Chapter 4 - Kiara’s CameraNo one had entered Kiara Moretti’s bedroom in three years.

Not the cleaners.

Not the guards.

Not Sofia.

Not even Alejandro.

The door remained locked behind a brass key he kept in his desk drawer, beneath old photographs and a hospital bracelet too small for any living wrist.

At eleven that night, Alejandro opened it.

Clara stood behind him with Emma half-hidden at her side.

Bruno waited in the hall with two guards, but Alejandro had forbidden him from entering.

“This is unnecessary,” Bruno said.

Alejandro did not turn around. “So was poisoning me.”

The key clicked.

The door opened.

The air inside smelled faintly of dust, lavender, and time.

Kiara’s room was still pink.

Pink curtains. Pink canopy bed. Pink shoes lined neatly beneath a white chair as if the child might return and choose a pair in the morning.

Emma looked around with wide eyes.

“She had rabbits too,” she whispered.

On the bed sat a stuffed bear with a stitched smile.

Beside it, on the shelf, was a small wooden music box.

Alejandro crossed the room slowly. Each step seemed to hurt him more than the last. He stopped before a little white bookshelf and reached behind a framed drawing of a house with three stick figures.

A tiny black device sat hidden behind the frame.

Clara frowned. “A camera?”

Alejandro nodded. “Kiara had night terrors. I installed it myself after she kept saying someone was standing by her door.”

Clara’s skin prickled.

“She saw someone?”

Alejandro’s face closed.

“I thought she was dreaming.”

He removed the memory card with shaking fingers.

In the security room, Bruno protested again.

“The system may not even read it. That camera is old.”

“Then pray it doesn’t,” Alejandro said.

The monitor flickered.

Static appeared first.

Then the study.

The angle was strange, high and narrow through a gap between shelves. The camera had not been aimed at Kiara’s room anymore. At some point, the wall panel had shifted, leaving the lens pointed through an old ventilation opening into Alejandro’s private study.

The timestamp was wrong by several minutes, but the date was that day.

Everyone leaned closer.

At 4:12 p.m., Alejandro entered the study and sat at his desk.

At 4:19, a shadow moved near the wine cabinet.

At 4:21, someone stepped into view.

Sofia.

She wore cream silk and white gloves.

She looked over her shoulder, then removed a small vial from her sleeve.

Clara covered Emma’s eyes.

On the screen, Sofia uncorked the Barolo, poured something inside, swirled it, wiped the rim, and replaced it exactly.

Bruno swore under his breath.

Alejandro said nothing.

At 4:25, Sofia lifted her face toward the hidden lens.

For one strange second, it looked as though she was staring directly at them from the past.

Then she smiled.

Not nervous.

Not guilty.

Victorious.

“She wanted you dead,” Clara whispered.

Alejandro’s eyes remained on the screen.

“No,” he said hoarsely. “She wanted me blamed for something first.”

The recording continued.

At 4:31, another figure entered the study.

A man.

Broad shoulders.

Dark suit.

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