Sal’s voice came slowly.
“Jack was never in that transport van.”
The words struck me even though I already suspected the truth.
Sal continued.
“Vince arranged for Jack to be moved before the official transfer.
He said he wanted to question him.
I followed because I knew something was wrong.”
Vince’s face hardened.
“Shut up, Sal.”
Paulie stepped closer to him.
Sal went on.
“They took Jack to a warehouse near the river.
Henry Mercer was already there.”
I knew Henry’s name from the ledger.
He had been a junior accountant at Moretti Holdings, twenty-six years old, unmarried, and officially listed as having resigned a week before my father’s arrest.
“What did Henry know?” I asked.
“The same thing Jack knew,” Sal said.
“That Vince had been stealing from his uncle and selling information to competitors.”
Vince laughed once, but there was no humor in it.
“Old man, you’re signing your own death warrant.”
Dante spoke without raising his voice.
“No one dies in this room unless I say so.”
The silence that followed was worse than shouting.
Sal wiped his mouth with a trembling hand.
“Vince wanted Jack to confess on tape.
Jack refused.
Henry tried to run.
One of Vince’s men fired.
Then everything broke loose.
Jack was hit in the shoulder.
Henry died.”
I looked at the photograph again.
“So whose body was buried in my father’s grave?”
Sal met my eyes.
“Henry Mercer’s.”
The room tilted.
For ten years, I had brought flowers to the wrong man.
For ten years, Henry’s family—if he had one—had no grave to visit.
“How?” Dante asked.
“Vince needed Jack dead,” Sal said.
“Not just missing.
Dead.
The transport fire was arranged.
Henry’s body was placed inside.
Dental records were altered.
Jack’s ring and watch were planted with him.”
My hand went instinctively to my throat.
At the funeral, the director had given me a small velvet bag containing what he said had survived the fire: my father’s wedding ring, warped by heat.
A lie.
Every part of it had been a lie.
Dante looked at Vince.
“Did you order the fire?”
Vince said nothing.
I reached back into the folder.
“I found the photograph two months ago in an archived insurance file.
