Chapter 3 - THE LETTER THAT NEVER REACHED HIM
Luca arrived at Moretti Global at six fourteen the next morning.
By six seventeen, three executives had been pulled out of meetings.
By six twenty, the director of corporate security was standing inside Luca’s office.
“Pull every visitor record from seven years ago,” Luca ordered.
The security director blinked.
“That archive may—”
“Every record involving Nia Carter.”
The man stopped speaking.
Luca’s chief legal officer, Daniel Pierce, looked uneasy.
“What is this about?”
“My children.”
Silence.
Luca looked at every person in the room.
“I have six-year-old twins.”
Nobody moved.
“I learned that yesterday.”
Daniel slowly sat down.
Luca continued.
“Their mother claims she tried repeatedly to contact me after our divorce and that those attempts were intercepted.”
“By whom?”
“My mother.”
That produced another silence.
Everyone in Chicago knew Teresa Moretti had helped build the family empire after Luca’s father died.
They also knew crossing her was career suicide.
Luca leaned over his desk.
“If a single person in this building warns her about this investigation, clean out your office before lunch.”
For nine hours, Moretti Global became a crime scene disguised as a corporation.
Old server backups were restored.
Security logs were pulled from long-term storage.
Archived phone records were recovered.
At four thirty, Luca found the first piece.
Fourteen calls.
All from my old number.
All made during the six weeks after our divorce.
Twelve had reached his executive office.
Nine had been marked:
DO NOT FORWARD — FAMILY LEGAL MATTER.
Authorization initials: M.P.
Malcolm Price.
Teresa’s longtime attorney.
Luca stared at the screen until Daniel finally said, “There’s more.”
Two visitor entries.
My name.
Both times I had reached the lobby.
Both times security had rejected access under a standing instruction from Price.
Luca’s hands curled into fists.
“And the mail?”
Daniel hesitated.
“We’re still searching.”
“Search faster.”
Then Luca’s phone rang.
Evelyn.
He almost ignored it.
He and Evelyn had spoken only briefly after the restaurant.
She had slept in a guest suite.
For three years, their marriage had existed beautifully in photographs and awkwardly everywhere else.
Their relationship had never been passionate.
They respected each other.
They attended functions.
They shared homes.
They rarely shared truths.
Luca answered.
“Yes?”
“I need you to come home.”
“I’m busy.”
“I know about the letter.”
He became completely still.
“What letter?”
“The one Teresa gave Nia.”
Luca grabbed his coat.
Thirty minutes later, he entered the Gold Coast mansion he shared with Evelyn.
She was waiting in the library.
A cardboard box sat on the table.
“What is that?”
“Things your mother gave me before our wedding.”
Luca stared.
Evelyn folded her arms.
“She wanted me prepared to be a Moretti.”
“For what?”
“To understand what happened with you and Nia.”
His chest tightened.
“What did she tell you?”
“That Nia had become unstable because she couldn’t conceive. That she blamed you. That the marriage had deteriorated and you finally ended it.”
Luca looked away.
“That’s mostly what I believed.”
“Yes.”
Something in her tone made him look back.
Evelyn opened the box.
Inside were photographs, old magazine clippings, guest lists, correspondence.
Then she removed a folder.
“I remembered this last night.”
Luca took it.
Inside was a photocopy of the letter I had shown him.
His eyes found the forged initials.
L.M.
“I never wrote that.”
“I know.”
“How?”
“Because Teresa told me she had.”
The room seemed to tilt.
Luca’s voice dropped.
“What?”
“Not directly. Two years ago, we were drinking wine after a fundraiser. She was complaining that you never fully let Nia go.”
“I was married to you.”
“Yes, Luca.”
There was sadness in Evelyn’s expression.
“You were.”
He said nothing.
“She said sometimes a woman has to protect her son from his weaknesses. I asked what she meant. She said Nia had tried to manipulate you after the divorce and that she had ‘handled it.’ Then she laughed and said you would have gone running back if you’d known.”
Luca gripped the folder.
“And you never told me?”
“I thought she meant Nia wanted reconciliation.”
“You never asked?”
Evelyn’s eyes flashed.
“Don’t make me the villain because you’re afraid to look at yourself.”
The words stopped him.
“You married me while you were still grieving her. I knew it. You knew it. We built a marriage around pretending that respect was enough.”
He sat heavily.
“I’m sorry.”
“So am I.”
