Chapter 5 - THE HOUSE THAT LISTENED
My mother answered on the fourth ring.
"Claire? Why are you calling so early?"
The sound of her voice nearly broke me.
I gripped the edge of the breakfast table and forced myself to breathe normally.
"I just wanted to check on you."
"At eight-thirty in the morning?"
"You complain when I don't call."
"I complain because it's one of the few hobbies I can still afford."
I closed my eyes.
That was my mother.
Still making jokes while counting pills into a plastic organizer because insurance covered some things and life covered the rest.
"Did anyone from Saint Catherine's call you?" I asked.
"No. Why?"
"They mixed up some paperwork. If anyone calls about changing your appointment, tell them you need to speak to me first."
"Claire, what happened?"
"Nothing."
Luca gave me a look.
I amended it.
"Something happened at work, but I'm safe."
"That sentence is designed to make mothers die young."
"I'm sorry."
"Are you hurt?"
I looked at the brace around my back.
"I pulled a muscle."
Not the whole truth.
But I was not ready to tell her a woman in a red silk gown had shoved me into a desk and someone had tried to use her medical care as leverage.
"I'll explain later," I said.
"You'd better."
After we hung up, Daniel put two plainclothes security officers near her building and another at Saint Catherine's. Elena contacted the hospital's legal department. Within an hour, the fake procedure request had been frozen and copied for evidence.
Dr. Anthony Bellini did not answer his office phone.
By nine-thirty, his staff reported that he had left Chicago the previous evening for "a family emergency."
Vanessa had not left the drawing room.
Luca kept her there another twenty minutes, then entered with a smile I had never seen on him before.
It was warm enough to fool a stranger.
I was beginning to understand that the most dangerous expressions in the Moretti house were often the pleasant ones.
"Everything's fine," he told her. "Damian made a drafting error."
Vanessa searched his face.
"I told you it was probably nothing."
"You did."
"So we sign tomorrow?"
"As planned."
Her shoulders loosened.
She crossed the room and kissed him.
I turned away.
Not because I was jealous.
At least that was what I told myself.
It was because the kiss looked like another hidden microphone.
Something intimate being used for another purpose.
By noon, Daniel's team began sweeping the estate for additional devices.
They found the second one inside a bronze lamp in the small library.
The third was beneath the conference table in Luca's office.
The fourth was inside a smoke detector near the upstairs landing.
The fifth was in the base of a decorative clock in the family sitting room.
Five listening devices.
Five rooms where Luca regularly spoke privately.
The house had not merely been compromised.
It had been mapped.
I stood in the hallway while a technician removed the clock from the wall.
"How did nobody notice?" I asked.
Daniel looked at the device in his gloved palm.
"Because good surveillance doesn't look like surveillance."
Mrs. Carter came up beside us.
"And because Miss Bellini changed decorators three times this year."
Daniel's head turned.
"She chose every room where devices were found?"
Mrs. Carter thought about it.
"The mirror, yes. The lamp was part of a reading-room redesign. The conference table was refinished at her request. The upstairs smoke detectors were replaced after she complained about one chirping. The clock was a gift from her uncle."
Daniel stared at her.
"Which uncle?"
"Dr. Bellini."
The pieces were no longer scattered.
They were forming a picture.
A terrible one.
Luca joined us at the end of the hall.
"Anything else?"
Daniel held up the recorder.
"Five total. Same manufacturer. Same cellular routing. Somebody planned this over months."
Luca looked toward Vanessa's bedroom wing.
"And she never thought I'd sweep the house."
"She thought you'd trust the people who put them there."
His face hardened.
That landed.
Trust, I was learning, was the Moretti family's most expensive possession.
And the easiest one to steal.
I should have gone back to bed.
Dr. Harris had been very clear about rest.
Instead, I sat at the kitchen table with a heating pad and watched the household continue around me.
Staff whispered when they thought Mrs. Carter was not listening.
Nobody knew the full story, but everyone understood Vanessa was being watched.
By lunch, the whispers had changed direction.
Claire had caused trouble.
Claire had accused Miss Bellini.
Claire wanted attention.
Claire had been alone in Luca's study.
Claire was trying to break up the engagement.
I heard the last rumor from Maribel, another housekeeper, who repeated it only so I would know what was being said.
"I'm sorry," she whispered. "I told Rosa it was nonsense."
