Chapter 3

Five days before the hearing, Serafina went to Pier Twelve under the cover of the Foundation's annual insurance inventory.

Black Harbor mornings lay beneath a permanent gray fog. The container cranes moved through it slowly, like a row of expressionless steel giants. Serafina's car had barely stopped before the warehouse manager came out with two security men.

"Ma'am, the Don didn't tell us you were coming."

"A Foundation insurance inventory doesn't need the Don to tell you anything."

The manager smiled and did not move aside. "This isn't a museum. It's men's cargo. You might not understand it even if you looked."

"Warehouse Twelve holds forty-seven works of art registered under the Moretti Foundation, and I am the legal officer of record. Open the door."

She held out the authorization letter. The manager did not take it. He called Enzo first. Serafina waited at the door until they realized that continuing to block her would create a formal record of a refused audit.

The warehouse door finally rose.

Several standard art transport crates stood at the front, their seals and insurance numbers all in order. The manager opened two of them and showed her sculptures wrapped in moisture-barrier cloth.

"It's all here. You can go back and answer to the insurers now, ma'am."

Serafina did not look at the sculptures. She walked straight to the scanning terminal.

"I want every crate number."

"The terminal covers internal Family cargo."

"Then filter for Foundation numbers only."

The manager put his hand out in front of the screen. "Mr. Enzo said—"

"Enzo is not the Foundation's legal officer of record."

Serafina pressed her ID card to the terminal. The green access light came on. She entered the batch numbers from the prosecutor's letter and pulled up the wife's seal authorization images from the past six months.

The first. The second. The third.

Every impression had the same crack on the right side.

She cast the terminal display onto the audit tablet she carried. The manager's expression changed, and he reached for the power cord. Serafina hit the lock key, and across the city, Mara received the hash copy at the same moment.

"Turning it off won't help," she said.

The warehouse alarm went off without warning.

Red lights spun, and security took her, citing safety, into the lounge at the end of the corridor. The door swung open, and a faint, sweet perfume washed over her.

This was not a staff lounge.

Gianna's cashmere coat was draped over the long sofa. There were prenatal vitamins on the table and a stack of private clinic bills. An unfinished black gown hung on the rack, with the Moretti black rose embroidered at the waist. The design sheet beside it read: Founders' Gala. Mother of the Heir.

Serafina turned to the last page.

The black rose brooch was drawn in at the accessory position on the gown.

What this room proved was not an affair. Someone was already inside a Moretti warehouse, setting up a life for a different Donna.

"Ma'am." Enzo's voice came from outside the door.

He came in and turned the clinic bills face down first, without a flicker of panic. "Gianna is only taking some of the load off you. Your health isn't good. The Family can't wait for you to handle everything yourself."

"Who said my health isn't good?"

"Everyone knows you've barely come to the port these last few years."

"Because you stopped telling me."

Enzo spread his hands. "Same result. She gets things done, and the staff are willing to listen to her."

Outside the door, the warehouse manager lowered his head. Enzo controlled their bonuses, their shifts, and their families' medical insurance. As long as he said Gianna was carrying some of the Donna's load, everyone there would accept that version.

All at once Serafina saw the whole machine.

Gianna created the overreach, Enzo explained it away, and the staff carried it out to protect their own interests. Luca sat at the top, and as long as the cargo left port on time, he could pretend not to know how a name was being taken.

Her phone rang.

Luca opened with an order. "Leave Pier Twelve right now."

"My seal has been copied."

"The warehouse isn't safe. I'm sending the driver to take you back to the estate."

"You're not going to ask who copied it?"

There was a pause on the other end. "We'll talk when I get home."

"Every time you say we'll talk later, the cargo has already left port."

Luca's voice dropped. "Serafina, go home."

She did not argue further. After she hung up, she entered the gown design, the clinic bill numbers, and the freight profit-sharing records into the audit list item by item. She could not take the originals out, but the manager had been present, the system carried a record of her access, and Mara had a remote copy.

Before she got in the car, Serafina looked back at the warehouse.

Ten years ago she had given every piece of art in there a provenance that could be shown in public. Now the same warehouse was telling her that the Donna did not deserve to know what her name was being used to ship.

After the car pulled away from the docks, it did not turn toward the Foundation office. It drove straight for the estate.

"Stop the car," she told the driver.

The driver's hands tightened on the wheel. "The Don told me to take you home."

"I still have audit work."

"I'm sorry, ma'am."

Serafina reached for the door handle. The central lock gave a soft click. The door did not open.

In the mirror she saw another Moretti car following them.

Luca had finally noticed how deep she was digging.

Yet he still called detaining her "protection."