Chapter 9 - THE EMPTY BEDROOM
Cesare reached the townhouse to find the front door open and one security officer bleeding beside it.
"Where's Elsie?" Cesare shouted.
Rosa ran from the kitchen.
"Upstairs. She's safe."
Cesare nearly collapsed with relief.
Upstairs, Elsie sat beside her bed gripping a lamp like a baseball bat.
"Grandpa!"
He dropped to his knees and pulled her into his arms.
"Are you hurt?"
"No. Rosa locked us in the pantry first."
Rosa appeared behind him. "Whoever came in knew the alarm code."
Cesare looked at Julian, who had followed him upstairs.
Julian's face changed.
"Vanessa knows the code."
Elsie reached under her pillow.
"They wanted this."
She pulled out a folded piece of paper.
Cesare stared.
"I thought Ethan took your backpack."
"He did. But I put my favorite flower paper under my pillow because it had a shiny stamp."
She unfolded it.
The page was half covered in crayon, but underneath were columns of numbers, bank routing codes, and a list of initials.
Marta arrived moments later and photographed the page.
"These aren't invoices," she said. "They're transfer instructions."
Julian pointed at one line.
J.B. - 14% PROXY CONFIRMED.
Another line read:
E.C. FUNDS CLEARED - 6.2M.
Then Marta found a third.
V.C. - CONTROL AFTER MARRIAGE.
Julian looked like he'd been punched.
"She wasn't marrying me. She was buying the company."
Cesare's voice was ice. "She was doing both."
Elsie pointed to a small handwritten note in the bottom corner.
"What does that say?"
Marta zoomed in with her phone camera.
The handwriting was Ethan's.
ARCHIVE ORIGINALS - THEATER SUBLEVEL B.
Cesare looked toward Julian.
The theater where the fire had started.
May you like
Sublevel B was beneath the records room.
And according to the building plans, it had been sealed for twenty years.
