Chapter 8 - What Chase StoleKatarina read the sentence 4 times.
ASK HER WHAT CHASE STOLE FOR YOU.
The note lay inside a transparent evidence sleeve on Agent Ellison’s desk.
Vittorio stood near the window.
Renzo sat in the corner with one ankle resting over his opposite knee, so motionless that a stranger might have mistaken him for furniture designed by an unusually dangerous architect.
“What did he steal?” Agent Ellison asked.
Katarina shook her head.
“I do not know.”
She looked at Vittorio.
His expression revealed nothing.
“Do you?”
“No.”
The agent watched him.
“An actual no?”
“Yes.”
“Remarkable.”
Vittorio ignored the remark.
Agent Ellison slid several photographs across the desk.
Hotel room.
Access card.
A laptop charger.
Empty drawers.
A wastebasket containing receipts.
One photograph showed the nightstand.
A small piece of paper rested beside the lamp.
There were 8 handwritten digits.
Katarina leaned closer.
“That is Chase’s handwriting.”
“You are certain?”
“Yes.”
Agent Ellison placed a printed bank record beside it.
“The number is part of an account identifier connected to Bramwell Freight.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means Chase and Venn may have been fighting over money before Chase left.”
Vittorio spoke.
“How much?”
“Eleven million that we can confirm.”
Even Renzo moved his eyes.
Agent Ellison continued.
“Possibly more.”
Katarina sat back.
Eleven million dollars.
Chase had once thrown a glass against the wall because she had spent 68 dollars on a pair of shoes without telling him.
The memory was so absurd beside the number that she almost laughed.
“He was stealing millions while checking my grocery receipts.”
Agent Ellison’s eyes softened slightly.
“Control rarely has much to do with money.”
Katarina looked away.
She already knew.
They spent 3 hours examining Chase’s known devices and accounts.
At 1:15, an analyst entered carrying Katarina’s old employee laptop.
She recognized the dent near the corner.
“That was mine.”
“We recovered it from a storage unit leased through one of Chase’s companies.”
“I returned that computer to IT almost a year ago.”
Vittorio’s expression sharpened.
The analyst opened the machine.
“The device you returned appears to have been substituted with another machine using a cloned asset label.”
Katarina stared.
“He stole my work computer?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
The analyst entered a command.
A folder appeared.
SERVINO-M.
Vittorio crossed the room.
“What is M?”
No one answered.
The analyst opened it.
Dozens of scanned documents appeared.
Contracts.
Shipping manifests.
Old accounting statements.
Corporate registrations.
Most dated back more than a decade.
Vittorio’s face changed.
It was the first time Katarina had seen genuine surprise reach him before he could stop it.
“You know these.”
“Yes.”
“What are they?”
Vittorio reached toward the laptop and stopped before touching it.
“Records from Servino Maritime.”
“Your company?”
“My father’s.”
The room became silent.
Servino Holdings had many divisions.
Katarina knew almost all of them.
Real estate.
Logistics.
Construction.
Hospitality.
Private investment.
She had never heard of Servino Maritime.
“What happened to it?”
Vittorio’s voice remained controlled.
“It ceased operating 15 years ago.”
“Why?”
He looked at Agent Ellison.
The agent answered instead.
“Because 2 cargo vessels connected to the company were investigated for moving undeclared goods through the Port of Philadelphia.”
Katarina looked back at Vittorio.
“Smuggling?”
“My father’s people called it unregistered commerce.”
“That sounds like smuggling with a better suit.”
Renzo coughed into his fist.
Vittorio looked at Katarina.
“Yes.”
The answer was almost enough to make her smile.
Almost.
“What did Chase want with records from 15 years ago?”
Vittorio did not respond immediately.
Then understanding appeared in his face.
“My father kept a second ledger.”
Agent Ellison leaned forward.
“You know where?”
“No.”
“But you know it existed.”
“Yes.”
“What was in it?”
“Names.”
“What kind of names?”
Vittorio’s silence was answer enough.
Politicians.
Businessmen.
Police.
Customs officials.
People who had accepted money to see nothing.
Katarina felt the room become smaller.
“Chase was looking for it.”
“Yes.”
“He thought I could get it.”
“Possibly.”
“I did not even know Servino Maritime existed.”
“Which means he may never have intended for you to consciously obtain anything.”
The sentence came from Agent Ellison.
Katarina looked at her.
“What does that mean?”
“It means someone close to Vittorio might have been using you as a transfer point.”
Vittorio became still.
Renzo uncrossed his legs.
The temperature of the room seemed to drop 5 degrees.
“Who had access to the administrative floor?” Agent Ellison asked.
“Hundreds,” Katarina said.
“Who had access to your specific desk?”
Katarina thought.
Joanna.
Dolores occasionally.
Maintenance.
Directors.
Couriers.
Executives moving between meetings.
She closed her eyes.
Then remembered.
“Silvio.”
Vittorio turned.
Katarina immediately regretted saying it.
Not because she believed it.
Because of the way Vittorio’s face emptied.
“Silvio Fenucci?”
Agent Ellison asked.
Katarina nodded slowly.
“He came to my desk several times during quarterly board meetings. He always brought pastries. He would sit in Joanna’s chair while waiting for Vittorio.”
Renzo stood.
“No.”
Vittorio looked at him.
Renzo said nothing further.
Agent Ellison made a note.
“Anyone else?”
Katarina forced herself to continue.
“Mr. Gueritini. Park. Daws. Most senior directors.”
