Chapter 6 - THIRTY-ONE PERCENT
By breakfast, I was apparently worth hundreds of millions of dollars.
I still had twenty-eight dollars in my checking account.
Life is stupid that way.
“I don’t want it,” I said.
Luca sat across from me in the library.
“That isn’t how trusts work.”
“Then make it how they work.”
“I can’t.”
“You own the company.”
“Seventy-eight percent yesterday, apparently forty-seven percent today.”
I rubbed my forehead.
“Great.”
Mrs. Caruso placed coffee beside me.
“You need sugar.”
“I need a different life.”
“Sugar is easier.”
I added two spoonfuls.
Dad paced near the window.
“This was Antonio’s plan?”
Claire had finally agreed to meet.
Not at the mansion.
At Caruso’s restaurant.
She arrived wearing sunglasses and carrying the red folder.
Luca sent security ahead.
The restaurant still had broken windows covered in plywood, but Mrs. Caruso insisted on opening the kitchen.
“If people are going to confess crimes in my dining room, they can at least eat.”
Claire sat at the same table where Antonio Moretti’s photograph had once hung.
She looked exhausted.
“Your father created the trust in 2008,” she told Luca.
“The year he died.”
“Yes.”
“Why Emma?”
Claire looked at Dad.
“Because of Emily.”
I clenched my jaw.
“That isn’t an answer.”
“No. It’s guilt.”
Claire opened the folder.
Inside were copies of legal documents.
Antonio had discovered enough about my mother’s death to believe Matteo was responsible, but not enough to prosecute him without exposing other crimes tied to Moretti businesses.
“He tried to force Matteo out,” Claire said.
“Matteo refused.”
“So Dad helped fake his death?” Luca asked.
Claire shook her head.
“No. Matteo did that himself.”
“Then why didn’t Dad tell me he survived?”
“He didn’t know for certain.”
Dad cleared his throat.
“I knew.”
Luca looked at him.
“But Antonio didn’t.”
“I never told him.”
“Why?”
“Matteo threatened Emma.”
Luca’s anger flashed.
“You let my father die believing his son was dead.”
Dad stood.
“I kept my daughter alive.”
Nobody spoke.
Luca looked away first.
Claire continued.
“Antonio suspected Matteo might return. The trust was insurance.”
“Insurance for what?” I asked.
“If Matteo resurfaced and tried to claim family assets, control would split.”
“With me.”
“Yes.”
“Why would that stop him?”
“Because major asset transfers require sixty percent approval.”
Luca understood.
“Matteo can’t liquidate the company without Emma.”
“Correct.”
“So he needs my vote,” I said.
“Or your death.”
Mrs. Caruso set down a plate harder than necessary.
“Nobody is killing anyone before lunch.”
Marco almost smiled.
Then the front door opened.
Every security man moved.
A young attorney stepped inside carrying a briefcase.
He looked terrified.
“Mr. Moretti?”
Luca nodded.
“I’m Daniel Cho. Chicago Federal Trust.”
“What do you want?”
“To execute the trust documents.”
He looked at me.
“Ms. Reed needs to sign acknowledgment.”
I stared at the papers.
“If I refuse?”
“The ownership exists regardless.”
“Wonderful.”
Daniel opened the briefcase.
Inside was a tablet and several folders.
Then he froze.
“What?”
He checked again.
His face went white.
“The original trust certificate is missing.”
Claire stood.
“That’s impossible.”
“It was sealed in our legal archive.”
“When did you last see it?”
“This morning.”
Marco was already on his phone.
Daniel swallowed.
“There’s something else.”
“Of course there is,” I said.
“The trust includes a succession clause.”
Luca frowned.
“What clause?”
“If Emma dies before formally acknowledging her interest, the shares transfer…”
He stopped.
“To whom?” Luca asked.
Daniel looked at Vanessa.
She had been standing near the kitchen doorway.
“To Vanessa Bellini.”
Nobody moved.
Vanessa laughed.
“What?”
Daniel turned the document.
Her full legal name appeared in black ink.
VANESSA MARIE BELLINI.
She stared.
“I didn’t know.”
Luca’s expression became unreadable.
“You expect us to believe that?”
“Yes.”
“Your father knew about the trust.”
“I knew nothing about this.”
Claire whispered, “Antonio added Vanessa as secondary beneficiary because she was a child.”
“How old?” I asked.
“Eleven.”
Vanessa stared at Claire.
“Why me?”
Claire looked uncomfortable.
“Because Antonio believed Victor’s daughter should not pay for Victor’s crimes.”
Vanessa sat down.
For the first time since I met her, she looked small.
Not cruel.
Not elegant.
Just stunned.
“So if Emma dies, I get thirty-one percent?”
Daniel nodded.
Marco’s hand moved subtly toward his jacket.
Vanessa saw it.
“Oh, come on.”
“You impersonated her yesterday.”
“To steal a ledger, not murder her.”
“Convenient distinction.”
