Chapter 3 – The Security Footage

The glossy photograph slipped from my fingers, landing softly on the carpet.

Jenna stared at it, her breath catching in her throat. She looked up at her father, her eyes wide with a sudden, terrifying confusion.

“Dad?” Jenna whispered, stepping away from him. “You were there? You were outside the study?”

Michael was staring at the photo like it was a ghost. He was shaking his head violently, his hands trembling harder than they had all evening.

“No,” Michael choked out. “No, Jenna, I swear to God. That isn’t what happened.”

“But the timestamp,” Marcus, the security chief, pointed out, his voice grim. “That’s 11:15 PM. The exact time the coroner estimated your father suffered the heart attack.”

“I was drunk!” Michael shouted, his voice cracking with desperation. He grabbed the back of the chair to steady himself. “I had been drinking all day! I don’t remember being in that hallway! I don’t remember seeing Vanessa!”

“If you were that drunk,” I asked quietly, trying to make sense of the chaos, “how could you be standing so perfectly still in the photo?”

Michael looked at me, a profound, agonizing realization washing over his face.

“I wasn’t drunk,” he whispered, the memory suddenly forcing its way through years of alcoholic blackout. “I was sober. I had been sober for three weeks. I went to the study to tell him.”

Tears spilled from Michael’s eyes. He sank into a chair, burying his face in his hands.

“I remember now,” he sobbed. “I went to tell him I was trying to get clean. But when I got to the hallway, I saw Vanessa run out. She looked terrified. I went inside…”

He looked up, his face twisted in horror.

“He was on the floor. He was clutching his chest. I knelt beside him. I asked him what happened, and he… he tried to hand me something.”

“The money clip,” Jenna breathed.

“Yes,” Michael said. “But before he could speak, the door opened behind me. Someone hit me in the back of the head. When I woke up, I was in my own bed, reeking of bourbon, with empty bottles all around me. Everyone thought I had just passed out drunk while my father died.”

The room was silent.

Vanessa hadn’t acted alone. She hadn’t just walked out and left the old man to die. Someone else had been in the house. Someone who had knocked Michael unconscious, planted the alcohol to discredit him, and allowed Vanessa to frame a natural death.

“Read the letter,” Marcus ordered, pointing to the parchment paper still in Michael’s hand.

Michael unfolded the heavy paper. His eyes scanned the brief, typed lines.

Michael, the letter read. If Luca pursues the truth about his father, this photograph goes to the police. They won’t see a grieving son. They will see a disgraced, alcoholic failure who was present during a murder and did nothing. Tell your brother to let the engagement go quietly, or you will take the fall for everything.

“Blackmail,” Jenna whispered. “They’re using you to stop Uncle Luca.”

“They know Luca would never risk sending his own brother to prison,” Marcus added. “Dominic Bellini is boxing him in.”

I looked at the photograph on the floor. Something was bothering me.

“Mr. Moretti,” I said, pointing to the image. “Look at the angle of the camera.”

Michael frowned, wiping his eyes. “What about it?”

“The Moretti estate has security cameras in the ceilings, angled downward,” I explained, remembering the layout from cleaning the massive house. “But this picture… it’s taken from chest level. And it’s looking slightly upward.”

Marcus stepped closer, examining the photograph intently. “She’s right. That isn’t from the house security system. Someone was standing in the hallway holding a camera.”

“Or a phone,” Jenna realized.

“Who else was in the house that night?” I asked.

Michael thought hard, pressing his fingers to his temples. “Just the family. Dad, me, Jenna. Luca was out of town on business.”

“And the staff?” I pressed.

“The staff had been dismissed for the night,” Michael said. Then, his eyes widened. “Except for the night manager. He was the one who found me in my bed the next morning.”

“Who was the night manager?” Marcus demanded.

Michael looked at the security chief, a terrifying dread settling over his features.

“It was you, Marcus.”