The Message He Never Forgot

PART 2 — THE THREE MEN

I closed my good eye, trying to ignore the throbbing in my head.

“My laptop had confidential documents,” I whispered. “Dante, if someone gets access to those files—”

“They won’t.”

His answer was so immediate that I opened my eye again.

“How can you be sure?”

“Because the men who attacked you are going to tell me everything they know.”

Something in his voice made my stomach tighten.

“Dante, please don’t do anything reckless.”

He stared at me for a long moment.

“Harper, three men left you bleeding on a sidewalk. You were alone, unarmed, and doing absolutely nothing to deserve what happened.” He leaned forward, his expression unreadable. “And you’re worried about me being reckless?”

I didn’t have an answer.

Before I could speak, his phone vibrated. He glanced at the screen and stood.

“Marco found something.”

“Dante—”

“I’ll be right outside.”

He walked to the door, then stopped with his hand on the handle.

“Harper?”

“Yes?”

“Whoever did this knew your name. They knew where you parked. They knew your routine.”

His eyes darkened.

“This wasn’t random.”

After he left, I stared at the ceiling, trying to remember the attack.

Then something surfaced.

One of the men had spoken to the others while holding me against the car.

The boss said to make sure she never talks.

At the time, I had thought he meant some criminal employer.

But now, lying in that hospital bed, I remembered something else.

Two days earlier, I had accidentally opened an encrypted message on Dante’s office computer. I hadn’t read much, but one sentence had caught my attention.

The transfer must be completed before Friday. Harper cannot discover the original account.

I had immediately closed the file.

I never mentioned it to Dante because I assumed it was business I wasn’t authorized to see.

Now I wondered if that message had been the reason someone wanted me dead.

When Dante returned thirty minutes later, his face was colder than before.

“Did you recognize any of the men?” he asked.

“No. But I remember one of them saying something.”

I repeated the words I had heard.

Dante went completely still.

“What did you say?”

I repeated them.

He slowly placed his phone on the bedside table.

“Someone ordered them to silence you.”

“I think so.”

“Harper, have you seen anything unusual at the office recently? Documents, payments, messages?”

My heart began pounding.

I told him about the encrypted file.

For the first time since I had known him, Dante looked genuinely surprised.

“You opened my private computer?”

“Accidentally! I was trying to retrieve the zoning report.”

“And you saw a transfer?”

“Only one sentence. I swear.”

He didn’t accuse me of anything. Instead, he pulled a chair closer and sat beside me.

“Listen carefully. You are not going back to that office until I know who is responsible.”

“But my job—”

“Your job is staying alive.”

His voice softened slightly.

“And that is an order I’m not willing to negotiate.”

I wanted to argue, but exhaustion was dragging me under.

Just before I fell asleep, I felt his hand gently close around mine.

“Dante?”

“Yes?”

“Please don’t become a monster because of me.”

He said nothing for several seconds.

Then he answered quietly.

“Harper, the monster was already here. Someone simply made the mistake of giving him a reason.”

When I woke again that evening, Dante was still there.

And he had discovered something that changed everything.

The three men had been arrested before noon.

One had already confessed.

They hadn’t been hired by Dante’s enemies.

They had been paid by someone inside his own organization.

Someone who knew my schedule, my habits, and exactly which documents I handled.

Someone who had worked beside me for years.

Dante looked at me, his jaw tight.

“Harper, I need you to tell me something.”

“What?”

“Who was the last person who asked you about the transfers?”

I thought back to the previous week.

Then I remembered.

“Adrian.”

Dante’s most trusted financial director.

His oldest friend.

And the man who had stood beside him through every battle that built the Moretti empire.

Dante rose slowly.

“Then I know where to begin.”