Chapter 4 - THE WOMAN WHO DIED TWICE
Clara locked the archive door behind them.
Marcus checked every window and placed two security sensors near the entrance.
Elena sat on an old sofa with a blanket around her shoulders.
Julian remained beside the ledger.
Camila’s mother, Isabella Laurent, had died twenty-three years earlier when a balcony collapsed during a charity gala in Monaco.
Julian had been fifteen at the time.
The tragedy had dominated European news for weeks.
Five guests had died.
The building had belonged to Rossi Development.
The official investigation blamed unauthorized renovations performed by a subcontractor.
Julian’s father had publicly accepted moral responsibility while denying legal fault.
Julian remembered Camila standing at the funeral beside her father.
She had been only ten years old.
He had not spoken to her.
He had merely watched from a distance while Victor Laurent held his daughter’s hand.
“What does Isabella’s death have to do with Elena?” Julian asked.
Clara opened a second file.
“The balcony collapse was not an accident.”
Julian looked at the structural reports.
Load calculations had been changed.
Inspection photographs had been replaced.
Payments had been sent to three officials.
One payment bore Sofia Rossi’s authorization.
“My mother knew.”
“She approved the concealment,” Clara said.
“And my father?”
“He discovered it after the collapse.”
“Why didn’t he expose it?”
“Because Matteo caused it.”
Julian stared at her.
“Matteo was twelve.”
“He entered a restricted control room during the gala.”
Clara pushed an old photograph across the table.
It showed a young Matteo standing beside a temporary support mechanism.
“He released the locking system as a prank.”
Julian read the witness statement beneath the photograph.
A maintenance worker had seen the boy.
The man withdrew his testimony two days later.
He received enough money to disappear permanently.
“My father buried five deaths to protect a child.”
“He believed Matteo had not understood the consequences.”
“And my mother?”
“She believed the Rossi name mattered more than the dead.”
Julian walked away from the table.
Everything he had believed about his family was shifting beneath him.
“Why would Camila help them now?”
“She does not know Matteo caused the collapse,” Clara replied.
“She believes your father ordered unsafe construction to save money.”
“Her father knows the truth?”
“Victor Laurent knows enough to hate the Rossi family.”
Elena spoke from the sofa.
“The merger gives Victor access to Rossi Development’s private archives.”
Julian looked at her.
“You knew?”
“I learned when I examined Matteo’s transfers.”
Clara nodded.
“Victor and Matteo formed a secret agreement.”
“Victor receives proof he can use to destroy the Rossi empire.”
“Matteo receives control of what remains after Julian is removed.”
Julian’s expression hardened.
“Removed how?”
“Financially.”
“Politically.”
“Or physically.”
Marcus moved closer.
“The merger vote is in six days.”
Julian thought about the billion-dollar negotiations consuming his attention.
Every late-night meeting.
Every legal delay.
Every disagreement carefully created by Matteo.
They had kept Julian distracted while controlling Elena.
“Where does Camila fit?”
“She was sent to influence you,” Elena said.
Julian looked at her.
Pain appeared briefly in her eyes.
“Your mother showed me photographs of you together before I disappeared.”
“I never touched Camila while we were married.”
“I know that now.”
“I should never have become involved with her.”
“You believed I had left.”
“I should have waited.”
Elena looked down.
Neither of them pretended that eight months of damage could disappear because the truth had changed.
Clara turned several pages.
“Camila’s role was to become indispensable.”
“To persuade you to complete the merger.”
“And eventually to marry you.”
Julian’s mouth tightened.
“Victor wanted his daughter inside the Rossi family.”
“He wanted revenge to look like love.”
A bell sounded from the hallway.
Marcus reached for his weapon.
Clara checked one of the monitors.
A black SUV had stopped near the convent gate.
Two men stepped out.
Gabriel Sloane was one of them.
“How did they find us?” Marcus asked.
Clara looked toward Julian’s jacket.
“Your phone.”
“It was secured.”
“Not well enough.”
Julian removed it.
Marcus crushed the device beneath his boot.
“We need another exit.”
Clara gathered the ledger and storage drive.
“There is a tunnel beneath the chapel.”
A heavy blow shook the front door.
Elena stood too quickly.
Pain crossed her face.
Julian caught her.
“Can you walk?”
“Yes.”
“You are not convincing.”
“I do not need to convince you.”
Another impact hit the door.
Wood splintered.
Marcus led them through the archive toward the chapel.
Clara opened a hidden panel beneath the altar.
Stone stairs descended into darkness.
“You go first,” Julian told Elena.
“No.”
“Elena.”
“If they want the evidence, they will follow whoever carries it.”
Clara handed the ledger to Marcus.
Then she gave the digital drive to Elena.
Julian stared at her.
“Why her?”
“Because everyone will assume you have it.”
The front door collapsed somewhere behind them.
Footsteps entered the convent.
Marcus descended first.
Elena followed.
Clara went behind her.
Julian remained at the top of the stairs.
“What are you doing?” Elena whispered.
“Buying time.”
“No.”
“I will follow.”
“Julian.”
He looked at her.
Eight months of distance stood between them.
So did six years of marriage.
“I did not come this far to lose you again,” he said.
He closed the panel before she could answer.
Julian moved behind the altar as Sloane entered the chapel.
The scar along the man’s jaw looked exactly as Julian remembered.
Sloane held a suppressed handgun.
“You have created an inconvenience,” he said.
“You threatened my wife.”
“I delivered instructions.”
“You kidnapped her from a hospital.”
“That was not my preferred method.”
“Who ordered it?”
Sloane smiled.
“You are still pretending this family has a single leader.”
Julian shifted slightly, drawing him away from the altar.
“Matteo paid you.”
“Your brother pays everyone.”
“My mother sent the flowers.”
“Your mother prefers symbols.”
“And Camila?”
“Miss Laurent prefers results.”
Julian’s stomach tightened.
“She knows Elena is alive.”
“She has always known.”
The revelation landed harder than Julian expected.
Camila had listened while he described sleepless nights.
She had stood inside his mansion and pretended to comfort him.
She had known where Elena was.
“What does Camila want?”
“What every neglected child wants.”
Sloane lifted the weapon.
“To make the people responsible suffer.”
Julian heard a faint scrape beneath the chapel floor.
Sloane heard it too.
He turned toward the altar.
Julian attacked.
They struck the stone floor together.
The weapon slid beneath a pew.
Sloane drove his elbow into Julian’s ribs.
Julian caught his coat and slammed him against a pillar.
The hidden panel opened.
Marcus emerged and pointed his gun.
Sloane froze.
“You should have kept running,” Marcus said.
Sloane smiled.
Then an explosion shook the convent.
Dust fell from the ceiling.
Flames appeared through the archive doorway.
Sloane used the distraction to break free.
He threw himself through a stained-glass window and vanished into the darkness.
Julian ran toward the tunnel.
“Elena!”
Clara emerged first.
Then Marcus.
Elena did not appear.
Julian descended the stairs.
Smoke filled the passage.
He found her twenty yards inside, leaning against the wall.
Her hands were empty.
“Where is the drive?”
Elena looked past him.
“A man came through the other entrance.”
“Did he take it?”
“Yes.”
“Who?”
She struggled to breathe.
“I could not see his face.”
Then a familiar voice echoed from deeper inside the tunnel.
“Julian.”
Matteo Rossi stepped into the dim light.
May you like
He held the digital drive in one hand.
And in the other, he held a gun aimed directly at Elena.
