Chapter 6
Camilla came to Domenico’s house the following morning.
Without Marco.
That mattered.
She looked tired.
No diamonds.
No elaborate dress.
Only a dark coat and sunglasses.
Domenico met her in the library.
Livia was at preschool.
He did not want his daughter anywhere near the conversation.
Camilla removed her glasses.
“Elena said somebody was following her.”
Domenico did not react outwardly.
“Who?”
“She didn't know.”
“Then why call you?”
“Because she thought it might be Marco.”
Domenico felt anger rise.
He forced it down.
“Did you believe her?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Because Marco was upstairs.”
“At home?”
Camilla nodded.
Domenico waited.
Something was wrong.
“If Marco was upstairs, why didn't you simply tell Elena?”
Camilla stared at her hands.
“I did.”
“And?”
“She said I was lying.”
That could be true.
Or Elena could have seen something Camilla did not understand.
Domenico requested security footage from the neighborhood surrounding Marco and Camilla’s home.
Eighteen months was too long for most recordings to survive.
But an automated license-plate system maintained by the homeowners’ association retained logs.
Marco’s primary car never left.
Another vehicle registered to a company he controlled did.
It exited at 10:19 p.m.
Five minutes after Elena.
Returned at 11:42.
Marco said an employee had borrowed it.
The employee denied that.
Now Marco’s story had a hole.
But the vehicle did not appear near the crash scene in police records.
No witness described it.
No traffic camera captured it nearby.
Domenico refused to jump ahead.
Then Rachel brought him something from Elena’s storage box he had overlooked.
A photograph.
It showed a black sedan parked outside the foundation office.
On the back Elena had written:
M says this isn't his.
Check plate.
The plate matched the company vehicle that left Marco’s house after Elena.
Elena had been watching it before she died.
May you like
That meant when she told Camilla someone might be following her, she was not inventing the possibility out of fear.
She recognized the car.
