Chapter 4 - THE CHAPEL BENEATH THE HALLThe Moretti chapel stood at the western edge of the estate.
For generations, the family used it for weddings, funerals, and private oaths. Alessandro had prayed there beside his father’s coffin.
He had never heard of a chamber beneath it.
Isabella knew one existed.
Daniel had discovered the entrance while repairing security systems two months before his disappearance. He told her he found old stonework beneath the altar but refused to explain further.
“He said knowing would endanger me.”
“And you accepted that?” Alessandro asked.
“I was pregnant. He was already checking our windows every night.”
“You both lived on half-truths.”
“Yes.”
The honesty disarmed him more effectively than denial.
Alessandro selected six guards he believed had no connection to Sofia or the DeLuca family. Isabella refused to leave Emma behind in the main hall.
“If Sofia has people inside your security team, separating us makes Emma easier to take.”
“She cannot enter the chapel.”
“She already entered your house, your father’s history, and my marriage.”
Emma carried the damaged rabbit as they crossed the marble corridor.
Vivian followed under guard.
“You are not coming,” Alessandro told her.
“I know where Sofia keeps the Saint Orison records.”
“Why?”
“My father made me sign transfers after my mother died.”
“Then tell us.”
“I need protection.”
“You need permission to remain alive?”
Vivian’s eyes flashed.
“You think all twelve families obey you because they respect you? They obey because Sofia knows which children, mistresses, and witnesses each family hid. If she releases those files, your council destroys itself.”
Alessandro looked toward the grand hall.
The family leaders sat beneath armed watch, outwardly furious and inwardly terrified.
Every one of them had something buried.
“Come,” he said.
The chapel altar carried an old carving of a crown surrounded by thorns.
Emma raised the rabbit.
“Same picture.”
Isabella pressed the stitched ear against the carving.
A mechanism shifted beneath the stone floor.
The altar moved aside, revealing a spiral staircase.
Cold air rose from below.
Alessandro descended first.
The chamber beneath the chapel was larger than the building above it. Shelves lined the walls, filled with sealed ledgers, photographs, and recordings dating back fifty years.
A circular table stood in the center with thirteen chairs.
One chair bore the Bellandi crest.
The supposedly destroyed family had never been removed from the true council.
Its seat had been hidden.
Isabella walked toward it.
Her name was carved into the wood.
Not recently.
The letters had been cut decades earlier, when she was still a child.
“How did they know?” she whispered.
A projector activated.
Carlo Moretti appeared on the far wall beside Antonio Bellandi.
Both men were alive in the recording.
Carlo spoke first.
“If our children see this, Sofia has already rewritten the war.”
Alessandro stood completely still.
His father continued.
“The Briar Circle was not a rebellion. It was a protection pact. We created it after discovering that members of the Twelve were purchasing court orders, medical confinements, and false deaths to remove inconvenient family members.”
Antonio placed a ledger on the table.
“Sofia controls the network. Vincent DeLuca moves the money. Others participate when it benefits them.”
Vivian closed her eyes.
Carlo looked directly toward the camera.
“Alessandro, your aunt will tell you I chose Bellandi over blood. The truth is that blood without conscience is only another chain.”
A gunshot sounded in the old recording.
The image lurched sideways.
Sofia’s younger face entered the frame.
The video ended.
Alessandro’s breathing changed.
Isabella touched the table.
“My father and yours died here.”
“Not here,” Vivian whispered.
Everyone turned.
“My father told me Carlo survived the first attack. Sofia moved him to Saint Orison.”
Alessandro stepped toward her.
“My father was buried.”
“You buried someone.”
A monitor beside the Bellandi chair turned on.
A live medical feed appeared.
An elderly man lay inside a private hospital bed, connected to oxygen and cardiac monitors.
His identification read:
May you like
CARLO MORETTI—PATIENT ACTIVE.
👉 Alessandro’s father might still be alive inside the very network he had tried to expose.
