Chapter 2 - The Pretty Lady’s Secret
“The pretty lady,” Emma said. “The one you are going to marry.”
The room became so quiet that I heard the fire settle inside the marble fireplace.
Valentina DeLuca.
The woman whose engagement ring had been chosen from a private collection in Milan.
The woman who had slept beside me the previous night.
The woman who had kissed my father’s clock with two fingers the first time she entered this study and told me she understood why I never replaced it.
For nearly two years, Valentina had moved through my life with elegance, intelligence, and the careful patience required to stand beside a man whose name made strangers nervous.
She never flinched when armed guards opened our car doors.
She never asked for details about meetings I could not discuss.
She never pretended my family’s history was cleaner than it was.
I had mistaken her calm for loyalty.
Now a black device blinked beside the opened gears of my father’s clock.
I kept my voice steady for Emma.
“When did you see her?”
The child looked down at Señor Bunny.
“Last night.”
“What time?”
“I don’t know.”
“Was it dark?”
Emma nodded.
“Mama was cleaning upstairs. I woke up because Bunny was gone.”
“Where was he?”
“Here.”
She pointed toward the sofa near the fireplace.
I remembered seeing the stuffed rabbit beneath the side table that morning. Sophia had apologized and carried him away before breakfast.
Emma continued.
“The pretty lady came in. She didn’t turn on the big light. She had a little light in her mouth.”
“A flashlight?”
Emma nodded again.
“She took the clock down. Bunny and me watched.”
“Did she see you?”
“No. I was behind the curtain.”
A four-year-old had hidden in my study while my future wife installed surveillance inside my dead father’s clock.
The thought created a kind of rage I had learned never to display too quickly.
Violent men often believed anger proved strength.
My father taught me that anger shown too soon only warned the guilty.
“What else did she do?”
“She talked to somebody.”
“On the phone?”
Emma lifted Señor Bunny to her ear.
I understood.
Valentina wore a small wireless earpiece.
“Do you remember what she said?”
Emma’s forehead wrinkled.
“She said, ‘He still trusts the old man.’”
My pulse slowed.
The old man could have meant the clock.
It could have meant Enzo.
It could have meant my father.
“She said another thing,” Emma added.
“What?”
“The little girl saw too much.”
For the first time, my control nearly failed.
I touched Emma’s shoulder gently.
“Did she say that last night?”
Emma nodded.
“Was she talking about you?”
“I think.”
“Did she come near you?”
“No. She went away.”
“Did anyone follow her?”
“A man with shiny shoes.”
Half the men in my world wore polished shoes.
I needed more.
“Was he tall?”
Emma shrugged.
“Did he have hair?”
She thought carefully.
“Only on the sides.”
Enzo was seventy-two and nearly bald.
So was Judge Massimo Caruso, one of my father’s oldest political allies.
So were three board members.
Emma suddenly reached toward my wrist.
Her small fingers closed around my cuff.
“Sir?”
“Yes?”
“The lady saw Bunny.”
“When?”
“Before she went away.”
My eyes moved toward the stuffed rabbit.
Its loose ear hung to one side.
There was a faint dark mark near the stitching.
Not dirt.
Oil.
The same old clock oil on my fingers.
Valentina had touched the rabbit after working inside the gears.
“Did she take him?”
“She picked him up. Then she put him back.”
“Did she say anything?”
Emma hugged him tighter.
“She said, ‘Not this time.’”
I stood slowly.
The device inside the clock was not the only thing Valentina had been searching for.
I opened the study door.
Sophia waited in the hallway with Marco, Enzo, and two security men.
The moment she saw Emma unharmed, she crossed the distance and pulled her daughter close.
“Did she upset you?” Sophia asked.
“No, Mama.”
Sophia kissed Emma’s forehead.
I looked toward Marco.
“Seal the estate.”
His eyes sharpened.
“No one enters or leaves?”
“No one.”
“Valentina is expected for dinner.”
“I know.”
Enzo’s gaze moved toward the clock.
“What did you find?”
I held up the listening device.
Marco swore softly.
Enzo did not react.
That disturbed me.
A man who spent fifty years beside the Moretti family should have shown surprise after learning my private study had been compromised.
Unless surprise had already happened somewhere else.
“Have the entire house swept,” I ordered. “Use an outside technical team. Not ours.”
Marco nodded and left.
I turned toward Sophia.
“You and Emma will stay in the east guest suite.”
“We can return to our apartment.”
“No.”
Her face tightened.
“Signor Moretti, I appreciate your concern, but I will not have my daughter treated like a prisoner.”
“You are not prisoners. Emma saw something dangerous.”
