Chapter 4 - THIRTY-SEVEN UNOPENED LETTERS
Dominic did not open the first envelope for almost an hour.
He sat behind his father’s desk with the shoebox in front of him while snow gathered against the tall windows of the Moretti estate in Westchester.
Thirty-seven letters.
Thirty-seven pieces of a life someone had stolen.
Marco stood near the fireplace.
Rosa remained by the door.
Neither spoke.
Finally Dominic picked up the oldest envelope.
The postmark was seven years old.
He broke the seal.
The handwriting was Elena’s.
**Dominic,
I don’t understand what changed. I don’t understand how you could tell me on Sunday that you loved me and send that letter on Wednesday. Maybe I was stupid. Maybe I misunderstood everything. But there is something you deserve to know. I’m pregnant.**
Dominic stopped reading.
His eyes closed.
Rosa quietly turned away.
He continued.
Elena had written that she wanted nothing from him.
Not money.
Not protection.
Only honesty.
She asked him to meet her once.
Twenty minutes.
That was all.
The second letter had been written a week later.
I went to your building again. They wouldn’t let me upstairs. I’m starting to believe you really meant what you wrote, but something still feels wrong.
The third came after someone threatened her.
The fourth contained an ultrasound photograph.
Dominic found it still inside.
A tiny gray shape.
His daughter.
Before she had a name.
Before she had yellow boots.
Before she carried a rabbit through Manhattan looking for the father she did not know existed.
Dominic pressed two fingers against his mouth.
Marco looked down.
By the tenth letter, Elena had stopped asking Dominic to contact her.
By the fifteenth, she had moved.
By the twentieth, Lily had been born.
There was a photograph.
Elena in a hospital bed.
Exhausted.
Smiling.
A newborn wrapped against her chest.
On the back she had written:
Her name is Lily Alessandra Carter. I gave her your mother’s middle name because whatever happened between us, I remember how much you loved her.
Dominic stood abruptly.
The chair struck the wall.
Rosa flinched.
“Who knew?”
His voice was quiet.
That was worse than shouting.
Rosa swallowed.
“Your father.”
“Who else?”
“I don’t know.”
“Rosa.”
“I swear.”
Dominic turned toward Marco.
“Find everyone who worked in this house seven years ago.”
“Already doing it.”
Dominic picked up the courier receipt.
Adrian’s signature sat at the bottom.
“Why would my uncle sign for private mail addressed to me?”
Marco’s expression was grim.
“We ask him.”
“No.”
Dominic looked at the letters.
“Not yet.”
He wanted Adrian comfortable.
Men revealed more when they believed nobody had noticed the knife in their hand.
Elena arrived that evening.
She had resisted coming to Westchester.
Dominic had expected that.
Then Lily learned the estate had a library with a rolling ladder.
The argument ended quickly.
“You have a ladder inside a library?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“That moves?”
“Yes.”
“Mommy, we have to go.”
Elena had looked at Dominic.
“This is temporary.”
“Of course.”
They both knew nothing about their lives was temporary anymore.
When Elena entered Alessandro’s study and saw the shoebox, she stopped breathing.
Dominic said nothing.
She approached slowly.
Her fingertips touched the first envelope.
Then the second.
Then the ultrasound picture.
“You never opened them.”
“No.”
“You really never got them.”
“No.”
Her eyes filled.
For seven years Elena had built a version of Dominic she could survive hating.
Now someone had torn it apart.
She sat down.
“I called you a coward every birthday.”
“You probably had other accurate names.”
She laughed through tears.
It was the first real laugh he had heard from her.
Dominic sat opposite her.
“I’m sorry.”
“For what?”
“For not finding you.”
“You tried.”
“Not hard enough.”
“Dominic.”
“I had resources.”
“You also had a father and uncle lying to you.”
“I should have known.”
“You were twenty years younger emotionally.”
“Seven.”
“Felt like twenty.”
He almost smiled.
Then Elena noticed the courier receipt.
She picked it up.
“Adrian?”
“Yes.”
Her expression changed.
“I remember him.”
“From before?”
“He came to Bellmont once.”
“When?”
“Three weeks ago.”
Dominic went still.
“Why?”
“Quarterly audit meeting.”
“Did he speak to you?”
“No.”
