Chapter 13 - THE WATCHER
We didn't stay in Vermont that night.
Security swept the property before anyone entered again.
The camera had been recently installed.
Someone was still interested in the house.
My attorney brought in a private investigator.
Within hours, the camera's signal had been traced.
The connection led to a property in New York.
Dante's.
But Dante had been in custody.
Someone else had access.
The investigator found one name attached to the security account.
My father's former financial adviser.
Marcus Vale.
I knew him.
He had disappeared after my father's death.
I had assumed he retired.
He hadn't.
He was still moving money.
Still watching.
Still protecting something.
The investigator handed me a photograph.
Marcus meeting my father six months before his death.
Beside them stood Isabella.
And behind them stood a teenage boy.
I stared at the boy.
My chest tightened.
“That's Dante.”
The investigator shook his head.
“No.”
He zoomed in.
The photograph became clearer.
The boy looked like Dante.
But he wasn't.
He was younger.
Smaller.
And standing beside him was a woman I recognized from an old family photograph.
My mother.
I looked at the investigator.
“Who is the boy?”
He answered quietly.
May you like
“Your father's second son.”
My blood went cold.