“Which is exactly why I should take her away.”
“If Valentina knows Emma saw her, leaving the estate could expose you.”
Sophia looked toward the front windows.
Rain blurred the drive.
She understood.
That did not mean she trusted me.
“Then I stay with her,” she said.
“Of course.”
“And no armed men inside the room.”
“One outside the hall.”
“Two doors away.”
I almost objected.
Then I remembered Grace—no, that was another man's story. This was Sophia, standing before me with the calm resistance of a mother who would not allow fear to become someone else’s authority.
“Agreed.”
Emma leaned toward her mother.
“Mama, the pretty lady is bad?”
Sophia looked at me before answering.
“We do not know yet.”
That was more generosity than Valentina deserved.
At four that afternoon, the outside technical team found seven additional devices.
One beneath my desk.
One behind a painting in the dining room.
Two inside guest bedrooms used by visiting allies.
One beneath the conference table in the underground operations room.
One inside Marco’s office.
And one hidden within the east guest-suite wall, directly beside the room where Sophia and Emma were supposed to sleep.
That device was newer than the others.
Installed less than twenty-four hours earlier.
Valentina had not been listening only to me.
She had prepared to listen to the child who saw her.
I moved Sophia and Emma to a secure room known only to Enzo, Marco, and me.
Then I removed Enzo and Marco from the list of people who knew.
Not because I had proof against either man.
Because the clock had taught me proof mattered more than comfort.
At six thirty, Valentina’s car entered the estate.
She arrived carrying a bottle of wine and wearing a cream-colored coat.
Her dark hair was pinned at the nape of her neck. Diamonds flashed at her ears.
She kissed my cheek in the front hall.
“You look tired.”
“I’ve had a difficult day.”
“Business?”
“Family.”
Something passed through her eyes.
Then she smiled.
“Should I be worried?”
“Should you?”
Her smile remained, but it required effort.
We ate in the smaller dining room.
No guards were visible.
No staff entered except Marco, who poured wine and left without looking at Valentina.
She discussed flowers for the wedding, a charity dinner, and whether my aunt’s table should be placed near the musicians.
I answered when necessary.
At dessert, she reached across the table.
“You have barely looked at me.”
I placed the black listening device beside her hand.
The blood left her face.
She did not ask what it was.
That told me enough.
“Where did you find it?” she whispered.
“Inside my father’s clock.”
Valentina looked toward the closed doors.
“Who else knows?”
“A child.”
Her hand trembled.
“Emma.”
It was not a question.
“You know her name.”
“She lives here.”
“You installed a device beside the room where she was supposed to sleep.”
“I did not install that one.”
“Then you admit installing the clock.”
Valentina closed her eyes.
“Yes.”
The answer hurt more because she did not deny it.
“Who were you listening for?”
“You.”
“Who received the recordings?”
She looked toward me.
“If I tell you, people will die.”
“People may already die.”
“You don’t understand.”
“I understand that the woman I planned to marry entered my study in darkness and planted surveillance inside the last object my father touched.”
Her eyes filled.
“I never wanted to hurt that clock.”
“That is the part you regret?”
“No.”
She reached for my hand.
I moved it away.
Valentina’s face collapsed for one second before control returned.
“Alessandro, listen to me. You cannot trust the people closest to you.”
“I trusted you.”
“I know.”
“Was that the plan?”
She shook her head.
“The plan was supposed to end before we became real.”
“What plan?”
Her phone vibrated on the table.
One message appeared.
UNKNOWN: HE FOUND IT. ASK WHETHER THE GIRL SPOKE.
I read it before she turned the screen over.
“Answer.”
“I can’t.”
“Answer.”
Valentina unlocked the phone with shaking fingers.
She typed:
He found the device. The child said nothing useful.
The response came immediately.
Then bring her rabbit tomorrow. The key is inside.
My eyes moved toward Valentina.
“What key?”
“I don’t know.”
“You expect me to believe that?”
“I knew they wanted the clock. I did not know about the rabbit.”
“Who are they?”
Valentina’s eyes moved toward the dark window.
Lightning flashed over the river.
Then every light in the house went out.
The emergency system should have activated within three seconds.
It did not.
From somewhere beneath us came the sound of a security door unlocking.
Valentina stood so fast that her chair fell backward.
“They’re here.”
“Who?”
She looked at me with tears in her eyes.
“The man your father trusted before he died.”
My phone rang.
Enzo’s name appeared.
When I answered, I heard only breathing.
Then an unfamiliar voice spoke.
“Bring the child’s rabbit to Hawthorne Pier, Alessandro.”
May you like
A gunshot sounded through the line.
The call ended.
