When Midnight Strikes at the Crematorium, a Father Discovers His Daughter-in-Law's Dark Mob Secret Inside the Furnace
👉 Previous choice: You chose Option A – Press the emergency power kill switch and manually inspect the furnace hatch.
I slammed my palm onto the red emergency kill switch. The deep thrum of the burners immediately cut out, leaving a ringing silence that felt heavier than the roar had been. Heat still radiated from the reinforced steel hatch, making the air around it shimmer.
My hands moved by instinct, fumbling with the thermal safety latch. It clicked open with a metallic groan. Smoke, thick and acrid, billowed out as I pulled the heavy door ajar.
A hand reached out, then a man’s face, bruised and disoriented. He coughed, his eyes watering from the smoke, and dragged himself onto the gurney. He wore a rumpled suit, his shirt torn, and a heavy gold signet ring glinted on his right hand. The ring bore an intricate crest: a stylized lion wrapped around a quill, the unmistakable symbol of the Moretti syndicate.
“Vinny,” the man rasped, his voice raw. “Vincent Rinaldi. FBI informant.”
He pushed himself up, wincing. “They drugged me. Thought I was dead.” He wiped sweat from his brow, his gaze fixed on my face. “Clara. Your daughter-in-law. She’s deep with them.”
Vinny fumbled inside his jacket pocket, pulling out a folded, damp document. He flattened it on the gurney beside him. It was a property transfer form, the recipient field filled with an unfamiliar name, the sale price absurdly low. Below it, Clara’s familiar, elegant signature, stamped with her notary’s blue seal.
“She liquidates their properties,” Vinny explained, his voice gaining strength. “Forced sales, fake deeds. They just disappear the owners. This ring… it was my proof. They didn’t find it.”
He pointed to the document. “Fourteen properties. A fortune. She sets up the final disposal. Knew you wouldn’t check the logs, Arthur. Knew you always played by the book.”
I stood there, the industrial flashlamp still clutched in my hand. The weight of the world pressed down on my shoulders. My daughter-in-law, a financial liquidator for a crime syndicate. The heat from the now-cooling furnace seemed to mock my own rising internal temperature.
➡️ Read CHAPTER 5: The Liquidator’s Ledger to continue the story.
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