Chapter 11 - THE WEIGHT OF MY BROTHER’S NAME
I did not sleep.
For six years, I had imagined Ewan dying because of a personal betrayal.
A rival.
A debt.
A deliberate execution.
The truth was uglier.
He died because powerful men valued documents more than his life.
And one of those men had been welcomed into our home for decades.
Victor Vandermark.
I confronted my mother again.
“Did Father know the fire was planned?”
Two blinks.
No.
“Did Roman know?”
She closed her eyes.
Then one blink.
Yes.
I stood so fast the chair fell backward.
My mother became agitated.
Delia rushed in.
“Gabriel.”
I pointed at the board.
“He knew.”
“Then prove it.”
“I don’t need proof.”
“Yes, you do.”
Her voice hardened.
“If you walk out of this room and solve this the way everyone expects Gabriel Moretti to solve it, Theo inherits the same world that killed his father.”
That stopped me.
Delia was right.
Ewan had tried to build a lawful future.
If I answered his death with another disappearance, another secret, another body, I would only preserve the system that destroyed him.
So I did something my father would have despised.
I called federal prosecutors.
Not to confess.
Not yet.
To negotiate preservation of corporate records connected to Pier 44.
Miriam arranged the contact through outside counsel.
It was dangerous.
If the records widened beyond the Vandermark investigation, they could expose parts of my own empire.
I knew that.
For the first time in my life, I accepted the cost before knowing the price.
Roman heard about the contact within six hours.
He called me.
“You’ve lost your mind.”
“Possibly.”
“You bring federal eyes into the harbor, they don’t stop at Victor.”
“I know.”
“You’ll destroy what your father built.”
I looked at the photograph of Ewan on my desk.
“Maybe that’s overdue.”
Roman went silent.
Then he said:
“You always were your mother’s son.”
May you like
It was meant as an insult.
For the first time, I took it as a compliment.
