Chapter 3 - THE MAN ALESSANDRO CALLED BROTHER
Matteo Romano was thirty-eight, handsome in the polished way wealthy men often were, with a charcoal suit and the relaxed posture of someone who had never been told he couldn’t enter a room.
He looked at Emma.
Then at the rabbit.
Then at the paper in my hand.
Marco stepped between us.
“You shouldn’t be here.”
Matteo smiled again.
“Neither should you. Alessandro asked everyone to remain in the great hall.”
“I was assigned to Mrs. Bennett.”
“By Alessandro?”
“Yes.”
Matteo’s expression softened.
“My brother is overreacting.”
Emma whispered to me, “That’s not his brother.”
I almost smiled despite the fear.
Matteo heard.
“Smart girl.”
He crouched.
Emma moved behind my leg.
Something in his face changed.
Not anger.
Recognition.
“Daniel’s eyes,” he murmured.
My breath stopped.
“What did you say?”
Matteo stood.
“Nothing.”
“No.”
I stepped toward him.
“You knew my husband.”
Marco’s hand moved beneath his jacket.
Matteo noticed.
“Relax.”
“Answer her.”
Matteo looked at me.
“Yes.”
The kitchen tilted.
“How?”
“He worked for several families.”
“He was an architect.”
“He was many things.”
I hated how everyone kept saying that.
“What did he do?”
Matteo glanced at the paper.
“Daniel discovered accounts he should not have.”
“The Verona accounts?”
His face went still.
Marco looked at me.
“Verona?”
I realized Matteo had not known exactly what the paper contained.
Too late.
His eyes sharpened.
“Give me that.”
“No.”
“Clara.”
I stepped backward.
“How do you know my name?”
He sighed.
“Daniel spoke about you.”
“When?”
“Years ago.”
“Before he died?”
“Yes.”
“After Emma was born?”
Matteo looked at the child.
“Yes.”
My stomach turned.
Daniel had hidden a world from me.
But this man had been inside it.
“Did you kill him?”
Marco inhaled sharply.
Matteo actually looked offended.
“No.”
“Did your sister?”
His face changed.
That was enough to terrify me.
Before he could answer, Alessandro entered.
“What is happening?”
Matteo turned.
“Nothing.”
Marco spoke immediately.
“Mrs. Bennett found something inside the rabbit.”
Alessandro crossed the room.
I handed him the paper.
He read the message.
His eyes rose slowly toward Matteo.
Neither man moved.
They had known each other almost thirty years.
I could feel the history between them.
“You call me brother,” Alessandro said.
Matteo gave a tired smile.
“So?”
“Daniel wrote not to trust you.”
“Daniel was paranoid.”
“You knew him.”
“Yes.”
“You never told me.”
“No.”
“Why?”
Matteo leaned against the counter.
“Because your father hired him without telling you.”
Alessandro’s jaw tightened.
“To do what?”
“Find leaks.”
The answer changed the room.
Marco said, “What kind of leaks?”
“Money. Names. Information.”
Matteo looked at Alessandro.
“Your father suspected someone was selling schedules to rivals. Daniel created architectural surveys as cover while mapping restricted properties.”
I remembered Daniel coming home late.
Trips he could never explain.
Phone calls he took outside.
I had thought he was working.
Technically, he had been.
Just not the way I believed.
“What happened in Verona?” Alessandro asked.
Matteo’s eyes shifted.
“Nothing.”
Alessandro folded the paper.
“Wrong answer.”
Marco closed the kitchen doors.
Emma stopped eating.
I crouched beside her.
“It’s okay.”
It wasn’t.
Matteo exhaled.
“Verona was a transfer point.”
“For what?”
“Accounts.”
“What accounts?”
“Old money your father kept outside official books.”
Alessandro’s face darkened.
“How much?”
“Enough.”
“Matteo.”
“Forty million euros.”
Even Marco looked shocked.
Alessandro stared at the paper.
“Where is it?”
“Gone.”
“Who took it?”
Matteo looked at me.
I hated that.
“Daniel.”
“No,” I said.
“He died with nothing.”
“Did he?”
“I paid for his funeral with borrowed money.”
Silence.
Matteo stared at me differently now.
Not with contempt.
With calculation.
“He never told you.”
“Told me what?”
“That he transferred the accounts into a protected trust.”
“For whom?”
Matteo looked at Emma.
I felt cold from head to toe.
“No.”
Alessandro turned toward him.
“You’re saying Daniel moved forty million into the child’s name?”
“Not exactly.”
“Then say exactly.”
Matteo hesitated.
“It was locked behind a biometric succession key.”
Marco frowned.
“What key?”
Matteo pointed toward the rabbit.
“The mark is part of it.”
I looked at the toy.
“This rabbit unlocks money?”
“No. The symbol identifies the holder.”
“Holder of what?”
“The second half.”
Before he could explain, Vivian stormed into the kitchen.
“What is going on?”
Alessandro’s eyes hardened.
“You were told to stay in the hall.”
“I am your fiancée, not a prisoner.”
Her gaze went to Matteo.
Brother and sister exchanged one quick look.
That was all.
But I saw it.
So did Alessandro.
“Vivian,” he said.
“Did you know Daniel Bennett?”
She laughed.
“Of course not.”
Emma suddenly spoke.
“Yes you did.”
Everyone turned toward her.
Vivian’s face drained.
I touched Emma’s shoulder.
“What do you mean?”
Emma pointed.
“She was in Daddy’s picture.”
My heart stopped.
“What picture?”
“At Grandma’s house.”
Vivian whispered, “Children say strange things.”
Emma shook her head.
“No.”
She hugged the rabbit.
“You had yellow hair and Daddy was mad.”
Vivian’s blonde hair was darker now.
But I remembered Daniel’s mother keeping boxes of old photographs after he died.
Most were still in storage in our small apartment.
Alessandro looked at Vivian.
“You met Daniel.”
“No.”
“Emma says you did.”
“She was a baby when he died.”
Emma frowned.
“I saw the picture.”
Exactly.
Not the meeting.
The photograph.
Alessandro stepped closer to Vivian.
“You’re going to tell me why Daniel Bennett had a photograph of you.”
Vivian’s breathing changed.
Matteo moved toward his sister.
“Alessandro—”
“No.”
That one word stopped him.
I suddenly remembered something.
One of Daniel’s old boxes.
A photograph I had almost thrown away because it meant nothing to me.
Daniel standing outside a hotel beside a blonde woman.
The woman’s face partly turned.
A black car behind them.
I had assumed she was a client.
“Mommy,” Emma whispered.
“What?”
“Mr. Bunny’s eye is loose.”
I looked down.
One of the rabbit’s black button eyes had twisted sideways.
I touched it.
It came off.
Something tiny fell from behind it.
A metal key.
Not a house key.
A miniature encrypted drive.
Matteo lunged.
Marco grabbed him.
Vivian screamed.
Alessandro caught the drive before it hit the floor.
Then every light in the villa went out.
Darkness swallowed the kitchen.
May you like
Someone fired a shot in the corridor.
And Vivian’s voice disappeared from beside us.
