Chapter 13 - The Missing Bellini Ledger
I didn't believe her.
Not because Anthony was innocent.
By then I understood my father was capable of manipulation, secrecy, and terrible choices.
But murder?
No.
Sofia pushed a document across the interview table.
"Read it."
It was a payment transfer.
One hundred fifty thousand dollars to a security contractor.
Two days before Thomas Reed's death.
Authorized through a Vale account.
My father's electronic signature.
"That proves payment."
"Keep reading."
A memo:
Contain Reed situation before B reaches E.
B.
Bellini.
E.
Elena.
My stomach turned.
"You think Dad ordered someone to kill him?"
"I thought so."
"Thought?"
Sofia looked exhausted.
"Until six weeks ago."
"What changed?"
"I discovered Victor had access to Dad's authorization system."
"Like the guardianship petition."
"Yes."
"So Victor ordered it."
"I don't know."
I slammed the paper down.
"Then why say Dad?"
"Because that's what I believed for two years."
"And you never told me."
"I was terrified of him."
Our father.
The man who taught us to ride bicycles.
Who forgot birthdays but remembered university tuition dates.
Who cried exactly once at Mother's funeral.
Families were strange.
We stored versions of people inside our minds, then suffered when reality refused to match.
"Where is Reed's investigation?"
Sofia nodded toward a list.
"Storage facility in Evanston."
Of course there was another storage unit.
"Why didn't you give it to police?"
"I tried."
"When?"
"The week after he died."
"And?"
"Victor intercepted me."
"How?"
"His people controlled half of Dad's security network."
That phrase again.
Victor's people.
Everywhere.
Invisible until we looked backward.
"What did Reed find?"
"He believed your mother's death wasn't an accident either."
The air left my lungs.
"No."
"He found similarities."
"Between his crash and hers?"
"Same transport contractor arrived first. Same insurance investigator. Same attorney handled the estate."
My mother had died eleven years earlier.
This wasn't merely about my marriage anymore.
It stretched across decades.
"Why would Victor kill Mom?"
"Because she was trying to remove him as trustee."
I thought of the letter.
The recording.
My mother's fear.
"Does Dad know?"
"Maybe."
"That's not an answer."
"It's the only one I have."
I stood.
Sofia reached across the table.
"Elena."
I pulled away.
She let her hand fall.
"There's something else Reed found."
"What?"
"Victor wasn't the only Bellini stealing from the trust."
I frowned.
"Who?"
"Marco's father."
I froze.
Lorenzo Bellini had died five years before our wedding.
Marco worshipped him.
"What did he do?"
"Diverted money with Victor."
"Does Marco know?"
"I don't think so."
"And Dad?"
"Yes."
I closed my eyes.
Each generation handed poison to the next.
No wonder everyone lived in secrecy.
Nobody wanted to be the person who admitted the family legacy was rotten.
We retrieved Reed's files that afternoon under police supervision.
Six boxes.
Photographs.
Bank records.
Copies of correspondence.
One handwritten notebook.
Near the back, Reed had written:
CAROLINE VALE CRASH: NOT RANDOM. FOLLOW V.B. + L.B. PAYMENTS. A.V. MAY KNOW.
Victor Bellini.
Lorenzo Bellini.
Anthony Vale.
Three men.
My mother dead.
Then another entry:
A.V. attempted to reverse transfer 6 months after C.V. death. Denied. V.B. threatened disclosure.
Disclosure of what?
Marco read beside me.
His face had gone pale at his father's initials.
"I'm sorry," I said.
He laughed once, bitterly.
"For what?"
"Finding out your father wasn't who you thought."
He looked at me.
"You would know."
There was no accusation.
Only shared grief.
For the first time, we weren't husband and wife betrayed by each other.
We were two children learning our parents had failed us.
Marco turned another page.
"Here."
A photocopy of the original trust ledger.
Columns of transfers.
For twenty years, money had moved from protected assets into companies controlled by Victor and Lorenzo.
Millions.
Then a notation eight years ago.
L.B. stopped withdrawals. Conflict with V.B.
Marco stared.
"My father stopped."
"Maybe."
Two months later, Lorenzo Bellini had suffered a fatal heart attack.
Natural causes.
At least officially.
I looked at Marco.
He understood.
"No."
"Maybe we shouldn't assume."
"That's what everyone said about your mother."
His voice shook.
"My father found something."
We kept reading.
Near the end of the notebook, Reed wrote:
Lorenzo attempted to contact Caroline shortly before her crash. Believed Victor planning permanent removal.
My pulse raced.
Permanent removal.
The same word on the file found in the SUV.
Termination.
Maybe Victor had used the same methods for decades.
Anyone who threatened his control disappeared.
My mother.
Marco's father possibly.
Thomas Reed.
Then me.
Except I had run too fast and hidden too well.
The twins had saved me without knowing it.
Pregnancy made me cautious.
Fear made me invisible.
I looked at Marco.
"We give everything to federal investigators."
"Agreed."
"No family handling it."
"Agreed."
"No private Bellini solution."
He understood exactly what I meant.
"Agreed."
I believed him.
That realization surprised me.
Not completely.
Not blindly.
But enough.
Trust wasn't returning as one dramatic moment.
It was growing in small places.
In agreements kept.
In questions asked instead of orders given.
In the way Marco waited outside the twins' bedroom until they invited him inside.
That evening, he read them a dinosaur book.
Badly.
Mila corrected him three times.
Leo fell asleep against his arm.
I stood in the doorway.
Marco looked up.
Neither of us spoke.
Something fragile existed between us.
Not romance.
Not yet.
Maybe not ever.
But something alive.
Then Daniel entered quietly.
"Marco."
He hated interrupting.
I could tell.
"What?"
"Federal investigators reviewed Reed's files."
"And?"
"They're issuing warrants."
"For Victor?"
"Yes."
"My father?"
Daniel hesitated.
"Anthony too."
My stomach tightened.
"On what charge?"
"Obstruction. Fraud. Conspiracy."
Not murder.
Not yet.
"Anything else?"
Daniel held up a sealed evidence bag.
"They found the original Bellini ledger."
Marco stood.
"Where?"
"Inside Reed's files."
"So?"
Daniel looked at me.
"The ownership pages don't match your mother's version."
My blood ran cold.
"What does that mean?"
"The trust wasn't intended for any Bellini-Vale children."
"But Mom said—"
"Her amended trust was never officially accepted."
Marco frowned.
"Then the twins don't control it."
Daniel nodded.
"Not according to the original filing."
That should have been good news.
It wasn't.
Because if the children had no legal claim, Victor's entire campaign made no sense.
Unless he believed another document existed.
"What's missing?" I asked.
Daniel opened the ledger.
One page had been carefully removed.
Not torn.
Cut.
"The amendment."
Marco looked at me.
My mother's amendment.
The page that could determine ownership of billions.
Someone had removed it.
And there were only three people known to have handled Reed's files before police recovered them.
Thomas Reed.
Sofia.
And my father.
Then my phone vibrated.
A message from an unknown number.
A photograph of the missing page.
Held in someone's hand.
Beneath it:
IF YOU WANT THE ORIGINAL, COME TO THE HOUSE WHERE YOUR MOTHER DIED. COME WITHOUT MARCO.
I stared at the image.
The house where my mother died.
She hadn't died at home.
She'd died on a road.
Unless the message meant somewhere else.
I looked closer at the photograph's background.
Wallpaper.
Green flowers.
I knew it.
Our old family lake house.
The place my mother spent every summer.
The place my father sold after her death.
Except apparently...
someone still owned it.
May you like
And they were waiting for me there.
---
