Chapter 3 - Dinner With a Moretti
It was not a house key.
It was small, brass, and old.
A number had been engraved into it.
Antonio closed his fist.
“Sophia, whatever happens, don’t—”
The driver accelerated backward.
Another vehicle blocked them.
Sophia’s pulse hammered.
Then black SUVs appeared from the opposite direction.
Doors opened.
Men stepped out.
Alessandro emerged last.
He walked into the headlights as if fear were something that happened to other people.
Vittorio stopped.
For several seconds, the two men simply looked at each other.
Then Vittorio smiled.
“Alessandro.”
“Step away from the car.”
“You always did skip pleasantries.”
“Move.”
Vittorio glanced toward Sophia through the windshield.
His smile widened.
“So that’s her.”
Alessandro’s expression became lethal.
“You don’t look at her.”
Sophia heard the sentence through the closed window.
Something inside her tightened.
Not because it sounded possessive.
Because Alessandro looked afraid.
Not for himself.
For her.
Vittorio raised both hands.
“I came to talk.”
“You sent photographs.”
“I needed your attention.”
“You had it twelve years ago.”
Vittorio laughed.
“And yet here we are.”
Sirens sounded somewhere in the distance.
Vittorio returned to his vehicle.
Before entering, he looked directly at Sophia.
Then he tapped three fingers against his chest.
Three.
One.
Seven.
Her father went pale.
Vittorio drove away.
Alessandro reached Sophia’s door.
She unlocked it.
“What is 317?”
Antonio said, “Sophia—”
“No.”
She got out.
“I am finished with people protecting me by lying.”
Alessandro looked at Antonio.
Her father lowered his head.
“Tell her,” Alessandro said.
Antonio stared at him.
“You promised.”
“I promised to protect her. Keeping her ignorant is no longer protection.”
Sophia folded her arms.
“Finally, something we agree on.”
They went to Alessandro’s lakeside residence because Antonio refused to speak anywhere else.
Sophia expected something ostentatious.
Instead, the house was elegant and surprisingly quiet.
No gold ceilings.
No ridiculous statues.
Books everywhere.
Alessandro led them into a private dining room and dismissed the staff.
Nobody ate.
Antonio placed the brass key on the table.
“Seventeen years ago, I invested in a shipping company with Carlo Moretti.”
“Your father,” Sophia said to Alessandro.
“Yes.”
Antonio continued.
“The company became enormously profitable. But one partner began using legitimate shipments to conceal illegal transactions.”
“Vittorio.”
“Yes.”
“What kind?”
Antonio hesitated.
Alessandro answered.
“Money laundering. Smuggling. Bribery.”
Sophia looked at him.
“Mafia.”
The word hung between them.
Alessandro did not deny the history.
“My family had criminal ties,” he said. “My father spent the final years of his life trying to separate the legitimate companies from them.”
“And you?”
“I finished what he started.”
“Are you telling me you’re not involved in organized crime?”
“I’m telling you I run hotels, shipping, property, and investment companies. I also inherited enemies created by men who operated differently.”
It was not a perfect answer.
But it was more honest than Daniel had ever been.
Antonio pushed the key toward Sophia.
“Carlo and I collected evidence against Vittorio. Account records. Names. Transactions. Enough to destroy him.”
“Why not give it to police?”
“We intended to.”
“What happened?”
“Carlo died.”
Sophia knew the official story.
Heart attack.
She looked at Alessandro.
His eyes told her there was more.
Antonio continued.
“The evidence disappeared. I believed Vittorio had found it.”
“But he didn’t.”
“No.”
Sophia looked at the key.
“317.”
“A private deposit box.”
“Where?”
Antonio shook his head.
“I don’t know anymore.”
Sophia stared at him.
“That makes no sense.”
“The original institution was acquired twice. Records changed.”
“Then why does Vittorio want the key?”
“Because whatever is in that box could still destroy him.”
“And Daniel?”
Silence.
Sophia’s heart sank.
Alessandro answered.
“My brother discovered the box existed.”
“When?”
“Six months ago.”
Two months before Daniel proposed.
Sophia stood.
The chair scraped loudly against the floor.
“No.”
“Sophia.”
“No.”
Daniel had proposed six months ago.
He had taken her to a private rooftop overlooking Manhattan.
Her favorite flowers.
Her mother’s favorite song.
He had cried.
She had cried.
He had knelt.
Had every second been calculated?
“My father had the key,” she said slowly. “Why did Daniel need me?”
Antonio looked ashamed.
“Because the box is registered to the Bianchi Family Trust.”
Sophia understood.
She was the trustee.
After her mother died, Sophia had inherited administrative authority over a collection of family accounts.
She barely thought about it.
Her accountant handled most paperwork.
“Daniel married me, he gets access?”
“Not automatically,” Antonio said.
“But enough.”
Alessandro nodded.
“If you signed joint authorization documents.”
Sophia remembered a stack of papers Daniel had brought two weeks before the wedding.
Estate planning.
That was what he called it.
She had postponed signing because Marcela arrived unexpectedly.
Her knees weakened.
Alessandro stood but did not touch her.
He waited.
Choice.
Again.
Sophia steadied herself against the chair.
“So Daniel was using me.”
Antonio whispered, “We don’t know that the relationship began that way.”
Sophia laughed bitterly.
“Please don’t rescue the romance, Dad.”
Alessandro’s phone rang.
He answered.
Listened.
His expression darkened.
“Where?”
A pause.
“I’ll handle it.”
He ended the call.
“What?” Sophia asked.
“Daniel is gone.”
Antonio stood.
“Elena?”
“Gone too.”
Sophia should have felt betrayed again.
Instead she felt exhausted.
“Let them go.”
Alessandro looked at her.
“I can’t.”
“Because of the money?”
“Because Daniel took something from my office.”
“What?”
Alessandro hesitated.
Sophia stared at him.
“You’re doing it again.”
He exhaled.
“A file on you.”
“Why do you have a file on me?”
“It isn’t mine.”
“Whose?”
“My father’s.”
The room went silent.
“Your father died years ago.”
“Yes.”
“So why did he have a file on me?”
Alessandro walked to a cabinet.
He opened it.
Empty.
“The file contained records from the Bianchi trust.”
Sophia stared at the vacant shelf.
“And?”
“A photograph.”
“Of what?”
“I don’t know. It was sealed.”
“You never opened it?”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because my father wrote your name on the envelope and underneath it he wrote: Give this to Sophia only if Vittorio returns.”
Sophia’s phone vibrated.
A message from Elena.
One photograph.
Daniel stood inside what looked like an airport hangar.
Behind him was a private jet.
Elena’s message contained only four words.
HE LIED TO BOTH OF US.
Then another arrived.
I FOUND THE FILE.
Sophia typed immediately.
Where are you?
Three dots appeared.
Vanished.
Appeared again.
Then Elena sent a photograph of the sealed envelope.
Someone was standing behind her.
May you like
A hand rested on Elena’s shoulder.
A hand wearing Vittorio Mancini’s ring.
