Chapter 3 - Five Women, Five Rejections, and One Hidden Reason
My father answered on the seventh call.
"Sophia?"
"Who is Luca?"
Silence.
Not confusion.
Silence.
That frightened me more.
"Dad."
"Where did you hear that question?"
"Wrong answer."
Luca stood across the room.
Elena beside him.
Neither could hear my father's voice, but Luca could read my face.
"Sophia, listen to me carefully."
"No. You listen. I married a stranger because you told me our family would lose everything if I didn't. Now I'm holding a seventeen-year-old photograph of you with Marco Moretti."
"Marco isn't a Moretti."
"You know what I mean."
Another silence.
Then my father said, "You need to leave that house."
I looked at Luca.
"No."
"Tonight."
"No."
"Sophia—"
"You sent me here."
"I made a mistake."
"Then explain it."
"I can't."
"You can. You won't."
My father breathed heavily.
Finally he whispered, "Luca was never supposed to marry those women."
I stopped.
"What?"
"None of them."
Across the room, Luca's expression sharpened.
"What are you saying?"
"Marco selected them."
"Why?"
"Because Luca's father left conditions in his will."
I looked at Luca.
"What conditions?"
"Control of the family holdings transfers permanently to Luca when he marries."
The room seemed to shrink.
"And until then?"
"Marco controls a voting share through the trust."
Everything clicked into place.
The women.
The payments.
The rejection.
Marco hadn't been protecting Luca.
He'd been protecting his own power.
"Then why me?"
My father didn't answer.
"Dad."
"Because Marco couldn't buy you."
A chill ran through me.
"He tried?"
"Not directly."
"What does that mean?"
"Three months ago, I received an offer. Enough money to erase every debt I had."
"For what?"
"To refuse the marriage arrangement."
My throat tightened.
"But you didn't."
"No."
"Why?"
"Because that's when I realized what Marco had been doing."
My anger faltered.
"You knew?"
"Not at first."
"Why didn't you tell Luca?"
"Because I had no proof."
"You had enough proof to send your daughter here."
"I sent you because I believed Luca was safer than the man standing beside him."
I closed my eyes.
That was not forgiveness.
But it was an explanation.
"Why does Marco know you?"
Another long pause.
"Because seventeen years ago, Luca's father asked me to audit the Moretti companies."
"What did you find?"
"A hidden account."
Luca stepped closer.
"What account?" I asked.
My father lowered his voice.
"One containing money that never belonged to the Morettis."
"Whose was it?"
"I never discovered that."
"Then why does it matter?"
"Because somebody has been taking money from that account every year since Luca's father died."
I looked toward the window.
Marco's car was gone.
"Marco?"
"I believed so."
"Believed?"
"Until last week."
My pulse accelerated.
"What happened last week?"
"I received another statement."
"And?"
"The withdrawals continued."
"So?"
My father's next sentence changed the investigation completely.
"Marco was in a hospital during one of them."
I looked at Luca.
"Then somebody else has access."
"Yes."
"Who?"
"I don't know."
A sound came from the hallway.
Footsteps.
Elena turned.
Marco appeared in the doorway.
He looked exhausted.
"Before anyone accuses me of anything," he said, "you should know why I paid those women."
Luca's face went cold.
"I'm listening."
Marco placed a folder on the table.
"Your father ordered me to."
Luca stared at him.
"My father has been dead eleven years."
"Exactly."
Marco opened the folder.
Inside were letters.
Five names.
Five amounts.
Five instructions.
All apparently signed by Luca's father.
Luca picked one up.
His hands went still.
"I know his signature."
"So do I," Marco said.
"Why would my father sabotage my marriages?"
"He wasn't sabotaging them."
Marco looked at Sophia.
"He was testing them."
I frowned.
"What?"
"Each woman was offered money to leave. If she refused, I was instructed to tell Luca everything."
"All five accepted?"
"Every one."
Luca looked away.
The pain in his face was subtle.
But I saw it.
Five times he'd believed women had looked at him and decided he wasn't enough.
Five times money had actually made the decision.
"Why didn't you tell him?" I asked.
"Because his father's instructions prohibited it."
"That's convenient."
"I know."
Luca dropped the letter.
"And Sophia?"
Marco looked directly at me.
"There were no instructions for Sophia."
"Then who arranged our marriage?"
Marco's face became pale.
"I thought Charles Bennett did."
I was still holding my phone.
My father heard him.
"No," he said.
Everyone looked toward me.
I put the call on speaker.
My father's voice filled the room.
"I didn't arrange it."
Luca stared at the phone.
"Then who did?"
My father answered.
"I received the marriage contract already prepared."
"From whom?"
"I assumed Luca."
Luca shook his head.
"I've never seen it."
I felt suddenly sick.
Our marriage.
The debt.
The agreement.
All of it had been placed in motion by someone neither family could identify.
Then Elena whispered, "The contract."
We looked at her.
"What?"
"The original contract is downstairs."
We found it twenty minutes later.
Luca examined the signature.
Not his.
My father's signature was real.
The second signature appeared to be Luca's.
But beneath the final page was an embossed legal seal.
Elena recognized it immediately.
She whispered one name.
"Vittorio."
Luca went perfectly still.
I looked between them.
"Who's Vittorio?"
Nobody answered.
Finally Luca said, "My uncle."
"Where is he?"
Luca's eyes remained on the seal.
"Dead."
I waited.
Then Elena corrected him.
"No."
Luca slowly looked at his sister.
Elena's face had lost all color.
"Vittorio isn't dead."
And then she revealed the secret she'd been hiding for eleven years.
May you like
"I saw him three weeks ago."
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