Chapter 3 - The Brother Who Wanted a Crown
Marcus did not shout.
That was the frightening thing about him.
He held the water bottle between two fingers and studied Dominic with quiet amusement.
“She came back.”
Dominic remained motionless.
“No idea what you're talking about.”
Marcus laughed softly.
“You were always terrible at lying to me.”
“I never needed to lie to you.”
“No. Father did enough lying for everyone.”
A shadow crossed Dominic's expression.
Behind the wine racks, Elena crouched with one hand pressed against her mouth.
Marcus continued.
“Do you remember my twelfth birthday?”
Dominic said nothing.
“You received a horse.”
“I was nine.”
“I received a phone call.”
Marcus's voice remained calm.
“My mother and I were living above a laundromat. Father called for three minutes.”
Dominic's jaw tightened.
“Marcus—”
“He told me I should be grateful he remembered.”
Silence.
Marcus looked around the basement.
“And you wonder why I stopped believing fairness existed.”
“I don't wonder.”
Dominic met his gaze.
“I just refuse to become responsible for what he did.”
Marcus's smile disappeared.
“He gave you the empire.”
“He divided it.”
“He gave you respect.”
“I earned some of it.”
“He gave you his name.”
“You had his name.”
“Not in the rooms that mattered.”
Marcus stood.
Elena could hear years of hatred inside every sentence.
This had stopped being about money long ago.
Marcus wanted history rewritten.
Dominic represented everything he believed had been denied to him.
“You could have built something of your own,” Dominic said.
“I did.”
Marcus gestured around them.
“This.”
“A basement?”
“Your fall.”
Dominic almost smiled.
Marcus leaned closer.
“Give me the code.”
“No.”
“Elena has a son.”
Dominic's face became stone.
Marcus noticed.
There.
A weakness.
“Elena isn't part of this.”
“She made herself part of it.”
“You touch her or that boy—”
“What?”
Marcus's voice became almost playful.
“You'll kill me?”
Dominic lifted his restrained wrist.
“Currently difficult.”
Marcus smiled.
“Exactly.”
He turned toward the stairs.
Then stopped.
“Tell Elena I said hello.”
Elena's blood ran cold.
Marcus looked directly toward the wine racks.
For one horrifying second she was certain he knew.
Then he climbed the stairs.
The door closed.
They waited nearly five minutes.
Elena finally emerged.
Dominic's anger hit her before his words did.
“You're done.”
“What?”
“You don't come back.”
“Dominic—”
“He knows.”
“He suspects.”
“That is enough.”
Elena crossed her arms.
“You don't decide what I do.”
“I decide whether your child grows up with a mother.”
She flinched.
Dominic immediately regretted the words.
But he continued.
“Marcus is not pretending anymore.”
“Neither am I.”
Elena stepped closer.
“You think I'm doing this because I'm naïve?”
“I think you're brave enough to become stupid.”
“Those aren't the same thing.”
“They look identical at funerals.”
Elena stared at him.
Then she turned away.
Dominic's voice softened.
“Elena.”
She stopped.
“I can't protect you from here.”
“You don't need to.”
“You don't understand men like Marcus.”
Elena turned back.
“No. You don't understand women like me.”
Dominic fell silent.
She continued.
“I've spent years being told to stay quiet because somebody stronger had decided my fear belonged to them.”
Dominic watched her carefully.
“Derek?”
Elena had mentioned Noah's father only once.
Not by name.
She realized Dominic had remembered.
“My ex-husband,” she said. “He didn't chain me in a basement. He didn't need to.”
Dominic's expression changed.
Elena shook her head.
“I left. Built a life. Raised Noah. Worked three jobs when I had to. So don't confuse ordinary with weak.”
“I don't.”
“Then stop talking to me like I'm something you have to send away for my own good.”
Dominic lowered his gaze.
After a long moment he said, “Fair.”
Elena blinked.
She had expected an argument.
“That's it?”
“What would you prefer?”
“A billionaire mafia boss admitting I'm right with more pain.”
Dominic almost laughed.
“Don't get ambitious.”
For the first time since entering the basement, Elena felt the tension loosen.
Then Dominic said, “There is something you need to know.”
Elena sat.
“The code Marcus wants protects a trust.”
“Money?”
“Evidence.”
She frowned.
“My father kept records.”
“Of what?”
“Everything.”
Bribes.
Politicians.
Judges.
Businessmen.
Criminal organizations.
People who had purchased favors from Crane operations for decades.
Dominic's father had apparently believed information was safer than cash.
“If the records became public,” Dominic said, “half the people connected to my father's old empire would panic.”
“And Marcus wants them?”
“He wants control.”
“Why don't you give him fake information?”
“I already tried.”
Elena stared.
“That is why my ribs look like this.”
She winced.
Dominic continued.
“The archive requires two things. The numerical code and a physical key.”
Elena looked at the ring of keys in her lap.
“No.”
“Not those.”
“Where's the physical key?”
Dominic's expression changed.
“In this house.”
Elena leaned forward.
“Marcus doesn't know where?”
“No.”
“But you do.”
Dominic nodded.
“There's a chapel upstairs. Old private room my father used. Behind a painting of Saint Michael is a compartment.”
“And the key is inside.”
“Yes.”
Elena stood.
Dominic immediately said, “Absolutely not.”
She looked at him.
“You just told me where it was.”
“I was explaining the problem.”
“You were handing the problem to a cleaning woman.”
“I was not.”
“You should learn how conversations work.”
“Elena.”
“If we get that key before Marcus does, we have leverage.”
“If you're caught—”
“Then I tell him I'm cleaning.”
“In a private chapel behind a painting?”
Elena paused.
“Very aggressively cleaning.”
Dominic stared at her.
Then, despite everything, he laughed.
It was quiet.
Painful.
Real.
The sound transformed his face.
For a second Elena saw the man he might have been before power taught him to hide everything.
She hated noticing.
“Tomorrow,” she said.
“No.”
“Tomorrow.”
“Elena.”
“Good night, Dominic.”
She climbed the stairs.
The chapel was on the third floor.
She had passed it during her original cleaning assignment.
Tomorrow she would return before Marcus.
She would find the key.
And then maybe she could finally help Dominic escape.
Elena did not know that a small black camera above the basement door had recorded every time she had entered the mansion.
And across Boston, in a dark office overlooking the harbor, Marcus Crane was watching the footage.
Frame by frame.
Until Elena's face filled the monitor.
Marcus smiled.
May you like
Then he opened a file containing everything there was to know about Noah Marquez.
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