Chapter 9
Bianca denied it at first.
Then Alessandro sent her a photograph.
An archived charity image from the St. Gabriel fundraiser.
Alessandro stood near the stage.
Damien was several feet behind him.
And near the edge of the frame was Bianca.
The photograph was dated almost five years before she claimed they first met.
Bianca called within sixty seconds.
“Where did you get that?”
“Why were you there?”
She breathed into the phone.
“Damien invited me.”
“You told me you met him after he started working with me.”
“I lied.”
“Why?”
No answer.
Alessandro’s voice lowered.
“Why?”
“Because Damien told me never to mention our father.”
Alessandro closed his eyes.
Victor Moretti.
The old feud.
The business collapse.
A man who had cursed the Rizzano name until the day he died.
“What did your father tell you about me?”
“That you destroyed him.”
“That isn’t what happened.”
“That’s what we were raised believing.”
“We?”
Bianca began crying quietly.
Alessandro felt no satisfaction.
“Did you approach me because Damien told you to?”
“I didn’t date you until years later.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
Silence.
Alessandro understood before she answered.
“Yes.”
One word.
Everything changed.
Bianca rushed on.
“At first.”
Alessandro said nothing.
“I only wanted to meet you. Damien said we needed to understand who you were.”
“You were studying me.”
“It wasn’t like that.”
“Then what was it?”
“I don’t know.”
“You knew exactly where I would be.”
“Yes.”
“You knew I was married.”
“Yes.”
“You knew Elena was suspicious of Damien.”
Bianca stopped.
Alessandro felt his pulse slow.
“How?”
Bianca whispered, “Damien told me.”
Alessandro stared through the office windows.
The city lights blurred against the glass.
“Before Elena died?”
“Yes.”
The answer changed the room around him.
“What did Damien tell you Elena knew?”
“That she was asking questions about payments.”
“Anything else?”
“No.”
“Did you know about her car?”
Bianca said nothing.
Alessandro stood.
“Bianca.”
“I knew Damien had taken it to the garage.”
The words barely came through the phone.
“When?”
“A few days before the accident.”
“Why didn’t you tell anyone?”
“Because I didn’t think it mattered.”
“You didn’t think it mattered after she died?”
Bianca started crying harder.
“Damien said the accident had nothing to do with him.”
Alessandro disconnected.
Not because he believed she was finished.
Because he no longer trusted himself to listen.
Across the room, Elena’s letter lay open.
For four years Alessandro had believed Damien entered his life as an ally.
May you like
Now he knew Damien’s sister had been watching him before his wife died.
And somewhere in Indiana, Damien had been paying for a storage unit ever since.