“Did he see you?”
“Yes.”
That was it.
Elena had worked at Bellmont for eight months without anyone realizing who she was.
Bellmont had only recently been acquired by Moretti Group.
Then Adrian visited.
Saw Elena.
Three weeks later she was fired.
Dominic stood.
“He recognized you.”
Elena’s face tightened.
“And realized I was looking at the accounts.”
Marco entered the room.
“Exactly.”
He placed a folder on the desk.
“We traced Westerly Consulting.”
“Owner?”
“Shell corporation. Delaware.”
“Keep going.”
“We did.”
Marco opened the folder.
“Westerly pays a company called Northline Property Services. Northline pays two trusts in the Caymans.”
“Beneficiary?”
“Still hidden.”
“Then why are you smiling?”
Marco rarely smiled when things were good.
He smiled when things became dangerous.
“Because someone got lazy.”
He produced a bank transfer.
“One Northline payment went domestic six months ago.”
Dominic read the recipient.
AM HOLDINGS.
The initials were enough.
Adrian Moretti.
Elena stared.
“Twelve million?”
“Probably more,” Marco said. “We’ve only traced eighteen months.”
Dominic looked toward the snow outside.
Adrian was not stealing because he needed money.
Adrian Moretti owned more than most people could spend in five lifetimes.
This was about something else.
Power.
Leverage.
Possibly preparation.
“If he’s siphoning money,” Elena said, “why risk drawing attention by firing me?”
“Because you recognized the pattern,” Dominic replied.
“What pattern?”
Dominic looked at Marco.
Marco answered.
“The money isn’t only disappearing.”
He opened another document.
“It’s buying shares.”
Elena leaned forward.
“Shares of what?”
“Moretti Group subsidiaries.”
Dominic felt the final piece slide into place.
Adrian was moving corporate money through shell companies.
Then using stolen funds to purchase positions through private investors.
If Dominic suffered a scandal, arrest, incapacity, or death—
Adrian could seize control.
Elena whispered, “He’s building a takeover.”
“Yes.”
“And seven years ago?”
Dominic looked toward the shoebox.
Maybe Adrian had not merely helped Alessandro remove an inconvenient girlfriend.
Maybe Elena had always been a threat.
She had been an accountant even then.
Smart.
Curious.
Unimpressed by Moretti intimidation.
She had once asked Dominic why one of the trucking companies reported fuel costs twenty percent above industry averages.
Dominic remembered laughing and telling her she should run his books.
Perhaps Adrian had remembered too.
A small voice came from the doorway.
“Are those letters from Mommy?”
Lily stood wearing pajamas Rosa had purchased that afternoon.
Elena quickly wiped her face.
“Yes.”
“Why didn’t he read them?”
Nobody answered immediately.
Lily looked at Dominic.
“Were you bad at mail?”
Marco coughed.
Dominic nodded solemnly.
“Apparently very bad.”
She walked toward him.
“Mommy says people should say sorry when they mess up.”
Dominic looked at Elena.
“I’ve been informed.”
Lily climbed onto the chair beside him.
“Did you say it?”
“Yes.”
“Did Mommy forgive you?”
Elena opened her mouth.
Lily continued.
“Because she says forgiveness takes time.”
Dominic’s eyebrow rose.
“She does?”
“All the time.”
Elena looked betrayed.
“Lily.”
“What?”
Dominic almost smiled.
Then his phone buzzed.
A message.
Unknown number.
One photograph.
It showed the gates of the Moretti estate.
Taken from outside.
Minutes earlier.
A second message followed.
Pretty family.
Dominic’s smile disappeared.
Marco saw his expression.
“What?”
Dominic turned the screen.
Elena immediately pulled Lily closer.
A third message appeared.
You should have left the past buried.
Dominic stared at the words.
Then he looked toward the security cameras outside.
“Lock the estate.”
Marco was already moving.
“All entrances?”
“Every one.”
Elena stood.
“What’s happening?”
Dominic looked at her.
For seven years he had believed keeping Elena away from his world had been someone else’s decision.
Now the person who had made that decision knew she was back.
And knew about Lily.
Dominic’s voice became cold.
“The man who stole seven years from us just made his first mistake.”
“What mistake?”
May you like
“He threatened my daughter.”
---
