Chapter 10 - THE LETTER IN THE WALL
Luca phoned before sunrise.
"You're inviting cops into family business now?"
"My employee is missing," Dante replied.
"Rosa took a vacation. Ask payroll."
"Funny. She left her phone in a dumpster."
For a moment, Luca was silent. Then he said, "You always did mistake loyalty for disobedience."
Dante ended the call.
At noon, Price obtained a warrant for the locked treatment room. Inside were clinical supplies, old monitoring screens, and a filing cabinet stripped almost bare. In the wall behind it, an officer found a thin envelope taped beneath a removable panel.
It contained Lena Price's handwritten statement. She described pressure to record that Dante had no voluntary movement on days when she had observed a response. She also described unfamiliar medication vials transported by Hart and signed out under false names.
"This is important," Detective Price said, "but it needs corroboration."
Marina found a photograph tucked behind the last page. Lena stood beside Rosa on the back terrace, both smiling, with a little girl between them.
On the reverse was a phone number and one sentence: If I vanish, call my sister before you call my employer.
Gabriel traced the number to Connecticut. It was disconnected, but the old account address gave them a place to start.
Dante studied the photograph. "Why didn't she come to me?"
"Because she thought you'd believe your doctor over her," Marina said gently.
The detective's radio crackled. A patrol officer had located Rosa at a roadside motel. She was alive.
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But Rosa's first words to police were not about herself.
"They're taking Mr. Montenegro out of the country tonight," she said. "Check the airstrip."
