Chapter 223 False Signal

Chapter 223 False Signal
Matteo's POV:

They’d been gone for hours.

Not minutes. Not the kind of “we lost her for a second” gap that could be patched with a sweep and a phone call.

Hours meant Elio had time to settle her somewhere clean. Hours meant he could move her twice if he wanted.

Hours meant she could be bleeding and no one would know yet.

I didn’t let myself imagine it.

I let Luca feed me facts, and I turned those facts into movement.

We left the estate in three vehicles, unmarked, no Moretti plates, no usual drivers. Two cars were decoys. One carried the people who mattered.

I drove.

Adriano was in the passenger seat because he refused to be left behind.

“You’re not going alone,” he’d said in the security hub.

“It’s faster if I do,” I’d answered.

“It’s faster if you stay alive,” he’d replied, and the conversation ended there.

Luca stayed back, but his voice lived in our ears. He had cameras, traffic feeds, internal logs, RECON overlays, and every ugly piece of data he could scrape without lighting up the city.

“Talk to me,” I said as we hit the service road that cut around the outer perimeter.

“RECON’s confidence is seventy-two percent,” Luca said. “It’s narrowing toward industrial strip southeast. Three likely nodes. Primary: Warehouse cluster off Route 19.”

“Who owns the land,” Adriano asked.

“Shell companies,” Luca replied. “It’s either laundering or someone hiding something old.”

“Lorenzo remnants,” Adriano said.

“Likely,” Luca confirmed.

I kept my eyes on the road. Hands steady on the wheel. Breath controlled. Rage pushed up in waves and I pushed it back down. I needed my head.

“Elio wants you loud,” Adriano said quietly.

“I know.”

“He wants you on camera. He wants you breaking rules.”

“I know.”

Adriano looked at me. “Then don’t give him that.”

I didn’t answer.

Because I wasn’t thinking about cameras.

I was thinking about the corridor lights going out.

The gun in her back.

The van door shutting.

The sound she didn’t make.

If she stayed calm, it meant she was already calculating. That was good.

But calm didn’t stop pain.

“ETA,” I said.

“Seventeen minutes to primary node,” Luca replied. “Traffic is light. No police chatter.”

“Keep it that way,” Adriano said.

“I am,” Luca answered. “I’m not touching city systems. Just monitoring. Minimal footprint.”

Good.

Elio wasn’t just a criminal. He was a Lorenzo raised by a Lorenzo. He’d grown up inside rules built on cruelty and control. He wasn’t going to leave easy trails.

And he wasn’t going to keep her somewhere that screamed “hostage.”

He’d keep her somewhere that looked like a decision.

We split before the industrial strip.

Team One took the access road and held position like I’d ordered earlier. Team Two went overhead, drone coverage, silent, high altitude. Team Three stayed back to keep sweeping the estate for the leak.

I had one job.

Find her.

Bring her back breathing.

Everything else came later.

Luca’s voice crackled. “I’m getting movement. Two vehicles, both clean, both unregistered plates. One matches the angle from perimeter camera. They’re moving toward the primary cluster.”

“Lead us,” I said.

“I’ll keep you off main roads,” Luca replied. “Turn right in three hundred meters.”

We cut through a side artery and dropped into the industrial sprawl like we belonged there. Warehouses. Fenced lots. Closed loading bays. Security lights that didn’t mean safety, just surveillance.

Adriano checked his weapon without looking down. Calm. Mechanical. The way he got when he decided something was going to get ugly.

“You sure you want me here,” he said.

I glanced at him. “If you weren’t here, you’d be angry.”

“I’m already angry.”

“Then we’re aligned.”

He exhaled once, almost a laugh. Then his face went blank again.

Luca spoke. “Two minutes out. RECON is tightening. It’s favoring Warehouse 3B. East side. Single access point. Low camera density.”

“Too clean,” Adriano muttered.

I didn’t disagree. But we didn’t have the luxury of waiting for perfect.

