Chapter 6 - THE WOMAN IN ROOM 418
By Friday evening, my life had been reduced to a map of places someone else had watched me go.
My apartment.
My mother's building.
Saint Catherine's Medical Center.
The grocery store on Wabash where I shopped after late shifts.
A coffee shop near the train station.
The Moretti estate.
Daniel printed the GPS history and spread it across Luca's study desk.
I stood beside him, feeling more exposed with every page.
"How long?" I asked.
"At least six weeks."
"Six weeks?"
"That's as far back as the server log goes. The beacon may have been there longer."
I tried to remember every time I had changed clothes in the staff room, every time I had left my bag unattended, every casual conversation about my mother.
Six weeks.
Someone had known my routine before I knew there was a reason to be afraid.
Luca looked at Daniel.
"Who had access to the lockers?"
"Staff. Management. Vanessa's personal assistants sometimes use the service corridor."
"Cameras?"
"The corridor, yes. Not inside the changing room."
"Review six weeks."
"Already started."
I rubbed my arms.
"Why me?"
Luca's gaze softened slightly.
"Because you worked in my study."
"Half the housekeeping staff worked in your study."
"You worked late. You covered evenings. You moved between the private floor and service areas without attracting attention."
Daniel nodded. "If they were monitoring the house, Claire would be useful without knowing it. Her movements could tell them when rooms were occupied, when staff changed shifts, when family meetings ended."
Useful.
The word made me feel worse than frightened.
It made me feel converted into a tool.
Luca saw my expression.
"They chose you because you were responsible," he said. "Not because you did anything wrong."
"That is not as comforting as you think."
"I know."
At seven-forty, Daniel received the first break from the Lakeshore Grand.
Room 418 had been rented in Damian Hart's name.
But Damian had never entered it.
Security footage showed a woman checking in with his confirmation number and a baseball cap pulled low over her face.
The desk clerk remembered her because she tipped cash.
A lot of cash.
"Can we identify her?" Luca asked.
Daniel enlarged a still image.
The woman's face was partially turned toward the elevator.
I recognized her.
"I've seen her."
Both men looked at me.
"Where?"
"Here. At the estate. Maybe two months ago."
"Who was she with?"
I stared at the grainy image.
Then I remembered carrying coffee to Vanessa's morning room and seeing a woman leave by the side entrance. Blonde hair beneath a scarf. Nervous hands.
"Vanessa."
Daniel searched the household visitor records.
No matching name.
Mrs. Carter was called in.
She looked at the photograph and frowned.
"That may be Caroline Shaw."
Luca's head lifted.
"Vanessa's former assistant?"
"Yes. She worked for Miss Bellini before the engagement. Left suddenly last spring."
"Why?"
Mrs. Carter's lips tightened.
"Miss Bellini said she stole jewelry."
Daniel looked at Luca.
"Was there a police report?"
"No," Mrs. Carter said. "Miss Bellini said she preferred discretion."
Of course she did.
Within thirty minutes, Daniel had an address for Caroline Shaw.
It was not in Chicago.
It was in Milwaukee.
But her cell phone, according to a lawful data request Elena managed through an investigator she trusted, had connected to a Chicago tower that afternoon.
Near the Lakeshore Grand.
"She may still be there," Daniel said.
Luca reached for his jacket.
This time he did not suggest I come.
This time I did not suggest it either.
Then Daniel's phone rang.
He listened for less than a minute.
"Caroline just called the estate."
Luca stopped.
"What did she want?"
"Claire."
I stared at him.
"Me?"
Daniel nodded.
"She refused to speak to anyone else. Said if Claire wants her mother safe, she should come to the hotel alone. Room 418."
Luca's face became stone.
"No."
"I wasn't planning to go alone."
"You're not going at all."
I looked at Daniel.
He avoided my eyes.
"She asked for me because she thinks I'm easier to control."
"Which is why you are not rewarding the idea."
"Or she knows I'll listen."
Luca stepped closer.
"Claire."
"What if she's scared of you?"
The question landed harder than I expected.
Luca went still.
I continued carefully.
"I'm not saying she should be. I'm saying maybe she is. Vanessa told Damian you were recording him. She told me I'd be fired. She told the staff I'm trying to seduce you. Maybe Caroline thinks you're part of whatever Vanessa told her too."
Daniel looked at Luca.
"Boss, Claire may be right."
"That is becoming an irritating pattern."
I almost smiled.
He did not.
"If we go," he said, "you do not enter that room alone."
"Agreed."
"You wear a wire."
"Given the week I'm having, that feels appropriate."
Daniel did smile then.
Luca looked at both of us as if we were becoming impossible.
Room 418 smelled like hotel air conditioning and burnt coffee.
Daniel waited in the adjoining room with two security officers. Luca stood out of sight in the connecting doorway.
