Chapter 5 - The Traitor in Rossi Tower
Rossi Tower was silent when Gabriel returned.
Too silent.
The executive lobby normally carried the controlled rhythm of assistants, security staff and private elevators.
Now every corridor had been cleared.
Frankie’s men controlled the building.
Gabriel entered with Norah beside him.
“You stay upstairs.”
“No.”
“That wasn’t a suggestion.”
“Then you wasted the words.”
Gabriel looked at her.
Norah adjusted her glasses.
“My brother hid the clue. I’m coming.”
For several seconds, they stared at one another.
Frankie sighed.
“I’m going to pretend I’m not enjoying watching someone tell you no.”
Gabriel gave him a look.
Frankie stopped smiling.
They descended to sublevel four.
The polished architecture disappeared.
Concrete replaced marble.
Old brick appeared behind utility walls.
Parts of the original warehouse had survived beneath the skyscraper built above it.
Norah held Daniel’s map.
“This way.”
They followed a narrow maintenance corridor.
At the end stood an old steel door.
Gabriel placed his medallion into one indentation.
Norah pressed the hidden brass plate from her glasses case into another.
Two clicks.
The door opened.
Inside was a room no larger than a walk-in closet.
Shelves lined the walls.
Paper files.
Photographs.
Audio tapes.
Hard drives.
The Lazarus archive.
Gabriel stared.
His father’s dead hand had just reached across nine years.
Norah stepped inside.
“This could destroy half the city.”
“It could destroy us too.”
Gabriel opened one folder.
Judges.
Police officials.
Businessmen.
Union leaders.
Criminal organizations.
Every alliance Vittorio Rossi had ever made.
Every betrayal he had anticipated.
Norah suddenly noticed an empty space on the shelf.
“Something’s missing.”
Gabriel looked.
Dust outlined the shape of a large binder.
“The ledger.”
A voice came from behind them.
“Correct.”
Gabriel turned.
Frankie did too.
A man stood at the end of the corridor.
Not Anthony Moretti.
Gabriel’s expression changed.
“Victor.”
Victor Sanz had worked for the Rossi family for twenty-two years.
He had carried Gabriel home after Gabriel was wounded at twenty-five.
He had stood beside Vittorio’s coffin.
He had eaten Christmas dinner with Gabriel’s mother.
Victor smiled sadly.
“You were always intelligent, Gabriel. Just never suspicious enough of family.”
Gabriel’s voice became cold.
“You restored Norah’s credentials.”
“Yes.”
“You watched her.”
“Yes.”
Norah stared at him.
“You sent the man to the bar.”
Victor shook his head.
“Anthony did that.”
“Then you work for Anthony.”
“I work for myself.”
Victor held up the missing binder.
“For once.”
Gabriel moved forward.
Victor stepped backward.
“Don’t.”
Frankie positioned himself between Norah and the corridor.
Gabriel’s eyes remained on Victor.
“My father trusted you.”
“Your father trusted leverage.”
Victor’s smile vanished.
“He kept files on everyone. Including me.”
“What did you do?”
“Something I refuse to let a dead man punish me for.”
Gabriel understood.
Victor needed the ledger because it contained evidence against him.
“What did Anthony promise you?”
“Freedom.”
“Anthony doesn’t give freedom.”
“No. But he buys loyalty.”
Victor glanced at Norah.
“Your brother understood that too late.”
Norah froze.
“You knew Daniel?”
Victor said nothing.
Her voice trembled.
“You were there.”
Gabriel turned toward her.
Norah stepped forward.
“You were there the night he died.”
Victor’s silence answered.
Gabriel’s expression emptied.
Frankie knew that expression.
It was the most dangerous one.
But Norah touched Gabriel’s arm.
“Don’t.”
Victor laughed.
“Still protecting people, Miss Bellini?”
Gabriel’s eyes narrowed.
Victor continued.
“Daniel did the same thing. Protected Vittorio. Protected you. Protected everyone except himself.”