"Who told Rosa?"
Maribel hesitated.
"One of Vanessa's assistants."
Of course.
By two o'clock, I had become the easiest explanation in the house.
A maid with bills.
A wealthy employer.
A beautiful fiancée.
People loved stories they already understood.
Vanessa understood that better than anyone.
She came into the kitchen at two-fifteen.
No security men followed her visibly, which meant Daniel's people were getting better at disappearing.
She wore cream trousers and a pale sweater, looking less like a woman under investigation than someone preparing for a magazine photograph.
The room emptied almost immediately.
Staff suddenly discovered tasks elsewhere.
I stayed seated.
My back did not give me much choice.
Vanessa stopped across from me.
"Quite a day you've created."
"I didn't hide the recorders."
Her eyes narrowed.
So she knew we had found more than one.
Interesting.
"I have no idea what you're talking about."
"Then why did you say recorders?"
For the first time, I watched Vanessa lose control for half a second.
She recovered.
"Because Luca told me Daniel was checking electronics."
Maybe.
Maybe not.
She leaned closer.
"Do you know what men like Luca do when they're finished using people like you?"
"People like me?"
"Women who mistake attention for importance."
There it was again.
The rumor, sharpened into a weapon.
"He isn't interested in me."
"Of course he isn't."
Her smile returned.
"That's what makes this embarrassing."
A flush climbed my face despite myself.
Vanessa saw it and smiled wider.
"You think because he ordered a doctor and spoke gently to you that you've become special. You haven't. Luca protects what belongs to his house. That's all."
I looked at her.
"Is that what you are?"
Her smile vanished.
"Excuse me?"
"Something that belongs to his house?"
The silence between us turned sharp.
I had never spoken to her that way before.
It felt dangerous.
It also felt wonderful.
Vanessa placed both palms on the table.
"You have no idea what you're standing in the middle of."
"Then stop pushing me into it."
"You should have stayed quiet."
"You should have kept your hands off me."
Her face changed.
Not much.
Enough.
"Careful, Claire."
A voice behind her answered.
"That's good advice."
Luca stood in the kitchen doorway.
Vanessa straightened.
"Luca."
"Leave her alone."
"I was checking on her."
"You were threatening her."
"Don't be absurd."
He walked into the room.
"Then you won't mind if Daniel saves the kitchen audio."
Vanessa went still.
I looked up sharply.
Luca pointed to a small camera in the corner above the pantry door.
"Security system. It has sound."
Vanessa stared at it.
Then at him.
"You're recording me now?"
"No. That camera has been there for six years."
He paused.
"Apparently you're not the only one who forgot cameras work both ways."
She turned and left without another word.
My hands were shaking.
Luca sat across from me.
"You shouldn't provoke her."
I stared at him.
"She came into the kitchen."
"I know."
"And for the record, I was doing very well."
A corner of his mouth moved.
"You were."
"Then why are you telling me not to provoke her?"
"Because I would prefer you remain uninjured for more than twelve consecutive hours."
I looked down at the table so he would not see me smile.
He placed a folder in front of me.
"Daniel found something in Peter Bell's estate records."
Inside was a photograph of a storage facility near Lake Geneva, Wisconsin.
"Bell rented a private archive unit there for eleven years," Luca said. "Vanessa paid the account after his death."
"What's inside?"
"We don't know."
"Can't you get access?"
"Elena is working on it. The lease is in a trust name."
I turned the page.
A handwritten inventory had been filed with Bell's estate attorney.
Furniture.
Books.
Family documents.
One line had been circled by Daniel.
M. Estate files — original copies.
I looked at Luca.
"Your first will."
"Maybe."
His phone rang.
Daniel.
Luca answered.
"Yes?"
Daniel's voice was loud enough that I could hear it.
"Boss, we found a sixth device."
Luca's expression hardened.
"Where?"
A pause.
Daniel said, "Claire's staff locker."
Every muscle in my body went cold.
Luca looked at me.
"When was it installed?"
"Hard to say. But this one isn't audio-only."
"What is it?"
"GPS beacon."
I stopped breathing.
Daniel continued.
"Someone hasn't just been listening to Claire. They've been tracking when she leaves the house."
May you like
Then he said the part that made Luca rise from his chair.
"And according to the activity log, the beacon pinged outside Margaret Bennett's apartment three times this week."