Evelyn sat opposite him.
“Are the children yours?”
“I don’t need a test to know.”
“But you’re having one.”
“Yes.”
She nodded.
“Good.”
Luca looked at her.
“You’re remarkably calm.”
“I cried last night.”
That surprised him.
“Why?”
“Because two six-year-old children met their father in a restaurant, and their first emotion was confusion.”
She swallowed.
“And because I realized your mother helped build our marriage out of another woman’s heartbreak.”
For the first time, Luca saw Evelyn not as his perfect wife but as another person Teresa had arranged into the correct position.
“I’m going to confront her.”
“Not yet.”
He frowned.
Evelyn pushed another paper toward him.
It was an invoice.
A medical consulting company.
Six years earlier.
Forty thousand dollars.
Paid by the Moretti Family Foundation.
Recipient: Dr. Leonard Vale.
Luca knew the name instantly.
The fertility specialist who had treated us.
“What is this?”
“I found it in the foundation records this morning.”
His blood turned cold.
The payments began three months before our divorce.
There were four of them.
Consulting services.
No description.
No deliverables.
Luca stood.
“I need to see Nia.”
I opened my apartment door that evening and found him standing there alone.
No driver.
No security.
No expensive overcoat despite the February cold.
Just Luca.
“What are you doing here?”
“I found your calls.”
I froze.
“All fourteen.”
I said nothing.
“And the building records.”
My throat tightened.
“They told you I never came?”
“Yes.”
“They lied.”
“Yes.”
He handed me a folder.
“Do you recognize this doctor?”
I saw the name.
Dr. Vale.
Every muscle in my body tightened.
“He told us my hormone levels were inconsistent.”
Luca nodded.
“He also received forty thousand dollars from my family foundation.”
My face went numb.
“When?”
“While we were his patients.”
I had spent years believing my body had failed.
Even after becoming pregnant, part of me had wondered whether I had been some statistical miracle.
I grabbed the doorframe.
“Nia?”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re not.”
“I said I’m fine.”
He backed away.
The old Luca would have moved closer anyway.
This one seemed to understand he no longer had that right.
“I’m investigating.”
“Good.”
“I want you to know what I find.”
“Why?”
“Because it happened to you too.”
I looked at him.
That answer mattered more than he probably knew.
Ava appeared behind me.
“Mom?”
Then she saw Luca.
“Oh.”
Noah appeared next.
For a strange second, all four of us simply stood there.
Luca’s expression softened.
“Hi.”
Ava looked at him seriously.
“Are you actually our dad?”
“Yes.”
“You had a test already?”
I almost smiled.
Luca blinked.
“No.”
“Then technically Mom says we should wait for evidence.”
Luca looked at me.
Despite everything, a laugh escaped him.
Ava frowned.
“It’s not funny.”
“No,” he said quickly. “You’re absolutely right.”
Noah studied him.
“Do you know basketball?”
“A little.”
“Mom says rich people say ‘a little’ when they mean they paid somebody to teach them.”
I closed my eyes.
Luca laughed again.
A real laugh this time.
I had not heard it in seven years.
It hurt.
And warmed something I wished would remain cold.
Luca looked at me.
“Can I take the test tomorrow?”
“Yes.”
“And afterward…”
He looked toward the twins.
“Could I see them again?”
I hesitated.
“Supervised.”
“Of course.”
“No surprises.”
“Agreed.”
“No photographers. No Moretti employees. No gifts worth more than fifty dollars.”
His eyebrow lifted.
“Fifty?”
“Don’t test me.”
“Fifty.”
Behind me, Ava whispered to Noah, “He listens to Mom.”
Noah whispered back, “Everybody listens to Mom.”
Luca looked down to hide a smile.
For one fragile moment, everything almost felt normal.
Then his phone rang.
His mother.
Luca looked at the screen.
I watched his face harden.
He rejected the call.
A second later, a message appeared.
He read it.
“What?”
I asked.
His eyes lifted.
“She knows.”
“Knows what?”
“About the restaurant.”
Fear moved through me.
Luca turned the screen.
Teresa had written only one sentence.
Before you destroy this family for that woman again, remember who protected you the first time.
I stared at the message.
Then I looked at Luca.
“She isn’t afraid of being caught.”
“No.”
He slid the phone into his pocket.
May you like
“She thinks she did the right thing.”
And that, I realized, was far more dangerous.