Vanessa looked at me.
“I didn’t know.”
I believed her.
I hated that I believed her.
Maybe because real shock is hard to fake.
Maybe because I had seen enough lies in twenty-four hours to recognize the shape of truth.
Then the restaurant phone rang.
Mrs. Caruso answered.
“Caruso’s.”
Her face changed.
She handed the receiver to Luca.
“For you.”
Luca put it on speaker.
Matteo’s voice filled the room.
“Congratulations, Emma.”
My skin crawled.
“You know.”
“I know everything Antonio did.”
“What do you want?”
“You already know.”
“My shares?”
“Your signature.”
“On what?”
“A transfer.”
Luca said, “Go to hell.”
Matteo laughed.
“This isn’t your negotiation, little brother.”
“It became mine when you threatened her.”
A pause.
Then Matteo said, “You always did love broken things.”
Luca’s face hardened.
I said, “Where’s Victor?”
“Alive.”
“Prove it.”
A muffled sound.
Then Victor’s voice.
“Vanessa!”
She grabbed the phone.
“Dad?”
“Don’t give him anything!”
The line shifted.
Matteo returned.
“Tonight. Ten o’clock. I’ll send instructions.”
“No,” I said.
Everyone looked at me.
Matteo sounded amused.
“No?”
“You need my signature.”
“Yes.”
“Then I set terms.”
Luca stared at me.
I continued.
“Victor comes first.”
“Emma—” Vanessa began.
I raised a hand.
“Alive. Unhurt. Public place.”
Matteo laughed softly.
“You’re learning.”
“And I want the envelope my mother left.”
Silence.
“You have it?” I asked.
“Yes.”
“Then bring it.”
“What makes you think you can negotiate with me?”
“Because if you kill me before I acknowledge the trust, Vanessa gets the shares.”
Vanessa’s eyes widened.
“If you kill her,” I continued, “Luca still blocks you. If you kill all of us, lawyers freeze everything for years.”
Matteo stopped laughing.
“You need me alive.”
I leaned toward the phone.
“So start acting like it.”
The line went dead.
Nobody spoke.
Then Mrs. Caruso put a plate of ravioli in front of me.
“You negotiate better when you eat.”
Vanessa stared at me.
“That was either incredibly smart or incredibly stupid.”
“Probably both.”
Luca was still looking at me.
“What?”
“You’re not going.”
“We covered this.”
“No, yesterday you were an employee chasing answers.”
“And today?”
“Today you are the legal obstacle between my brother and several billion dollars.”
“Promotion?”
Marco coughed to hide a laugh.
Luca did not.
His phone buzzed.
A message from Matteo.
One photograph.
Victor Bellini, alive.
One address.
Navy Pier.
10:00 P.M.
And one instruction:
EMMA COMES ALONE.
Below it was a second photograph.
My father leaving Caruso’s kitchen fifteen minutes earlier.
Taken from across the street.
Dad was supposed to be upstairs.
I ran outside.
He was gone.
On the sidewalk lay his cane.
Beside it, written in fresh blood:
May you like
NOW YOU HAVE TWO REASONS TO COME.
We searched for Dad for forty-three minutes before the first real clue arrived. A traffic camera caught him entering a gray sedan voluntarily. That detail made me furious and relieved at the same time. He had not been dragged from the sidewalk. He had chosen to get in. Marco enhanced the driver’s image. Claire. Luca called her immediately. No answer. Mrs. Caruso called from her own phone and Claire answered on the first ring. Apparently nobody ignores Teresa twice. Claire said Dad had contacted her secretly because he remembered something about Antonio’s trust and did not want me following. They were headed to retrieve an old notarized statement from a storage unit. The blood beside Dad’s cane was theatrical—animal blood poured by someone who had been watching and wanted us panicked. Matteo had turned my father’s private errand into a threat before Dad even realized he was being followed. Luca was furious with him when he returned, but Dad refused to apologize. “You children keep running toward bullets,” he said. “I thought I’d try paperwork.” The statement he brought back was signed by Antonio and described the purpose of my trust in plain language: not inheritance, but leverage. Emma Reed was to have enough ownership to stop either Moretti son from controlling the company alone if Matteo survived. Antonio had anticipated that Luca might become ruthless too. Luca read that sentence twice. “He didn’t trust either of us,” he said. Dad corrected him. “He trusted checks and balances.” I had heard that phrase in school. I had never expected to become one. The document also contained a clause nobody had noticed in the copies: if I voluntarily transferred the shares to Matteo under coercion, the transfer would be void. That changed the negotiation completely. Matteo could not simply force my signature. He needed evidence that I acted freely, which meant cameras, witnesses, and a believable story. Vanessa understood before I did. “He doesn’t just need Emma,” she said. “He needs her to perform.” Luca looked at me. I could see him recalculating every risk. For once, I was doing the same. If Matteo needed a performance, then perhaps we could give him one. Not the ending he expected, but enough of a stage to make him step into the light.