Norah’s eyes filled.
“What happened?”
“Anthony wanted the archive. Daniel wouldn’t tell him where it was.”
“And?”
Victor looked away.
“That night got out of control.”
Norah’s voice cracked.
“You killed my brother.”
“I was there.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
Victor finally met her eyes.
“No.”
Norah stopped.
“Anthony did.”
Gabriel studied him.
“Why should we believe you?”
“Because I’m the reason Norah survived.”
Victor looked at her.
“I told Anthony Daniel had no family.”
Norah stared.
“You knew about me?”
“Daniel begged me not to tell them.”
The revelation struck harder than hatred would have.
Victor had betrayed Daniel.
But he had also kept Norah alive.
Human beings, Gabriel thought bitterly, were rarely simple enough to hate cleanly.
Victor backed toward the emergency stairwell.
“I’m leaving.”
“With the ledger?” Gabriel asked.
“Yes.”
“No.”
Victor smiled.
“You’re going to stop me?”
Gabriel moved.
Norah grabbed his arm.
Victor used the distraction to disappear through the stairwell door.
Frankie chased him.
Gabriel followed.
By the time they reached the garage, a vehicle was already speeding toward the exit.
Frankie swore.
Gabriel pulled out his phone.
“Lock the building.”
“Too late,” Norah said.
She pointed toward the security screen.
Victor’s vehicle had exited.
Gabriel called his men.
No answer.
Then another phone rang.
Norah’s.
Unknown number.
She looked at Gabriel.
He nodded.
Norah answered.
“Hello?”
Anthony Moretti’s voice came through.
“Miss Bellini.”
Norah went still.
“Eleven years,” Anthony continued. “You’ve become difficult to find.”
Gabriel took the phone and activated speaker.
“What do you want, Anthony?”
A quiet laugh.
“Gabriel Rossi. Your father would be disappointed.”
“My father is dead.”
“Dead men can still ruin lives. You’ve just discovered that.”
“Victor has the ledger.”
“I know.”
“Then call him.”
“I have.”
Anthony paused.
“He changed the arrangement.”
Gabriel frowned.
“What arrangement?”
“He was supposed to bring it to me.”
“And?”
“He disappeared.”
Norah looked at Gabriel.
Victor had betrayed Anthony too.
Anthony continued.
“So now we have a problem.”
“Your problems don’t interest me.”
“This one will.”
A sound came through the phone.
A woman’s voice.
Gabriel froze.
“Gabriel?”
His mother.
Gabriel’s face changed.
Norah had never seen fear in him before.
Now she did.
Anthony spoke again.
“Bring me the key to the archive and Victor Sanz.”
Gabriel’s voice became dangerously calm.
“You already have the ledger.”
“Victor has the binder. Not the digital archive.”
Anthony laughed softly.
“And your father was clever enough to encrypt everything.”
Gabriel looked at Norah.
Two keys.
Two families.
Anthony continued.
“Midnight tomorrow.”
“Where?”
“You already know.”
The address from the note.
Where Daniel had died.
Anthony ended the call.
Gabriel stood perfectly still.
Norah touched his hand.
He looked at her.
For three years, she had thought Gabriel Rossi feared nothing.
She had been wrong.
Everyone had someone they could not afford to lose.
And now Anthony had found his.
But the next shock came seconds later.
Frankie’s phone buzzed.
He read the message.
His face went pale.
“What?”
Frankie handed Gabriel the phone.
A security photograph showed Victor entering a private airfield.
He was not alone.
Beside him was a woman.
Gabriel’s mother.
The photograph had been taken three hours earlier.
Before Anthony’s supposed kidnapping.
Norah stared at Gabriel.
“If she was with Victor voluntarily…”
Gabriel finished the thought.
“Then Anthony may not have taken her at all.”
And suddenly Gabriel no longer knew whether his mother was a hostage—
May you like
or part of the conspiracy.
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