We rolled into the cluster with headlights off and engines low. Team vehicles fanned out. No shouting. No sirens. No dramatic arrival.

Just movement.

Just professionals doing what they were built to do.

We parked behind a stack of shipping containers and moved on foot. Weapons up. Eyes scanning. Every door was a question.

I hated that Ivy wasn’t on comms.

I hated not hearing her voice telling me what she saw.

I hated not knowing if she was still whole.

“Perimeter clear,” one of my men said softly.

“Back exit covered,” another said.

Adriano touched my shoulder once. Grounding, not permission.

“Go,” he said.

We moved.

Warehouse 3B looked dead. No guards. No obvious cameras. No vehicles parked like someone was inside.

That didn’t reassure me. It made my skin tighten.

I signaled the breach. Two men took the sides of the door. One checked for wires. Another checked the lock. It wasn’t reinforced. It wasn’t even new.

That was wrong.

“Door’s not alarmed,” the lock man said.

“Open it,” I said.

He did.

The door swung inward with a slow, ugly creak.

Dust hit us first.

Stale air. Old oil. Metal. The smell of a building that hadn’t seen life in a long time.

We swept in fast. Corners. Overhead. Catwalks. Blind spots.

Nothing.

No furniture. No lights. No makeshift cage. No evidence of recent use.

Just emptiness.

“Clear,” one of my men said.

“Clear.”

“Clear.”

My heart didn’t slow.

It started hammering harder. Because the only thing worse than walking into a room where she was hurt...was walking into a room Elio wanted me to enter.

I stepped farther in.

And then I saw it.

Centered on the concrete floor, placed like someone had measured the space.

A watch.

Her watch.

The one she never removed. The one Luca had noticed. The one I’d noticed and ignored because I didn’t want to ask questions I wasn’t ready to answer.

It sat there under the warehouse’s broken skylight like a target.

I stared at it for half a second too long. Adriano saw my face change.

“What,” he said.

I didn’t answer.

I walked toward it.

Adriano grabbed my arm. “Matteo...”

I shook him off and kept moving.

The watch wasn’t smashed. It wasn’t thrown. It wasn’t lost.

It was placed. And the blood on it wasn’t a smear from impact.

It was deliberate.

A thin coat along the strap, enough to stain and show. Enough to tell a story.

My breath cut.

Something hot surged up my throat.

A sound came out of me before I could stop it. Not a word.

A low, raw noise that made my men freeze.

I dropped to a knee and picked the watch up.

It was warm from my hand instantly. Too light. Too normal. Like it didn’t carry what it meant.

Blood on metal.

Blood on her.

My jaw locked so hard my teeth ached.

For one second, my control snapped.

I stood and threw the watch across the warehouse.

It hit a wall and cracked. Plastic and metal skittered across the floor.

The sound echoed.

My men didn’t move.

They didn’t speak. Because they knew what that meant.

I turned, and the room blurred at the edges.

I saw a guard’s face and I didn’t know if he was mine or Elio’s.

My hand tightened on my gun.

Adriano stepped in front of me immediately.

“Look at me,” he said.

I didn’t. He grabbed my jaw, firm, not gentle.

“Matteo,” he said, low and dangerous. “Look at me.”

I forced my eyes to his. He held my gaze like he was holding me in place.

“She’s not here,” he said.

My breath came hard.

“She’s bleeding,” I said.

“We don’t know that,” he snapped.

I stared at him, rage shaking under my skin.

Adriano didn’t blink. “Elio wants you to believe that. Because if you believe it, you stop thinking.”

I swallowed. It tasted like metal again.

“She could be bleeding,” I said, quieter.

“Yes,” Adriano replied. “And you still need your head to get her back.”

My hands shook once.

I forced them still.

I forced air in and out the way he’d told me earlier.

Control your breathing.

Control your hands.

Control your decisions.

“Luca,” Adriano said into the comm. “Talk.”

Luca came in immediately, voice tight. “I’m seeing it. That’s her anchor device.”

