“Still worried about your brother-in-law?”
“I'm worried about my daughter.”
“Then find the Ledger.”
“I don't have it.”
“Your father did.”
“My father took secrets to his grave.”
“Not all of them.”
“What do you want from the Ledger?”
“Insurance.”
“Against who?”
A pause.
“People worse than you.”
That almost amused me.
“Daniel, you're running medical experiments on a child.”
“I never chose the child.”
“Who did?”
Silence.
“Sal?”
Another pause.
Then:
“Ask your wife why Lila was selected.”
The call ended.
I immediately called Bianca.
No answer.
Again.
No answer.
Marco watched me.
“House?”
I called Rosa.
She answered.
“Where's Bianca?”
A pause.
“I thought she was with you.”
Everything inside me went cold.
“When did she leave?”
“Maybe twenty minutes ago.”
“With who?”
“Alone.”
“She didn't say where?”
“No.”
I ended the call.
A message arrived.
From Bianca.
One line.
I know where Adrian is. Don't follow me.
Underneath was a photograph.
Bianca in her car.
Taken from outside the windshield.
She wasn't alone.
A man sat in the passenger seat.
Gray suit.
Scar on his jaw.
Daniel Voss.
“She's with him,” Marco said.
“Yes.”
“By choice?”
I zoomed in.
Bianca's expression was tense.
Her hands gripped the wheel.
Then I noticed something reflected in the rearview mirror.
A second vehicle behind her.
Salvatore's.
“Maybe not.”
Marco was already tracking her phone.
“Signal dropped.”
“Vehicle?”
“Tracker disabled.”
“She knows where our trackers are.”
“Apparently.”
I stared at the message again.
Don't follow me.
Bianca knew me well enough to know those words would guarantee the opposite.
Unless that was exactly what she intended.
“She wants us to follow,” I said.
Marco looked up.
“Without looking like we're following.”
“Yes.”
“We don't know where she's going.”
“No.”
Then I remembered the red word in Whitmore's file.
ANTONIO.
My father owned three private properties nobody else used.
One had been abandoned since his death.
An old hunting lodge outside the city.
Adrian and Sal both knew it.
So did Bianca.
I gave Marco the address.
We headed north.
Forty minutes later, we saw Bianca's car.
Empty.
Salvatore's car sat beside it.
Also empty.
The lodge door was open.
Inside, no voices.
No movement.
On the floor of the entryway lay Bianca's handbag.
I picked it up.
Her phone was inside.
So was a photograph of Lila.
A staircase led down to the cellar.
From below came a man's voice.
“Vincent?”
Not Voss.
Not Sal.
I knew the voice even though I hadn't heard it in three years.
Adrian Russo.
Bianca's supposedly dead brother.
I descended.
At the bottom stood a man who looked older, thinner and far more tired than the brother-in-law I remembered.
Bianca stood beside him.
Alive.
Unhurt.
Salvatore stood across the room.
Daniel Voss was nowhere visible.
I stopped.
Adrian stared at me.
“It's been a long time.”
“You're dead.”
“So I've heard.”
Bianca looked between us.
“Vincent, please listen before you do anything.”
“To what?”
Adrian took one step forward.
“To the reason your father stole the Ledger.”
My jaw tightened.
“And what does that have to do with Lila?”
His face changed.
Pain.
Guilt.
Something worse.
“Everything.”
Then he said the sentence that changed the entire case.
“Salvatore wasn't trying to make your daughter blind.”
I looked at Sal.
Adrian continued.
“He was trying to keep her alive.”
May you like
And for the first time since the boy approached me in the park, I wondered whether I had been looking at the conspiracy backward.
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