Chapter 9 - Elena’s Old Ledger
Elena had not told Marcello everything.
She admitted it on the fourth night, sitting across from him in the twenty-four-hour diner beneath her apartment.
Lily slept upstairs with Elena’s neighbor.
Detective Patel had approved a patrol check but warned Elena not to alter or destroy anything connected to the threat.
Marcello stirred untouched coffee.
“What haven’t you told me?”
Elena took an old spiral notebook from her bag.
The cover was bent.
Pages were crowded with figures.
“My father worked for DeLuca Holdings.”
Marcello stared.
“Who?”
“Manuel Morales.”
The name meant nothing at first.
Then memory surfaced.
“Facilities procurement?”
“Queens warehouse division.”
Marcello remembered a scandal twelve years earlier.
A procurement supervisor accused of taking kickbacks.
Terminated.
No criminal charges.
“My father was fired.”
“Yes.”
“He said he was framed.”
“Everyone says that.”
Elena’s eyes hardened.
“I knew you’d say that.”
“I’m sorry.”
“No, you’re not. You’re repeating whatever file you were given.”
Marcello closed his mouth.
She pushed the notebook toward him.
“My father kept this.”
Inside were handwritten purchase orders, vendor numbers, dates, and initials.
Several entries were circled.
NAG.
Northvale Administrative Group.
Marcello stared.
“How old is this?”
“Twelve years.”
“That company existed then?”
“My father said it was being used to pad maintenance contracts.”
“By whom?”
“He never knew for sure.”
“Why didn’t he go to police?”
“He did.”
Marcello looked up.
“What happened?”
“The company conducted an internal review and gave police records showing my father had approved the invoices.”
“Did he?”
“He said his electronic credentials were used after hours.”
Marcello felt the room narrow.
Credentials.
Again.
Elena continued.
“He lost his pension eligibility. My parents’ marriage fell apart. He moved to New Jersey and stopped talking to almost everyone.”
“Why do you have this?”
“He gave it to me last year.”
“Why?”
“He said one day DeLuca would discover Northvale never disappeared.”
Marcello flipped pages faster.
Payments.
Shell vendors.
Duplicated purchase orders.
At the bottom of one page was a handwritten name.
O. MERCER.
Marcello stopped.
“How long has Owen worked for us?”
Elena asked.
“Twenty-three years.”
“You see why I didn’t trust you?”
Marcello looked at the notebook.
“Yes.”
The conspiracy was older than Camille.
Older than Julian’s executive title.
Possibly older than Marcello’s leadership itself.
“What did your father think Owen was doing?”
“Taking small amounts from large budgets.”
“How small?”
“A few hundred thousand a year.”
“That’s not small.”
“To you people it was.”
Marcello winced.
Elena noticed.
“Sorry.”
“No. Keep going.”
“He thought Northvale was a clearinghouse. Vendors overbilled DeLuca. Money went to Northvale-related companies. Somebody inside approved it.”
“Why frame your father?”
“He found duplicate invoices.”
Marcello reached the final page.
A sentence had been underlined twice.
OWEN SAYS J.D. KNOWS.
Marcello’s fingers went cold.
“J.D.”
Elena nodded.
“My father thought it meant someone named James.”
Marcello knew only one J.D. inside the family at the time.
Julian DeLuca.
Twelve years earlier, Julian had been twenty-three.
A junior analyst.
Young enough that everyone treated him as harmless.
Old enough to learn.
Marcello looked at Elena.
“Does your father still have original documents?”
“I don’t know.”
“Will he talk to me?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because your family destroyed his life.”
Marcello had no defense.
His phone buzzed.
A message from Julian.
WE NEED TO TALK WITHOUT LAWYERS.
Marcello showed Elena.
She stared at the screen.
“What are you going to do?”
“Talk to him.”
“Alone?”
“Yes.”
“That’s stupid.”
“He’s my brother.”
Elena gave him a sad look.
“You’re saying that like those two facts cancel each other out.”
They did not.
Marcello knew it.
But at eight the next morning, he went anyway.
May you like
Julian was waiting in their father’s old office.
And on the desk between them sat a blue maternity bag with a gold sunflower.
