Chapter 3 - THE ISLAND ELENA FORBADE
The funeral ended without a eulogy.
Giovanni sent the guests away and locked the chapel doors behind the family.
He led Emilio and Clarissa into the private office beneath the funeral home.
"Start at the airport."
Emilio took a slow breath.
Two days before Elena died, both children had received identical envelopes containing cash, a key, and instructions to fly to Cayo Lucero if she failed to call by midnight Friday.
They thought it was one of their mother's paranoid precautions.
Then she died Friday afternoon.
They flew that night.
"Why didn't you tell me?"
Clarissa's eyes filled with tears.
"Because Mom wrote, 'Do not tell your father until you know who is standing beside him.'"
Giovanni went still.
The sentence felt like a blade disguised as handwriting.
Emilio explained that the island key opened a storage room beneath an abandoned hotel.
Inside were photographs, account records, and old tapes labeled with names Giovanni knew from business and family circles.
Then someone broke into the hotel.
Emilio and Clarissa escaped with only the music box and one small envelope.
Giovanni held out his hand.
"Give it to me."
Emilio hesitated, then produced a sealed envelope from inside his jacket.
Giovanni tore it open.
Inside was a single page bearing Elena's signature.
It listed four names.
Three were crossed out.
The fourth was Giovanni's closest friend and chief of security, Luca Ferraro.
At that exact moment, someone knocked three times on the locked office door.
Giovanni read the four names again and noticed the ink around Luca's name was darker, as if Elena had gone back over it more than once.
Emilio admitted someone had searched their hotel room on the island while they were downstairs buying water.
Nothing valuable was taken, only a photocopy of Giovanni's old passport.
That meant whoever followed them had been interested in the family, not the money.
May you like
Luca's voice came from the other side.
"Giovanni, we need to talk before your children tell you another lie."
