Chapter 7 - The Man Who Knew Too Much
Dead men were difficult to question.
Men who only pretended to be dead were considerably more interesting.
Within six hours Matteo confirmed that Thomas Bellini’s death certificate had been issued in Monaco after an alleged sailing accident.
No body had been recovered.
A memorial had been held privately.
Vittorio attended.
Alessandro had sent flowers.
Now Bellini appeared on a Manhattan security camera looking very much alive.
“Find him,” Alessandro said.
Matteo nodded.
“Quietly?”
Alessandro thought of Camille’s warning.
“Legally.”
Matteo raised an eyebrow.
“That word sounds strange in your office.”
“Get used to it.”
Thomas Bellini was found forty-eight hours later in a furnished apartment on the Upper West Side rented through a shell company.
Alessandro did not send men through the door.
Instead his attorneys obtained enough financial evidence to convince Bellini that remaining hidden was no longer possible.
He agreed to meet.
The meeting took place in a private conference room at Vitali Maritime.
Camille insisted on attending.
Alessandro objected.
She won.
Bellini entered wearing a gray suit and carrying no briefcase.
Age had changed him.
Fear had changed him more.
He looked at Alessandro first.
Then Camille.
“I wondered how long it would take.”
Alessandro remained standing.
“You were at the gallery.”
“Yes.”
“You left the note.”
“Yes.”
Camille spoke.
“You came to my apartment six years ago.”
Bellini lowered his eyes.
“Yes.”
“You threatened my unborn child.”
“I tried to persuade you to leave.”
“You told me she could lose both parents.”
“I was trying to keep you alive.”
Camille stared at him.
“That is not what it sounded like.”
“I know.”
Alessandro leaned against the table.
“Start talking.”
Bellini took a breath.
“Your father discovered Camille was pregnant approximately two weeks after the attack.”
“How?”
“Her medical file.”
Camille’s face hardened.
“You accessed my medical records?”
“Giancarlo did.”
“Why?”
“He had people watching you.”
Alessandro felt shame despite not having ordered it.
“What did my father want?”
Bellini looked at him.
“To protect the bloodline.”
Alessandro almost laughed at the bitter irony.
“By separating me from my child?”
“At first, no.”
Bellini sat.
“Giancarlo believed you were going to die.”
The room became silent.
“He wanted Camille moved somewhere secure. He instructed me to arrange money and protection.”
Camille shook her head.
“That isn’t what happened.”
“Because Vittorio found out.”
Alessandro’s eyes narrowed.
Bellini continued.
“Your father and Vittorio had been fighting privately for years. Control of the trust was part of it.”
“We know about the trust.”
“Then you know why Sophie mattered.”
“Continue.”
“When Giancarlo learned Camille was pregnant, he changed his plan. If you died, he wanted your child recognized legally as heir.”
Alessandro stared at him.
“And Vittorio?”
“Would lose everything he expected to inherit.”
Camille whispered, “So he tried to erase Sophie.”
“Not physically.”
Bellini’s answer came quickly.
“Never physically. Vittorio understood that harming a child would turn Giancarlo against him permanently.”
“How comforting,” Camille said coldly.
Bellini accepted the contempt.
“He developed another solution. He convinced Giancarlo that Camille was in danger as long as her connection to the Vitalis remained visible.”
Alessandro understood.
“So my father agreed to send her away.”
“Yes.”
“And the forged letter?”
Bellini hesitated.
“That was Vittorio.”
“The necklace?”
“Vittorio.”
“The calls?”
“Blocked.”
“The letters?”
“Intercepted.”
Alessandro’s voice became quieter with each answer.
“And what did my father believe?”
“That Camille had voluntarily accepted protection in France.”
Camille stood.
“I accepted nothing.”
“I know.”
“Did Giancarlo know Vittorio told me Alessandro rejected Sophie?”
“No.”
“How can you be certain?”
“Because when he discovered the truth three years later, he nearly killed Vittorio.”
Alessandro froze.
“What?”
Bellini looked toward him.
“Your father found one of Camille’s letters.”
“When?”
“About a year before he died.”
Alessandro felt anger rise.
“And he never told me?”
“He intended to.”
“Intended?”
Bellini swallowed.
“He needed evidence first.”