“It’s a decoy,” Adriano said.

“Yes,” Luca answered. “I’m… I’m adjusting. RECON’s input has been compromised. It was tracking the watch, not her.”

I stared at the empty warehouse.

Elio had used Ivy’s own system against us.

He hadn’t just taken her. He’d taken her advantage too.

“Tell me you can recover,” I said.

“I can,” Luca replied, but it wasn’t confident yet. “Give me two minutes. I need to rerun without the anchor. I need a new variable.”

“What variable,” Adriano asked.

Luca hesitated. “Her baseline movement patterns won’t help once she’s restrained. But… her habits might.”

“Habits,” Adriano repeated.

I turned my head slowly.

“Ivy doesn’t stop thinking,” I said.

Luca went quiet. I stared at the floor where the watch had been.

“She’d expect Elio to use her tools,” I said. “She’d plan for that.”

Adriano’s eyes sharpened. “What did she build that doesn’t rely on a device?”

I didn’t answer him.

I answered Luca.

“RECON isn’t just tracking,” I said. “It predicts choices.”

“Yes,” Luca said.

“Then predict hers,” I said. “Not his.”

Luca exhaled. “Okay. Okay. I’ll run a model: if she’s conscious, if she’s mapping, if she’s trying to buy time, what location serves Elio and still lets her keep control long enough to send a signal?”

“Do it,” I said.

Adriano looked at the watch pieces on the floor.

“He wanted you here,” Adriano said.

“Yes,” I replied.

“He wanted you to break.”

“I almost did.”

“But you didn’t,” Adriano said.

I didn’t correct him.

Because I had broken for a second.

And Elio had gotten it on purpose.

I walked to the shattered watch, picked up the face piece, and smeared my thumb over the blood.

It was real.

I didn’t know if it was hers. But it was real enough to cut deep.

I stood and put the broken watch piece in my pocket anyway.

Proof.

A reminder.

A promise.

Luca’s voice returned, faster now. “I have an updated projection. Lower confidence, but it’s cleaner data. Two likely nodes. One is a staging house. One is an old clinic.”

“A clinic,” Adriano repeated.

“Private. Off-grid,” Luca said. “No records. No public cameras. It matches how Elio survived after the fire. It matches his pattern: controlled environments, clean rooms, predictable security.”

My stomach went cold.

Elio didn’t want chaos.

He wanted a place where he could talk.

Where he could shape the story.

Where he could keep Ivy conscious long enough for Matteo Moretti to come tearing through the door.

“What’s the address,” I said.

Luca gave it.

I didn’t hesitate.

I looked at my men. “Move.”

And they did.

We exited the warehouse in silence. No victory. No closure. Just the hard reset of knowing we’d been played.

As I got into the car, Adriano grabbed my shoulder again.

“Matteo,” he said.

I looked at him.

“If you lose control again, you lose time,” he said. “You don’t get to do that.”

I nodded once.

Then I drove.

The city blurred past. Industrial lots turned into side streets. Side streets turned into quieter edges of town where businesses kept their lights low and asked no questions.

In my ear, Luca kept feeding updates, tightening the net. Drone eyes. Traffic threads. Dead zones.

Elio thought he’d bought himself space with a decoy.

He bought himself minutes.

That was all.

I gripped the wheel harder.

“She’s still alive,” Luca said suddenly. “I’m not guessing. The model is reading movement patterns on the second node. There’s activity. Not random.”

My chest tightened.

“Say it again,” I said.

“She’s alive,” Luca repeated.

Adriano’s voice cut in, calm, lethal. “Then we bring her home.”

I didn’t answer.

Because my answer was already in the way I drove.

Elio wanted me chasing the wrong thing.

He wanted me arriving late.

He wanted me breaking in an empty room.

He got that.

Now he was going to get something else.

He was going to learn what happened when he made a mistake that couldn’t be undone.

Because the next door I walked through wasn’t going to be a decoy.

And the next time I saw blood, it was going to belong to him.