Chapter 8 - The Transfer Order
The van never reached the front steps.
Santiago’s men blocked it at the second gate.
The driver surrendered before anyone raised a weapon.
He thought he was transporting a patient under a lawful emergency order.
The order looked real.
That was the problem.
By midnight, Santiago’s attorney confirmed the document had been filed through an old medical guardianship provision created after Antonio’s death.
Matteo was listed as secondary family guardian.
Santiago stared at the document.
“When did I approve this?”
“You didn’t,” Paul Mercer said over speakerphone.
“Your father did.”
“For Sophia?”
“For any minor heir who became medically incapacitated.”
Ruby sat across the room.
Sophia beside her.
Santiago’s voice hardened.
“Why would Matteo want her declared incapacitated?”
Mercer hesitated.
“Because of the Moretti family trust.”
Santiago had managed businesses, fronts, legitimate properties, and less legitimate operations for seventeen years.
He knew every number that mattered.
Or thought he did.
Mercer continued.
“Your father gave Sophia twenty-two percent of the holding company.”
“She receives direct voting control at twenty-one.”
“She’s nineteen.”
“Yes.”
“If she is still legally incapacitated when she turns twenty-one, the secondary family guardian controls her voting shares.”
Santiago did not need the name.
Matteo.
Ruby looked at Sophia.
“Did you know?”
Sophia shook her head.
Santiago felt another piece lock into place.
His father’s murder had made him boss.
Sophia’s silence had made Matteo powerful.
Not publicly.
Quietly.
Through committees, proxy votes, medical decisions, and documents Santiago signed without reading because Matteo told him they were routine.
“How much money?” Ruby asked.
Mercer answered.
“Voting control is worth more than money.”
Santiago almost laughed.
That was exactly the kind of answer men in his world gave when the number was obscene.
Sophia signed.
Ruby translated.
“She wants every document involving her trust.”
Mercer paused.
Santiago looked at Sophia.
“She gets them.”
“All of them?” Mercer asked.
“All.”
Sophia looked at him for a long moment.
Then nodded once.
It felt like earning half an inch of ground back after losing miles.
At two in the morning, Tomas arrived with another discovery.
“Voss is moving.”
“Where?”
“Airport.”
Santiago stood.
“Stop him.”
“Federal agents already did.”
Santiago turned.
“Federal?”
Tomas nodded.
“Apparently Voss has been under financial investigation for months.”
“By who?”
Tomas gave him a name.
Special Agent Dana Keller.
Ruby dropped her coffee.
The mug shattered.
Everyone looked at her.
Santiago’s eyes narrowed.
“You know her.”
Ruby’s face went white.
“No.”
“That reaction says yes.”
She shook her head.
“I know the name.”
“From where?”
Ruby looked at Sophia.
Then at Santiago.
“Owen.”
The room went silent.
Santiago stepped closer.
“Your missing brother?”
Ruby nodded.
“The last voicemail he left before he vanished said, ‘If I make it to Keller, don’t come looking for me.’”
Tomas stared.
“You think he reached her?”
Ruby’s eyes filled.
“I never knew.”
Santiago pulled out his phone.
Ruby grabbed his wrist.
“Wait.”
He looked down at her hand.
She let go immediately.
“If Owen is alive and protected, calling attention to him could put him in danger.”
Santiago stared.
“If he’s alive, he has evidence against Matteo.”
“He is my brother before he is your evidence.”
There it was again.
The line Santiago kept crossing without seeing it.
He lowered the phone.
“Then we ask Keller for a meeting.”
Ruby nodded.
The meeting happened the next afternoon in a federal building downtown.
Agent Keller was in her forties, calm, direct, and completely unimpressed by Santiago Moretti.
“You brought Ms. Brennan?”
Ruby stood.
Keller’s expression softened.
“I hoped you would.”
Ruby stopped breathing.
“You know me?”
“Yes.”
“Is Owen alive?”
Keller said nothing for three agonizing seconds.
Then the conference-room door opened.
A man stepped inside.
Thinner.
Older.
A scar near his temple.
But alive.
Ruby made a sound Santiago had never heard from her.
“Owen.”
She ran to him.
He caught her.
For three years, Ruby Brennan had carried a disappearance like a grave.
Now her brother was standing in front of her.
But when Owen finally looked over her shoulder at Santiago, he did not look relieved.
He looked terrified.
“You shouldn’t have brought him here,” Owen said.
Santiago’s jaw tightened.
“Why?”
Owen looked toward Agent Keller.
Then back at Santiago.
May you like
“Because Matteo isn’t the only man in your organization who helped keep Sophia silent.”
