Chapter 7 - The Crime They Built Around Luca Moretti

The transfer packet was perfect.

Too perfect.

Moretti letterhead.

Moretti digital certificate.

Moretti banking instructions.

Luca’s executive approval.

All forged.

Emma stared at the signature.

“You sign like that?”

“No.”

“Good.”

Marco looked offended.

“It is a very good forgery.”

Luca looked at him.

“That did not help.”

The transfer moved four Navarro port leases into Moretti Coastal Holdings.

A dead Moretti company.

If completed, investigators would see exactly what Roberto wanted them to see:

Moretti Capital audited Navarro Logistics.

Emma appeared publicly as Luca’s girlfriend.

Gabriel’s account destroyed audit evidence.

Emma’s account joined the deletion.

Then valuable Navarro assets moved into Luca’s company.

Bribery.

Collusion.

Fraud.

A complete story.

False.

But believable.

Belini sat slowly.

“They built the entire gala around this.”

Luca nodded.

“Emma and I appearing together made it stronger.”

Emma looked at him.

“So our trap became theirs.”

“Yes.”

That irritated her.

A lot.

Gabriel looked at Carlo.

“Who has Luca’s certificate?”

Carlo frowned.

“No one should.”

Marco checked the Moretti key vault.

One missing historical token.

Registered years earlier to:

Matteo Moretti.

Luca’s cousin.

Dead.

Emma stared.

“Another dead person?”

Marco sighed.

“Apparently paperwork has become spiritual.”

Even Luca almost smiled.

Matteo had died in prison eight years earlier.

But his signing token had never been destroyed.

It had been stored by outside counsel.

Name:

Salazar & Crane.

Carlo stared at the screen.

“My father.”

Luca looked at him.

“You knew?”

“No.”

For once, everyone believed him.

The transfer had to settle through a correspondent bank at eight the next morning.

They had six hours.

Emma looked at the contracts.

“Can we cancel it?”

Vale shook his head.

“Not without alerting the counterparty.”

Luca understood.

“Let it continue.”

Gabriel stared.

“You want them to steal the ports?”

“No.”

Luca looked at Emma.

“I want to see who receives them.”

Emma smiled faintly.

“That sounds more like you.”

They placed legal holds behind the transfer.

Invisible until settlement.

At 7:42 a.m., the receiving company appeared.

Northstar Maritime Partners.

At 7:51, beneficial ownership resolved.

Not a rival Mafia family.

Not Roberto.

Not Nicolas.

A charitable foundation.

Belini frowned.

“That makes no sense.”

Carlo went white.

Emma noticed.

“You know it.”

He did not answer.

Luca’s eyes hardened.

“Carlo.”

He exhaled.

“The foundation belonged to my mother.”

Silence.

Maria Salazar.

Dead ten years.

Carlo looked sick.

“She hated my father.”

Vale searched the foundation records.

Dormant for a decade.

Reactivated six months earlier.

Authorized director:

Nicolas Salazar.

There.

The ghost again.

Emma looked at Carlo.

“So Nicolas was not just following Roberto.”

Carlo shook his head slowly.

“No.”

He understood before everyone else.

“My brother is stealing from him too.”

Luca leaned back.

Nicolas had helped Roberto frame the Navarros.

But he had redirected the assets into his own structure.

The younger plot inside the older plot.

Gabriel laughed once.

“Your family is exhausting.”

Carlo looked at him.

“That is fair.”

Marco received a location ping from the foundation’s secure token.

Manhattan.

Closer.

Grand Aurelia.

Emma stared.

“He went back to the gala hotel.”

Luca stood.

“Why?”

Vale answered.

“Because Daniel’s audit archive is still there.”

Emma frowned.

“Nicolas needs the evidence destroyed.”

Carlo shook his head.

“No.”

Everyone looked at him.

“If Nicolas wanted it destroyed, he would have let the deletion finish.”

Emma remembered.

Seventy-one percent.

The deletion had failed too conveniently.

Carlo continued.

“Nicolas always wanted leverage.”

Luca’s eyes sharpened.

“He wants the evidence.”

“Yes.”

“Against Roberto?”

“And everyone else.”

Emma stood.

The final move was clear.

Nicolas did not want Navarro Logistics.

He wanted the archive proving who had stolen from it.

Because with that archive, he could blackmail every partner in Roberto’s network.

Luca looked at Marco.

“Hotel.”

Emma reached for her coat.

Luca looked at her.

“No.”

She smiled.

“That word has had a difficult night.”

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Then she walked past him.

This time he followed.