Vittorio moved toward the door.
“Where are you going?” Katarina asked.
“To speak to Silvio.”
“No.”
He stopped.
There it was again.
The old pattern arriving at the edge of the room.
Action.
Control.
Protection.
Vittorio turned slowly.
Katarina rose.
“You said I was part of this investigation.”
“You are.”
“Then do not disappear and conduct a private interrogation the moment someone’s name makes you angry.”
“He was in my home yesterday.”
“I know.”
“He spoke to you.”
“I know.”
“And if he had anything to do with—”
“Vittorio.”
The word stopped him.
Katarina stepped closer.
“I am not asking you to trust Silvio.”
“I do.”
“Then trust me enough to let the investigation happen.”
For several seconds Vittorio looked like a man physically holding himself in place.
Agent Ellison wisely said nothing.
Finally, he turned toward Renzo.
“Find Silvio.”
The agent lifted one eyebrow.
“To invite him here,” Vittorio added.
Renzo’s mouth almost moved.
“Yes, boss.”
Silvio arrived 50 minutes later.
He entered without his usual smile.
His navy suit remained immaculate, but the man inside it looked 10 years older than he had in Vittorio’s apartment.
He saw the laptop.
Then he saw the folder.
His face became gray.
Vittorio noticed.
“So,” he said quietly. “You recognize it.”
Silvio sat.
“Where did you find that?”
Katarina felt Vittorio’s anger before seeing it.
Agent Ellison intervened.
“Mr. Fenucci, before you answer anything, I should inform you that this conversation may become part of a federal investigation.”
Silvio barely looked at her.
His eyes remained on Vittorio.
“Your father told me to destroy those records.”
Vittorio’s face became completely still.
“When?”
“Before he died.”
“You told me there were no records.”
“I lied.”
Renzo looked away.
The admission seemed to injure him too.
Silvio placed both hands on the table.
“I destroyed almost everything.”
“Almost?”
“One ledger remained.”
Katarina felt the words before understanding them.
“Where?”
Vittorio asked.
Silvio looked at her.
Katarina’s pulse quickened.
“No.”
Silvio closed his eyes.
“Oh, God.”
“What?”
Katarina demanded.
Silvio opened them.
“The drawings.”
No one moved.
“What drawings?”
“Your drawings, dear.”
Katarina stared.
Silvio rubbed both hands over his face.
“About 3 years ago, before Chase became involved with Venn, you were sitting outside Vittorio’s office during a board meeting.”
Katarina remembered hundreds of meetings.
“I used to draw while waiting.”
“Yes.”
“I drew people.”
“Yes.”
Silvio’s voice weakened.
“One afternoon you drew the decorative panel in the old conference room.”
Katarina remembered it.
An elaborate wooden panel behind the former chairman’s chair.
She had drawn its carved pattern because the meeting lasted almost 4 hours.
“I do not understand.”
“The panel concealed my safe.”
Vittorio turned toward Silvio with lethal slowness.
“Your safe?”
“I kept the ledger there after your father died.”
Katarina’s stomach dropped.
“You think my sketch showed the mechanism.”
“It showed enough.”
Vittorio’s hands closed.
“Why was she ever close enough to see it?”
“Because I was careless.”
Silvio looked at Katarina.
“And because no one paid attention to the quiet administrative assistant holding a pencil.”
The sentence struck differently than he intended.
Invisible.
That had been Katarina’s goal.
It had also made her useful.
“Chase found the sketchbook.”
Agent Ellison completed the thought.
“And realized what she had drawn.”
Silvio nodded.
“He may have recognized the mechanism through Venn. Or Venn recognized it for him.”
“Is the ledger still there?”
“No.”
Vittorio’s voice came out like stone.
“Where is it?”
Silvio looked at him.
“Gone.”
“How long?”
“Eleven months.”
The same month Katarina’s access card disappeared.
The same period when Chase began asking strange questions about Vittorio’s schedule.
Everything aligned.
Katarina felt nauseated.
“Chase has the ledger.”
“Or Venn does,” Agent Ellison said.
Silvio shook his head.
“No. Neither of them had it when Chase fled. If they did, they would not still be looking.”
“Then who?”
Silvio’s gaze moved toward Vittorio.
“Someone inside Servino Holdings.”
That evening, Katarina returned to her apartment alone.
She requested it.
Vittorio disagreed.
Visibly.
He still allowed the decision to remain hers.
Two security officers watched the lobby.
Renzo watched the street.
No one stood outside her door.
Katarina locked it.
Then she went to the easel.
The open-door drawing remained unfinished.
She turned the page.
For the next 2 hours she drew from memory.
The old conference-room panel.
The carved edges.
The center emblem.
The small irregularity near the lower right corner.
She closed her eyes and remembered what her 25-year-old hands had recorded without understanding.
When she finished, something bothered her.
One shape did not belong.
Katarina found the old sketchbook and compared the drawings.
There.
In the original sketch, reflected faintly in the polished wooden panel, stood a man.
Only half his face was visible.
He had been behind Katarina while she drew.
Watching the room.
Watching Silvio open the hidden compartment.
Katarina’s breathing stopped.
She knew the face.
She saw it every quarter in executive meetings.
She grabbed her telephone.
Vittorio answered before the first ring finished.
“Katarina?”
“I know who took the ledger.”
Silence.
“Who?”
May you like
Katarina looked at the charcoal reflection.
“Gueritini.”
