Chapter 3 - The Man Who Claimed to Protect Me Had Been Keeping My Family's Last Secret
For a moment, I couldn't hear anything.
Not the hum of the monitors.
Not Tomaso's footsteps.
Not even my own breathing.
The words filled the screen.
SHE WAS NEVER SUPPOSED TO SURVIVE.
I read them again.
Then once more.
The letters didn't change.
"Who wrote that?" I asked.
Cedric looked at the monitor.
"We don't know."
"You brought me here without knowing?"
"I brought you here because you recognized Vittorio."
"You knew about Matteo."
His silence answered first.
I stepped backward.
"How long?"
"Anna—"
"How long?"
"Four months."
Four months.
He had known my brother might be alive while I visited a grave with his name on it.
While I signed a contract.
While I walked into this house believing I had no family left.
I slapped him.
The sound cracked across the room.
Tomaso moved forward.
Cedric raised one hand.
The lawyer stopped.
Cedric touched his cheek.
Then he looked at me.
"You deserved an answer sooner," he said.
I had expected anger.
A threat.
Anything but that.
"Don't make this easier for yourself."
"I'm not trying to."
"Then tell me everything."
He nodded toward the photograph.
"That picture came from a private investigator. He was following Neri for a separate case. Matteo appeared beside him for eleven seconds."
"Eleven seconds?"
"The investigator lost them at a train station."
"And you couldn't find him again?"
"Not yet."
I looked at the monitors.
"Why would you care about my brother?"
Cedric's expression changed.
He turned his wheelchair away from the screens.
"Because the same people who took him put me in this chair."
My hands went cold.
"What?"
"There was an ambush last winter. Someone inside my organization sold my route. I survived. Two of my men didn't."
He glanced at the wheelchair.
"I haven't walked since."
I swallowed.
"And you think Vittorio did it?"
"I know he arranged the vehicles."
"Then arrest him."
Cedric gave a humorless smile.
"I don't make arrests, Anna."
"Then tell the police."
"We did. Someone warned him before they arrived."
Tomaso moved beside the desk.
"The investigation is still open," he said. "But we don't know who can be trusted."
I looked between them.
"And your solution was to marry me?"
Neither answered.
The room seemed to shrink.
"The debt," I said. "Was that real?"
"Yes," Tomaso replied.
"Did you arrange it?"
"No," Cedric said. "But I knew someone would use it to reach you."
"So you reached me first."
He held my gaze.
"Yes."
I wanted to hate him.
That would have been simple.
Instead, I remembered the blood on his cuff.
The cut near his temple.
The way he'd told Meera he would protect me.
I had mistaken danger for cruelty.
But danger was still danger.
"I want to leave," I said.
Cedric's face became unreadable.
"You can."
Tomaso turned sharply.
"Cedric—"
"She can leave."
I stared at him.
"Just like that?"
"I said I wouldn't promise what I couldn't deliver. I can deliver a car and a choice."
"What about the contract?"
"I'll tear it up."
I studied him.
"Why should I believe you?"
He opened a drawer.
He removed the signed pages.
Then he placed them in front of me.
"Because you can do it yourself."
I took the papers.
My signature stared back.
Analisa Vincenzi.
A name written by someone who had believed there were no options left.
I pulled the first page free.
The paper tore cleanly.
Then the second.
Then the third.
Tomaso watched without moving.
When I finished, Cedric pressed a button on his phone.
"Bring Mrs. Vincenzi's car around."
"Miss Vincenzi," I corrected.
His mouth moved slightly.
"Miss Vincenzi."
I almost smiled.
Almost.
Then a security alarm sounded.
A red light flashed above the monitors.
The screen showing Vittorio went black.
Another screen lit up.
The front gate.
A woman stood outside in the rain.
She held a cardboard box against her chest.
I knew her face.
Meera Costa.
My best friend.
She looked directly into the security camera.
Then she raised a piece of paper.
A message had been written across it in thick black marker.
ANNA, DON'T TRUST THE MAN IN THE WHEELCHAIR.
May you like
Cedric went perfectly still.
And for the first time since meeting him, I saw fear in his eyes.
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