“My father needed evidence before telling me I had a daughter?”
“He feared what you would do.”
“What did he think I would do?”
“Start a war inside your own family.”
Alessandro said nothing.
Because six years ago, that was probably exactly what he would have done.
Camille watched him.
Bellini continued.
“Giancarlo ordered Paolo Ricci to reconstruct everything that happened during your coma. The hospital records. The attack. Vittorio’s finances.”
“The storage unit.”
“Yes.”
“Paolo worked for Vittorio.”
“Officially.”
Alessandro understood.
“He was actually working for my father.”
“By then, yes.”
“What did they find?”
Bellini looked suddenly older.
“That Mott Street had never been an enemy attack.”
The room changed.
Even Camille seemed to stop breathing.
Alessandro stepped closer.
“Explain.”
“The men who attacked your convoy had inside information.”
“We knew that.”
“You suspected a leak.”
“Yes.”
“It wasn’t a leak.”
Bellini’s voice fell.
“The meeting itself had been created to put you there.”
“By whom?”
Bellini did not answer.
Alessandro already knew.
“Vittorio.”
Bellini nodded.
Camille covered her mouth.
Alessandro felt strangely calm.
That was how the worst anger always arrived.
Cold.
“Why?”
“Because your father planned to announce that you would take complete control of the family businesses.”
“I already ran them.”
“Not the trusts.”
Alessandro remembered.
At thirty-three, he had controlled operations but Giancarlo still held final authority over several major structures.
“He wanted me removed.”
“For long enough to make the board believe you were incapable of leadership.”
“Not dead?”
“No.”
“Then the attack went wrong.”
“Yes.”
Alessandro turned toward the windows.
New York spread beneath them.
His city.
His inheritance.
His prison.
Six years of his life had been shaped by his uncle’s ambition.
But Bellini was not finished.
“There’s something else.”
Alessandro turned.
“Of course there is.”
“The anonymous note at the gallery was not a threat.”
Camille stared at him.
“It said to stop digging.”
“Yes.”
“Then what was it?”
“A warning.”
“From what?”
Bellini looked at Alessandro.
“Vittorio knows you’ve discovered Sophie.”
“We assumed that.”
“No.”
Bellini shook his head.
“You don’t understand. Vittorio has spent six years believing the one thing that kept him safe was that you didn’t know why Mott Street happened.”
Alessandro’s eyes narrowed.
“Now he thinks Paolo’s archive survived.”
“It did.”
“If he believes you have it, he won’t focus on Sophie.”
“Why?”
“Because Sophie is no longer the threat to him.”
Bellini leaned forward.
“You are.”
Camille’s voice was quiet.
“What happens now?”
Bellini looked at her.
“Vittorio will try to destroy Alessandro without touching him.”
“How?”
“His businesses. Reputation. Board. Everything legitimate he built.”
Alessandro almost smiled.
“You think I care about losing companies?”
“No.”
Bellini’s next words erased the expression.
“But you’ll care when he tells the world what Alessandro Vitali really is.”
Camille glanced at Alessandro.
Bellini continued.
“He has records. Payments. old operations. Men who will testify if he protects them.”
Alessandro understood the strategy.
Vittorio could not defeat him privately anymore.
So he would turn Alessandro’s entire past into a weapon.
And now Alessandro faced a choice he had avoided his entire adult life.
Protect the empire his father gave him.
Or protect the little girl who had accidentally sat beside him on an airplane.
He already knew which one he would choose.
But before he could say it, Sophie ran into the conference room carrying her red sketchbook.
“Mom, look what I found.”
Camille turned.
“What?”
Sophie opened the book to an old drawing.
It showed Camille standing outside their Paris apartment.
Across the street was a gray figure beside a black car.
Sophie pointed.
“That’s the man from the gallery.”
Thomas Bellini went pale.
“No,” he whispered.
Alessandro looked at him.
“What?”
Bellini stared at the drawing.
“That isn’t me.”
And suddenly everyone in the room understood.
The man who had watched Camille in Paris for years only looked like Thomas Bellini.
Someone else had been wearing his face from a distance.
Someone Sophie had seen many times.
Someone still out there.
May you like
And Sophie’s innocent little sketchbook might contain the only record of him.
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