Chapter 6 - The Daughter Victor Never Claimed
Celeste Romano opened the door herself.
No security.
No expensive apartment.
No evidence of the money her father had stolen.
Just a second-floor condo above a dry cleaner in Cambridge and a woman in her early thirties holding a baby bottle in one hand.
She looked at Maya first.
Then me.
Then the two investigators behind us.
Her face changed when she saw the court order.
“So he finally did it.”
I frowned.
“Did what?”
“Ran.”
“You knew he would?”
“I knew he always had an exit.”
Celeste let us inside.
Her living room contained children’s toys, financial textbooks, and a framed graduation photograph.
No picture of Victor.
Maya sat across from her.
“You own forty percent of Merrick Family Claims Administration.”
Celeste nodded.
“On paper.”
“Who controls it?”
“My father.”
“Did you know survivor benefits were being diverted?”
Her jaw tightened.
“No.”
“Then why own the company?”
“Because when I graduated business school, he told me he wanted to give me something legitimate.”
I almost laughed.
Celeste saw it.
“I know how that sounds now.”
She placed the bottle on the table.
“My mother worked for him twenty-six years ago. He never publicly acknowledged me. Merrick was supposed to be the one thing that was mine.”
“Did you receive distributions?”
“Yes.”
“How much?”
“About sixty thousand a year.”
Maya exchanged a look with me.
Not enough to explain millions.
“Did you question where it came from?”
“I thought claims administration made money.”
Maya said nothing.
Celeste looked at me.
“You think I’m stupid.”
“No.”
That surprised her.
“I think people believe convenient explanations when the person giving them is someone they need.”
Her eyes flickered.
Maybe I was learning.
She stood and walked to a desk.
“Three months ago, I found duplicate claim numbers.”
She pulled out a thumb drive.
“My father said it was tax structuring.”
“Did you believe him?”
“For one week.”
“What happened?”
“I found Daniel Hart.”
Anna’s name was not in the room.
But suddenly she was.
Celeste opened a spreadsheet.
Hart, Daniel.
Approved benefit: $250,000.
Family payment: $1,800.
Administrative transfer: $248,200.
Destination account: V.M. HOLDINGS.
My stomach tightened.
“V.M.”
“Victor Moretti.”
Celeste nodded.
“After that I copied everything I could.”
“Why not report it?”
She looked at me.
“Report my father to whom?”
“The police.”
“And explain that a Moretti-controlled benefits company had been stealing money through accounts tied to your organization?”
Fair.
She continued.
“I thought about calling you.”
“Why didn’t you?”
“Because he told me you knew.”
The room went quiet.
Victor had used the same weapon again.
My name.
“You believed him?”
Celeste’s eyes filled.
“I had spent my whole life wanting him to claim me. When he finally gave me a company, I wanted to believe it was clean.”
Maya asked, “Where is Victor?”
“I don’t know.”
“Does he have property outside Massachusetts?”
“Rhode Island. Maybe Vermont.”
“What about the Pier Nine security drive?”
Celeste froze.
There.
Something.
“What?”
She sat slowly.
“Two weeks ago, he brought me a hard drive.”
I stood.
“Where is it?”
“He said if anything happened, I should destroy it.”
“Did you?”
“No.”
My lungs loosened.
“Where?”
“Safe-deposit box.”
Maya’s voice stayed calm.
“Which bank?”
Celeste looked at me.
“If I give it to you, what happens to me?”
I could have promised protection.
I could have lied.
Instead:
“You get your own lawyer.”
She blinked.
“And?”
“You cooperate through counsel. Nobody from my organization contacts you without Maya present.”
Marco, waiting near the door, raised an eyebrow.
I ignored him.
Celeste stared at me.
“You would let me testify against your uncle?”
“I’m asking you to.”
Something broke in her expression.
Not fear.
Relief.
Twenty years of family loyalty had probably taught her that blood was a debt.
I knew the feeling.
By four that afternoon, the drive was in an evidence lab.
There was one problem.
Victor had encrypted it.
Maya smiled for the first time in two days.
“That is not a problem.”
“What is it?”
“A delay.”
Our forensic team estimated twelve hours.
At hour six, Anna called.
Her voice was tight.
“Lucy’s school called.”
I stood.
“What happened?”
“Someone left an envelope in her backpack.”
The room went cold.
“What was inside?”
“A candy bar.”
I stopped breathing.
Anna continued.
“And a note.”
Her voice broke for the first time since I met her.
“Tell your mother to stop making rich men curious.”
I was already moving.
Then Anna said, “Nicholas.”
I stopped.
“If you send armed men to the school, you will scare her.”
Every instinct in me fought that sentence.
Victor had touched a child’s world.
My instinct was to fill every hallway with men who answered to me.
Anna knew that.
And she still said no.
“What do you want?”
There was a pause.
“Police.”
I closed my eyes.
“Okay.”
“And you.”
That surprised me.
“Me?”
“Lucy trusts you.”
I looked at the five candy bars still sitting unopened on my desk.
“Okay.”
When I reached the school, Lucy sat in the counselor’s office holding the note.
She looked up at me.
“Did I do something bad?”
The question nearly destroyed me.
“No.”
“Because I told you about the money?”
“No.”
“Mom’s mad.”
“She’s scared.”
Lucy studied my face.
“Are you scared?”
People rarely asked me that.
“Yes.”
Her eyes widened.
“Really?”
“Yes.”
“What do you do?”
I crouched.
“Try not to make fear choose for me.”
She thought about that.
Then handed me the note.
“Mom says we tell the truth even when it makes people mad.”
I took it.
“Your mom is right.”
Lucy nodded solemnly.
Then looked at my pocket.
“Did you eat the candy?”
“No.”
“That’s rude.”
May you like
For the first time all day, I laughed.
And for one minute in a school counselor’s office, Victor did not own the room.
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