Chapter 5 – [THE GHOST IN THE HOUSE]
“Your father?” I asked, staring at the heavy silver rosary dangling from Dominic’s fingers.
“He’s been dead for ten years,” Dominic whispered.
The damp cold of the sub-basement suddenly felt like ice against my skin.
Dominic’s father, Vincent Caruso, had built the family empire. He was a ruthless man, feared across the city. According to public record, he had died of a massive heart attack in a hotel in Rome. Dominic had flown his body back in a closed casket.
“Julian,” Dominic said, dropping to his knees again, holding the rosary up. “Where did you see this?”
Julian blinked, unaffected by the shock radiating from his father.
“The man with the gray hair wears it,” Julian said. “He comes to the carriage house sometimes. Camille meets him there.”
“You saw this man?” Dominic pressed, his voice tight. “What did he look like?”
“He’s old,” Julian said softly. “He has a scar on his neck. And he walks with a cane.”
Dominic closed his eyes. A ragged breath shuddered through his chest.
“It’s him,” Dominic breathed. “The scar from the bullet in ‘98. The cane from the car crash. It’s him.”
Answer one. Open two.
Camille didn’t just murder Dominic’s first wife. She didn’t just conspire with his underboss.
She was working with his dead father.
“He faked his death,” Dominic said, standing up. Anger was rapidly replacing the shock. “Ten years ago, the feds were closing in on him. A grand jury was about to indict him on federal racketeering charges. He faked the heart attack to escape prison, and he left me to clean up the mess.”
“But why would he be working with Camille?” I asked.
“Because of the ledger,” a voice said from the top of the stairs.
We both looked up.
Salvatore Russo was standing on the landing. The old jeweler slowly descended the concrete steps.
“Mr. Russo?” I asked. “Are the police here?”
“They are arresting Camille and Marcus now,” Salvatore said calmly. “I slipped away. Because there is something Dominic needs to know before the police ask to search the property.”
Salvatore stopped at the bottom of the stairs. He looked at Dominic.
“Your father didn’t come out of hiding to see Camille,” Salvatore said. “He came back for the ledger he left behind ten years ago. The ledger that holds the account numbers for over fifty million dollars in untraceable offshore funds.”
Dominic stared at him. “You knew he was alive?”
“I suspected,” Salvatore corrected. “Your mother knew for certain. Before she died, she told me Vincent would eventually return for the money.”
“Where is the ledger?” Dominic demanded.
Salvatore reached into his breast pocket and pulled out a small, velvet pouch.
“Your mother gave it to me nine years ago,” Salvatore said. “She asked me to hide it where your father would never think to look.”
He opened the pouch.
He didn’t pull out a book. He didn’t pull out a stack of papers.
He pulled out the sapphire necklace.
Dominic frowned. “I don’t understand.”
“The ledger isn’t a book, Dominic,” Salvatore explained. “It’s a microdot. A microscopic piece of film. Your mother had it placed inside this necklace.”
Salvatore turned the heavy platinum setting over.
“The backing of the main pendant is hollow,” he said. “I sealed the microdot inside, beneath the sapphire.”
My mind raced, connecting the dots I had seen just hours earlier.
“The opened prongs,” I gasped.
Salvatore nodded at me. “Yes, Nora. You saw the truth.”
He looked back at Dominic.
“Camille didn’t steal the sapphire to make a bridal collar,” Salvatore revealed. “She pried the stone out to get to the microdot hidden underneath it. She was stealing the fifty million dollars for your father.”
It all clicked.
Vincent couldn’t show his face. He needed an inside man. Or, in this case, a wife. He had orchestrated Camille’s marriage to his own son just so she could retrieve the hidden fortune.
“Does she have it?” Dominic asked, panic edging into his voice. “Did the police find the microdot on her?”
Salvatore shook his head.
“No. Because it wasn’t in the necklace.”
Dominic and I both stared at him.
“What do you mean it wasn’t in the necklace?” Dominic asked. “You just said you hid it there.”
Salvatore smiled a sad, nostalgic smile. He looked at me.
“I didn’t hide it there,” Salvatore said gently. “Your father did, Nora.”
My heart skipped a beat. “My father?”
“Harold Bennett was the greatest watchmaker in Chicago,” Salvatore said. “I was just a jeweler. I couldn’t open a sealed platinum casing without leaving a mark. But Harold could.”
Salvatore pointed to the necklace.
“I gave the necklace to Harold. He hollowed out the backing and hid the microdot. But before he returned it to me, he called me.”
Salvatore took a deep breath.
“Harold realized what was on that film. He knew it was blood money. He knew it could destroy innocent lives. So, he took the microdot out of the necklace.”
“And where did he put it?” Dominic asked.
Salvatore pointed a trembling finger at Dominic’s left wrist.
“He put it inside the one thing you wear every single day.”
I looked down.
Strapped to Dominic’s wrist was a vintage, silver Patek Philippe watch.
The same watch my father had spent three weeks repairing fourteen months before he died.
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