Chapter 3 - The Widow’s Secret
I returned to the ballroom twenty minutes later.
The guests had been separated by family. Moretti security guarded every door. Isabella sat near the fireplace with Vittorio and her brothers, her wedding gown spread across the chair as though she were still waiting for the ceremony to continue.
Sophia and Emma sat on the opposite side of the room beside my mother.
When I entered, Isabella stood.
“Where is Luca?”
“Gone.”
A flicker of relief crossed her face.
I held up his phone.
“But he left this.”
The relief vanished.
Vittorio stepped between us.
“My daughter is leaving.”
“No one leaves.”
“You cannot imprison three hundred people.”
“I can keep witnesses safe while an armed traitor is loose.”
“You’re treating us like criminals.”
“Your daughter threatened a widow with murder on camera.”
Isabella folded her arms.
“You heard an unclear recording.”
“I also heard you ask Luca whether he found a ledger.”
Her father turned sharply.
“What ledger?”
For the first time, Isabella appeared uncertain.
Vittorio stared at her.
“What have you done?”
She lifted her chin.
“What you were too weak to do.”
His hand moved fast.
The slap echoed across the ballroom.
Isabella’s face turned to the side.
Several people gasped.
She slowly faced her father again, one cheek reddening.
“You spent twenty years begging the Morettis to treat you as an equal,” she said. “I was going to make them obey us.”
Vittorio looked at me.
“I knew nothing about this.”
“That remains to be seen.”
He turned toward Isabella.
“Tell him.”
“No.”
“Isabella.”
“You offered me to him like a contract,” she snapped. “Don’t pretend you care what I did to survive the bargain.”
“I gave you the future of this family.”
“You gave me to a man who would always hold more power than I did.”
I stepped closer.
“So you planned to take mine.”
She met my eyes.
“I planned to make sure no husband could ever control me.”
“You could have refused the marriage.”
“And become useless to my father?”
Vittorio’s face tightened.
Isabella laughed bitterly.
“There. Look at him. He’s more offended that I failed than by what I did.”
None of that explained Sophia.
I gestured toward her.
“Why did Daniel Bennett have to die?”
Isabella’s eyes shifted.
“Ask Luca.”
“I’m asking you.”
“He discovered money moving through Romano Coastal Imports.”
Vittorio stared at her.
“Our company?”
“A shell division,” Isabella said. “Luca created it. Daniel found irregularities and threatened to report them to Alessandro’s father.”
Sophia stood.
“My husband didn’t threaten anyone. He was doing his job.”
Isabella looked at her without remorse.
“His job made him dangerous.”
Emma buried her face in her mother’s side.
My hands tightened.
“Who ordered his murder?”
“I told you. Luca has the proof.”
“Convenient.”
“It’s true.”
Marco entered carrying a laptop and the half-burned ledger.
“We recovered several pages. They show transfers from Moretti-controlled docks into Romano accounts.”
Vittorio shook his head.
“I never authorized that.”
“Some accounts carry your signature,” Marco said.
“They’re forged.”
Isabella smiled faintly.
“Of course they are.”
Her father stared at her with dawning horror.
“You forged my name?”
“I built a network that could survive you.”
“You would have destroyed our family.”
“I was saving it.”
“By stealing from mine?” I asked.
“Your empire wastes millions paying old men for loyalty they no longer have. Luca understood that.”
“Luca understood greed.”
“And you don’t?”
The room fell silent.
Isabella stepped closer, her voice low.
“You think you’re different because you protect servants and kneel for children? Men still fear your name. Families still disappear when they cross you.”
“Not widows. Not children.”
“A noble distinction.”
Sophia approached us.
“What did you say to Daniel before he died?”
Isabella looked at her.
“I never met him.”
“You knew his name.”
“Luca told me.”
“You knew about the bridge.”
“So did the newspapers.”
Sophia’s breathing became uneven.
“You planted the bracelet in my room. You threatened Emma. You pushed me into that cabinet. Why?”
“Because you found the photograph.”
I turned to Sophia.
“What photograph?”
She hesitated.
Then reached into the pocket of her uniform and removed a worn picture.
It showed Daniel standing beside a shipping warehouse. Behind him were two younger men.
Luca and Isabella’s older brother, Matteo Romano.
Matteo had supposedly died from an overdose six years earlier.
Vittorio took the photograph.
“Where did you get this?”
“Daniel kept it inside an old book,” Sophia said. “I found it after his death. Last week, Isabella saw it in my bag.”
Isabella’s voice hardened.
“That photograph belongs to my family.”
“It belonged to my husband.”
“Matteo was trying to expose Luca,” Vittorio said slowly. “He told me he was in trouble days before he died.”
Isabella looked away.
I understood.
“Daniel and Matteo were working together.”
Sophia nodded.
“Daniel told me he had a source inside the Romano family. He never gave me a name.”
Vittorio’s hand shook around the photograph.
“My son didn’t overdose.”
“No,” Isabella said. “Luca had him killed.”
Vittorio looked as though she had struck him again.
“And you still worked with Luca?”
“I found out years later.”
“You partnered with the man who murdered your brother?”
“I partnered with the man who had the evidence.”
Her father stared at her in disgust.
“You are not my daughter.”
“No,” she said. “I became what this family required.”
Marco’s phone vibrated.
He checked the message.
“We traced Luca’s vehicle to an industrial property near the river.”
“Which property?”
He showed me the screen.
Sophia went pale.
“That was Daniel’s warehouse.”
A second message appeared.
A photograph.
Luca stood inside the abandoned warehouse holding the leather ledger. Beside him sat one of my security guards, bound to a chair.
Beneath the image was a short message.
May you like
BRING ISABELLA AND THE BENNETT PHOTOGRAPH.
COME ALONE, OR YOUR MAN DIES.
