Chapter 10: The Luca Suite
The heavy oak door of Luca’s private suite clicked shut behind us, locking out the muffled strains of the gala music and the artificial laughter of the elite echoing down the hall. The room was vast, furnished in dark mahogany, slate grey leather, and floor-to-ceiling windows that overlooked the sprawling, manicured gardens of the estate. Yet despite its luxury, the suite felt like a command bunker—minimalist, austere, and charged with an electric tension.
Luca walked straight to the antique oak desk in the corner, pressing his thumb against a biometric scanner hidden beneath the polished wood grain. With a soft pneumatic hiss, a wall-mounted panel slid open to reveal a heavy steel safe set deep into the brickwork.
“They thought they hid everything in the digital cloud,” Luca muttered, his fingers flying across the digital dial. “They didn't realize Uncle Victor was old-fashioned. He trusted paper more than hard drives.”
I stood near the window, my arms wrapped tightly around myself as the adrenaline of the stairwell climb began to fade, leaving a hollow ache in my bones. Every muscle in my body felt bruised, but my mind was sharper than it had been in months. The ghost of Daniel—the man I was supposed to marry before he vanished into the DeLuca machinery—finally felt tangible, no longer just a fading photograph in a locket, but a real person whose stolen life was about to be dragged into the light.
Luca pulled a thick manila folder from the safe, its edges yellowed with age, and carried it over to the desk. He flicked on a brass reading lamp, casting a warm, golden pool of light across the documents inside.
“Here,” he said, his voice dropping as he gestured for me to come closer. “Read this. It’s the original land transfer deed signed the week Daniel disappeared, countersigned by my uncle and the head of municipal zoning.”
I stepped across the plush carpet, leaning over the desk as my eyes scanned the dense legal jargon. There it was—Daniel's signature, shaky and hurried, alongside a payout clause that proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that the family had forced him out under threat of total ruin.
Without thinking, I reached up and pulled the silver necklace out from beneath my collar, letting the tiny silver ring engraved with D.D. rest right on top of the incriminating document. The metal caught the warm lamp light, gleaming softly against the black ink of the contract.
May you like
Luca looked up from the papers, his dark eyes shifting from the ring to my face. The stern, untouchable master of the DeLuca empire was gone, replaced by a man staring directly at the collateral damage of his own family's sins.
“We take this to the board meeting tomorrow morning,” Luca said quietly, his voice unwavering. “And if they try to block us, we tear the whole foundation down.”
