“You don’t have evidence.”
Sophie looked at his bare right hand resting on the folder.
“You left fingerprints in my apartment.
Your youngest man did too.
You discussed Halsted in the van.
You brought me here alive because you wanted information.
And now you are the only person in this room asking Matteo to kill me before he checks what I said.”
The young kidnapper looked down at his ungloved hands.
Leo turned on him.
“What are you staring at?”
“Nothing.”
“Then keep it that way.”
Matteo leaned back.
“Who gave you the address?”
The young man looked at Leo, then at Matteo.
“Leo did.”
“Who identified the target?”
“Leo.”
Leo’s face hardened.
“Because I was the one handling Chloe.”
Sophie felt the first genuine shift in the room.
The guns had not moved, but their purpose had.
They were no longer pointed only at her.
Matteo closed the folder.
“You said you had proof,” he told Sophie.
“I said my firm had a file.”
“That is not the same thing.”
“No.
But my phone may contain something better.”
Leo’s reaction was immediate.
“She doesn’t get a phone.”
Matteo’s eyes moved to him.
Sophie continued before Leo could recover.
“Your men took it from my kitchen counter.
Chloe had been calling me for three days.
I ignored her because every conversation with my sister eventually becomes a request for money, shelter, or a lie I am expected to repeat.”
A familiar ache pressed behind Sophie’s ribs, but she forced herself to keep speaking.
“The last message arrived shortly before your men entered my apartment.
I saw her name on the screen.
I did not open it.”
Matteo looked toward the youngest kidnapper.
“Get the phone.”
Leo grabbed the folder.
“This is a trick.”
Matteo’s voice remained soft.
“Put that down.”
For one second, Leo did not obey.
The armed men around the warehouse watched him.
Then he released the folder.
The youngest man returned with Sophie’s phone sealed inside a clear evidence bag.
The irony almost made her smile.
They had preserved the device more carefully than they had preserved her apartment.
He placed it on the table.
Sophie gave Matteo the passcode.
Leo stared at her.
“You’re handing him your whole life?”
