Chapter 8
My father.
The man whose portrait still hung over the Bellini private dining room.
I stared at Marco.
“You’re lying.”
He laughed once.
“Now you know how it feels.”
Lucia stood.
“Marco.”
He turned toward her.
“You told me he didn’t know.”
Lucia’s face hardened.
“He knew enough.”
That was not denial.
I felt something inside me shift.
My father had spent years telling me Rachel died in an accident before Claire was born. He mourned her publicly. Toasted her memory. Told me never to ask my grandmother about it because “some grief deserves privacy.”
He had known she survived.
Marco kept talking.
“Rachel came back because your father promised protection.”
Thomas looked sick.
“He told her that?”
“Yes.”
“And?”
Marco’s jaw tightened.
“She brought the second token set.”
The protectors.
The names Lucia did not know.
“She was going to give it to him.”
“What happened?”
Marco looked toward Lucia.
She stared back at him with pure warning.
For forty years, that look had probably controlled him.
This time it failed.
“He handed Rachel back.”
Claire made a small sound.
I could not tell whether it was disbelief or pain.
“My father gave her to Lucia?”
Marco nodded.
“He said one hidden daughter wasn’t worth splitting the Bellini family.”
I stood.
The chair behind me scraped across the floor.
Sofia flinched.
That stopped me.
I forced myself to sit again.
Claire watched me.
This betrayal belonged to both of us.
My father had chosen family peace over Rachel’s life.
Lucia looked almost relieved now that the truth belonged to a dead man too.
“You see?” she said. “Even your father understood.”
I stared at her.
“Understood what?”
“That leadership requires choosing the larger body.”
“No.”
She smiled.
“You’ll learn.”
I looked toward Sofia.
Then Claire.
“No.”
My father’s mistake became clear all at once.
He had believed keeping the Bellini organization whole mattered more than whether it deserved to remain whole.
Lucia survived because he called cowardice stability.
Thomas whispered, “What happened to Rachel after the meeting?”
Marco lowered his eyes.
“I don’t know.”
Lucia laughed.
“Of course you do.”
Marco’s head snapped toward her.
She smiled coldly.
“You drove the car.”
Claire stared at him.
Marco went completely still.
Then I finally understood why he attacked me the moment Claire recognized Rachel.
May you like
Marco had not merely helped hide an old secret.
He had been there the last night Rachel Bellini was seen alive.