I sat in a chair near the window.
My back screamed from the drive.
At eight-fifty-two, someone knocked.
I opened the door.
Caroline Shaw looked younger than I remembered. Early thirties. Pale. Hair hidden under a knit cap. She entered quickly and locked the door behind her.
Then she saw the brace around my back.
Her face crumpled.
"She hurt you."
I did not answer.
Caroline covered her mouth.
"God. I knew she'd do something."
"You called me."
She nodded and sat across from me.
"I saw the security footage online. The engagement dinner. Someone posted photos. I saw the mirror downstairs. I knew she'd moved it."
"Did you install the recorder?"
Her eyes filled.
"One of them. The mirror."
The room seemed to tilt.
"Why?"
"Because Vanessa made me."
"How?"
Caroline rubbed her hands together.
"I used to handle everything for her. Appointments, purchases, private deliveries. A year ago I found payments to a company called Northlake Fiduciary. Thousands at a time. I asked questions. She accused me of stealing jewelry and said she'd make sure I went to prison if I ever talked."
"So you helped her spy on Luca."
"At first I thought she was collecting proof that he was cheating."
I glanced toward the connecting door.
Luca did not move.
Caroline continued.
"Then I heard meetings. Business. Trusts. Security schedules. It wasn't jealousy. It was planning."
"Planning what?"
She looked at me.
"A takeover."
The word sounded absurd in a hotel room.
But then again, so had a microphone inside a gold mirror.
"She said after the wedding Luca would sign papers making her temporary representative if anything happened to him. Her uncle would certify the medical side. Damian would manage the legal side."
"Damian says he didn't know about the altered papers."
Caroline gave a bitter laugh.
"Damian never knows the worst thing. Vanessa gives everyone one piece."
"What's Northlake Fiduciary?"
"A shell company. Her uncle set it up. But that's not the important part."
She reached into her coat.
Luca moved behind the doorway.
I saw the shadow shift.
Caroline pulled out a small key card.
"Peter Bell left a safe-deposit box in Milwaukee. Vanessa has been trying to access it for two years. She finally did last month."
"What's inside?"
"I don't know everything. I know she found old Moretti documents. A will. Corporate certificates. Something signed by Luca's father."
My heartbeat quickened.
"Why give this to me?"
Caroline looked toward the hotel window.
"Because I tried to leave six months ago. She found me. She always finds people because she plans their lives before they realize they're in danger."
"Then why are you here now?"
"Because yesterday she called me. She said the housekeeper found the mirror. She wanted me to come back and remove records from this room."
"What records?"
Caroline looked at the key card in her palm.
"The backup server."
Daniel entered from the connecting room.
Caroline jumped to her feet.
Luca stepped in behind him.
Her face went white.
"You lied to me."
"No," I said. "I told you I would listen. I didn't say I came alone."
She backed toward the window.
Luca stopped several feet away.
"I'm not here to hurt you."
Caroline laughed once, shaky and frightened.
"That's what people say when they have enough men to avoid doing it themselves."
Luca absorbed that without reacting.
"Then talk to Claire. I'll stay here."
He sat in the farthest chair in the room.
The gesture changed something.
Caroline slowly sat again.
Daniel examined the key card.
"Where's the server?"
"Not in this room. Basement business center. Private cabinet. She rented it under Damian's account."
"Password?"
Caroline gave it to him.
Daniel left immediately.
I looked at Caroline.
"You said Vanessa plans people's lives. What did she plan for Luca?"
Caroline's eyes filled.
She looked at him for the first time.
"The wedding wasn't the end of the plan."
Luca's face did not move.
"What was?"
Caroline swallowed.
"Three weeks after the wedding, you were supposed to have a medical emergency."
The room went silent.
"What kind?" I whispered.
"One her uncle could certify as incapacity. Long enough for Vanessa to control the trust. Long enough to transfer assets."
Luca's voice turned dangerously quiet.
"And after three weeks?"
Caroline began to cry.
"I don't know."
Then Daniel came back into the room carrying a laptop drive in an evidence bag.
His expression was grim.
"Boss. We found the backup."
"What's on it?"
Daniel looked at Caroline, then at me.
"Recordings. Documents. Medical forms. Draft transfer orders."
He paused.
"And a file labeled CLAIRE BENNETT."
My stomach dropped.
Luca stood.
"Open it."
Daniel connected the drive to a secure laptop.
The folder contained photographs of me leaving work.
My mother's address.
My bank balance.
My rent history.
My sister's nursing-school schedule.
And at the bottom, one document created four days earlier.
A termination letter on Moretti estate letterhead.
Signed with Luca's name.
It said I had been fired for theft.
May you like
The signature was a forgery.
The date was tomorrow.
