Chapter 4 - BLOOD DEBTS
Bianca Moretti lived in a penthouse overlooking Central Park, surrounded by white orchids, antique mirrors, and paintings that had no business hanging in a place funded by shipping money and old violence.
By the time Alessandro arrived, she was waiting.
She wore a silk robe the color of wine and held a glass of champagne. Her hair was perfect. Her makeup was soft. She looked like a woman expecting a dinner guest.
Not a man who had come to ask whether she had tried to murder his fiancée.
“You should have called,” Bianca said. “I would have dressed.”
Alessandro entered without answering.
Marco and two guards remained near the door.
Bianca noticed the absence of flowers, gifts, or affection.
Her smile faded.
“Where is Lucia?”
“Alive.”
For the first time, something flickered in Bianca’s face.
Not grief.
Not relief.
Disappointment.
Alessandro saw it.
So did I, later, when I watched the footage.
“She was supposed to eat the cake,” Bianca said carefully.
“She did.”
Bianca’s fingers tightened around the champagne glass.
“Then your men failed.”
“My men did exactly what I told them to do.”
The silence lengthened.
Bianca’s eyes hardened.
“You switched the plates.”
“Yes.”
“And she still ate the poisoned one.”
“Yes.”
Bianca looked at him for a long moment.
Then she laughed.
It was not a happy sound.
“You always were sentimental when it came to women.”
Alessandro stepped closer.
“Did you pay the sous-chef?”
“Do you honestly think I would answer that?”
“You will.”
Bianca set her glass down.
“And if I don’t?”
Alessandro’s face did not change.
“Then I will stop protecting you from the consequences of your husband’s debts.”
That hit her.
Bianca’s late husband, Lorenzo, had been Alessandro’s older brother. His death, officially a boating accident, had left behind private financial disasters. Loans. Gambling debts. Men who believed Bianca had access to money she did not have.
For years, Alessandro had handled them quietly.
He had protected her because she was family.
But family was a word with limits.
“You owe me,” Bianca said.
“I owe Lorenzo,” Alessandro replied. “Not you.”
“You took everything after he died.”
“I kept you alive.”
“You took the business.”
“Because Lorenzo had destroyed it.”
Her eyes filled with tears, but they were angry tears.
“You were always the favorite,” she whispered. “The clever one. The calm one. The one everyone trusted.”
Alessandro’s voice remained low.
“I never wanted Lorenzo dead.”
“But you benefited.”
“And that gives you the right to kill Lucia?”
Bianca looked away.
There it was.
Not an admission.
But close enough.
Marco stepped forward. “We have footage placing you at Il Cielo. We have Emma’s statement. We have proof you contacted the restaurant manager three days before the dinner.”
Bianca’s face went pale.
“You have nothing that proves I poisoned anyone.”
“No,” Marco said. “But we have enough to start.”
Bianca suddenly reached into the pocket of her robe.
Every guard moved.
Alessandro raised one hand.
She pulled out a phone.
“You think I did this alone?” she asked.
Then she pressed play.
A recording began.
A man’s voice.
Older.
Rough.
“You do what you need to do, Bianca. Alessandro has become weak. The girl is the weakness. Remove her, and he becomes useful again.”
Alessandro went still.
I recognized the voice only after Marco whispered the name.
Vittorio De Luca.
Alessandro’s uncle.
The man who had raised him after his father died.
The man Alessandro trusted more than anyone outside his own inner circle.
Bianca smiled bitterly.
“You see?” she said. “I was never the mastermind. I was the hand he used.”
Alessandro stared at her.
“Where is he?”
Bianca’s smile disappeared.
“He knew you would ask.”
Her phone buzzed.
Marco took it, checked the screen, and looked at Alessandro.
“A message from De Luca.”
Alessandro held out his hand.
The message contained only one sentence.
The girl was never the target. The woman was only the first warning.
A second message arrived seconds later.
It was a photograph.
Emma.
Standing in front of a school bus.
Taken that morning.
Alessandro’s face changed.
For the first time in years, the man everyone called untouchable looked afraid.
May you like
And he was not afraid for himself.
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