He wanted to buy my seat in the cinema hall for thirty thousand dollars, but Vincent Moretti turned pale after my answer

That evening in the cinema hall, Vincent Moretti offered me thirty thousand dollars if I would give up my seat, and I immediately realized that it was not about the ticket.

The manager standing beside him stopped breathing as if I had accidentally stepped onto the tracks.

“You are blocking the screen,” I told Moretti.

He was tall, with broad shoulders and a charcoal-colored coat, whose buttons reflected the dim hall light coldly. He whispered something into the ear of the man beside him.

“Mrs. Bennett, perhaps I could offer you another seat?” the manager smiled, but his fingers were trembling on the ticket machine.

There were almost empty rows all around.

My ticket said: G twelve.

“I am already sitting in my seat,” I replied.

Moretti looked at me.

“I will give you ten thousand dollars.”

“For the seat?”

“Yes.”

I looked under the seat, as if diamonds were supposed to be hidden there. The seat had an old, brown stain by the cup holder and leaned slightly to the left.

“You are a bad investor,” I told him.

The manager cleared his throat.

“Twenty thousand.”

“Now you are already creating discomfort.”

The advertisements were beginning on the screen. Moretti’s right hand touched the inside pocket of his coat, then he checked his watch and looked at my seat again.

He was nervous.

Not angry. Nervous.

“Do you know who I am?” he asked me.

“At this moment? A man who is blocking the film for me.”

The manager lowered his eyes.

Moretti sat down beside me, in G thirteen.

“Do not make this difficult for me,” he said quietly.

“I have not even opened the candy yet.”

I opened the wrapping. The sound of the plastic rang out in the empty hall as if a wall had collapsed.

Moretti clenched his teeth.

At the beginning of the film he barely moved. Then he reached toward my popcorn.

“This costs five dollars,” I stopped his hand.

“You rejected twenty thousand and you are bargaining over popcorn?”

“It is a different market.”

I still offered him the first handful. He almost smiled.

The film was about a rich father who tried to repair his relationship with his son through gifts. He bought him a car. The son asked for an apology. He arranged an expensive trip. The son only asked him to arrive on time.

Moretti was no longer watching the screen. He was looking at his own hands.

When the son in the film said, “You pay with money because money does not need to listen,” Moretti’s hand froze inside the popcorn box.

His face became gray.

“Is that your brother?” I asked.

Credits appeared on the screen: “Written and directed by Luka Moretti.”

Moretti did not turn his head.

“He is my younger brother.”

“Does he know that you are here?”

“No.”

“Does he know that you are watching his film?”

“No.”

Then something rustled lightly from his coat. He immediately grabbed the pocket.

“And why did you want to buy my seat?”

For the first time Moretti looked straight at me.

“Because there is something under that seat that you must not find.”

The doors of the hall closed. The manager glanced over silently. I slowly bent down, slipped my fingers under the seat, and touched the corner of cold metal. Just then Moretti seized my wrist…

His fingers were strong and cold. But I was not frightened—I only looked at my wrist.

“Let go of my hand.”

“Eva, please.”

“You know my name?”

Moretti let me go immediately. That was more disturbing than the grip.

Under the seat was a small flat box stuck there. My initials were written on it, with a small hand-drawn moon sign. I had seen this sign in Luka Moretti’s old letters.

“You know Luka?” I asked.

“Better than you think.”

“Then why do you not speak to him?”

His phone rang. An unknown number appeared on the screen. Moretti did not answer.

The back door of the hall opened and a man dressed in a black jacket entered.

“Give me the box, Mrs. Bennett,” he said.

Moretti stepped in front of him.

“You would not come in here if you had not forgotten my order.”

“The orders have changed.”

I clutched the box with both hands. Luka’s moon on it seemed almost to be breathing.

Moretti bent toward me.

“If you open it, there will be no road back.”

“You have already blocked my road.”

The lights suddenly went out. In the darkness someone whispered my surname.

Then the phone lit up again. This time I read a message: “If you trust my brother, open the box. If you do not trust him, open it anyway. —Luka”

Before I touched the lock, a police uniform appeared in the doorway behind Moretti…

The police officer was not alone. Behind him stood a woman holding a thin folder and a small voice recorder.

“Nobody move,” she said. “I am Detective Maria Alvarez.”

For the first time Moretti’s face was emptied of the confidence with which he had controlled everyone all evening.

“You have no right to come here,” he said.

“I have a court order. But I have not come to arrest you yet.”

The woman looked toward me.

“Eva Bennett?”

“Yes.”

“Open the box.”

Moretti stepped forward.

“She has nothing to do with this case.”

“That is exactly why it matters,” Alvarez replied.

The box trembled in my hands. The metal lock was small, but opening it felt like opening the door of my whole life. I lifted it with my fingernail.

Inside lay a memory card, a folded sheet of paper, and a silver fountain pen with a moon engraved on its top.

I recognized Luka’s handwriting on the paper.

“Eva, if you are reading this, my brother already knows that the truth has reached you. Do not believe his fear. Believe the voice.”

Alvarez switched on the small recorder.

Luka’s voice sounded through the hall—hoarse, but clear.

“Vincent used our father’s warehouses to transport drugs. When the accountant Nora Bennett discovered the movement of the money, Vincent damaged her car’s brakes. Nora died. And I believed my whole life that it had been an accident.”

The sound of blood rang in my ears.

Nora Bennett was my mother.

Moretti took a step backward.

“She was ill,” he said. “Luka has suffered from paranoia for years.”

Luka’s voice continued from the recorder.

“My film is not fiction. Every scene is from Vincent’s life. I left the accounts, transfers, and his own confession. Eva, your mother sent these materials to me the day before her death. I did not dare reveal them. You dared.”

“This is impossible,” Moretti whispered.

I looked at him.

“Do you remember my mother’s death?”

His jaw trembled.

“I was not there.”

Alvarez opened the folder.

“The repair shop record, a copy of the camera footage, and the bank transfers are here. But the main item is on this card.”

She put the card into a computer. A recording appeared on the screen: Moretti was standing in a dark office and saying to someone, “Nora must be silenced before everything is transferred to me.”

Moretti looked at the screen and fell onto a chair.

The man accompanying him tried to escape, but Alvarez blocked his way.

“Where did you find this recording?” I asked.

“Luka sent it to me three days ago,” she said.

“Then where is Luka?”

Before answering, Alvarez looked at her phone. She had received a message. Her face suddenly hardened.

“He is in the hospital. This morning a car hit him.”

Moretti raised his head.

“What did you say?”

Alvarez turned off the screen.

“And the doctor just called me. When Luka regained consciousness, he said only one thing: ‘Tell my brother that the second copy has already been sent.’”

Fear returned to Moretti’s eyes.

“Where did he send it?”

Alvarez looked toward me.

“We have to find that out. Because the second copy went to the person who is most threatened by Vincent…”