Chapter 3 - THE LITTLE GIRL MATTEO NEVER GOT TO HOLD
“What did you tell my brother?”
Gabriel's question struck Isabella before Rosa could say another word.
Isabella took a step backward.
“Gabriel, please. Not in front of everyone.”
“Then you should have thought of that before humiliating his daughter.”
“You don't know she's his daughter.”
Rosa flinched.
Gabriel noticed.
“Careful, Isabella.”
“I'm trying to protect you. A woman who works for you suddenly claims her child belongs to your dead brother. Surely you understand how convenient that is.”
Rosa's expression changed.
The fear remained.
But something stronger moved beneath it.
“I haven't asked this family for one dollar.”
“Not yet,” Isabella replied.
Gabriel raised his hand.
“Enough.”
Lily had begun rubbing her eyes.
She didn't understand the argument.
She only knew that adults were speaking loudly again.
Rosa kissed her forehead.
“It's okay, baby.”
“Home?”
“Soon.”
Gabriel stepped aside.
“Mrs. Keene, please take Rosa and Lily into the morning room. Bring the child some breakfast.”
Rosa hesitated.
“I don't want anyone taking Lily away from me.”
“Nobody is taking her anywhere,” Gabriel said. “You stay together.”
He looked at Isabella.
“And you stay here.”
Isabella's jaw tightened.
The morning room overlooked the eastern gardens.
Its windows reached almost to the ceiling, and a small fireplace warmed the furniture even when the rest of the mansion felt cold.
Gabriel hadn't entered it regularly since Matteo died.
His brother had always claimed the room because sunlight reached it first.
Rosa sat on the edge of a green velvet sofa.
Lily curled beside her, eating toast from a small white plate.
Gabriel remained standing.
“I need to understand.”
Rosa nodded.
“Matteo and I met during my first month here. I was twenty-six. He was thirty-four.”
Gabriel looked toward the window.
Matteo had been thirty-four when he died.
“He started coming into the kitchen because he knew I worked late,” Rosa continued. “Sometimes we'd talk for ten minutes. Sometimes two hours.”
“Why didn't he tell me?”
“He wanted to.”
Gabriel turned.
“Then why didn't he?”
“Because he was fighting with you about Hudson Landing.”
The familiar ache returned.
During Matteo's final months, the brothers had barely spoken.
Gabriel wanted to complete a redevelopment agreement with Romano Construction.
Matteo insisted the old riverfront property wasn't safe.
Then company money disappeared.
Three days later, Matteo was dead.
Gabriel had spent almost four years believing his brother had stolen from him.
“He thought you'd accuse me of trying to influence him,” Rosa said.
Gabriel opened his mouth.
Then closed it.
At that time, he probably would have.
He had trusted financial statements more than the people standing in front of him.
Rosa removed a small photograph from her wallet.
Its corners were soft from handling.
Matteo stood beneath a tree beside the Hudson, smiling with one arm around Rosa.
His hair was windblown.
His shirtsleeves were rolled.
For once, he looked completely free of the Moretti name.
Gabriel sat down.
He couldn't remember the last time he'd seen his brother smile like that.
“Where was this taken?”
“Beacon. Two weeks before the accident.”
He touched the photograph with one finger.
Matteo's left hand rested against Rosa's stomach.
Gabriel looked up.
“He knew?”
“I told him that morning.”
Rosa swallowed.
“He cried. Then he laughed. Then he went to buy a pair of baby shoes even though we didn't know whether we were having a boy or girl.”
Gabriel closed his eyes.
Matteo had wanted children since he was twenty.
He used to say the Moretti house was too quiet.
“What happened to the shoes?”
“I still have them.”
“Did he leave anything else?”
“A letter. And a little notebook where he wrote down names.”
Rosa looked at Lily.
“He liked Lily because your mother used to grow them near the kitchen window.”
Gabriel remembered those white lilies.
His mother's favorite flowers.
He had ordered the flowerbeds removed after her death because seeing them hurt too much.
Now a child named Lily sat eating toast in the room Matteo had loved.
Gabriel's voice grew rough.
“Why didn't you come to me?”
Rosa stared at him.
“I tried.”
The answer surprised him.
“When?”
“Six weeks after the accident. I was almost three months pregnant.”
“What happened?”
“I wrote you a letter. Mrs. Keene helped me address it.”
Gabriel glanced toward the doorway.
The housekeeper stood nearby, her hands clasped tightly.
“I remember,” she said.
Rosa continued.
“I waited two weeks. Then someone from the office told me the family wanted no more contact with anyone connected to Matteo.”
Gabriel frowned.
“I never gave that instruction.”
Rosa shook her head.
“There's more.”
She pulled a folded sheet from the inside pocket of her apron.
The paper had been opened and closed so often that one corner was almost transparent.
Gabriel recognized the Moretti letterhead.
His personal signature appeared at the bottom.
The letter ordered Rosa Delgado to leave the estate immediately and warned that any attempt to make claims against the family would be treated as harassment.
Gabriel read it twice.
“I never wrote this.”
“That's what I hoped.”
He examined the signature.
It looked genuine.
The letter had been printed on his office stationery.
The date was November 18, eleven days after Matteo's death.
Gabriel remembered November 18.
He had barely slept.
He had spent that entire week signing insurance forms, estate papers, payroll authorizations, and settlement agreements.
A terrible possibility opened inside him.
“Who gave you this?”
“A woman from the estate office. I never got her name.”
Mrs. Keene cleared her throat.
“I persuaded the personnel department to transfer Rosa to the cleaning staff instead of removing her completely. Gabriel, you had forbidden anyone from discussing Matteo.”
He looked at her.
“I forbade gossip about his death.”
“I know that now.”
“And you never told me about the baby?”
Mrs. Keene lowered her eyes.
“Rosa asked me not to.”
Rosa spoke quickly.
“Because I was scared. People were calling Matteo a thief. I was afraid someone would treat Lily the same way.”
Gabriel could not argue.
He had just heard Isabella do exactly that.
From the doorway, Isabella finally spoke.
“There's something you should know about Matteo's estate.”
Everyone turned.
Gabriel stood.
“What?”
“His inheritance wasn't transferred to you outright. Your father's trust contains a provision for any surviving child.”
Gabriel already knew.
Matteo's interest in the Hudson property had remained under Gabriel's control as trustee.
If a child existed, that child could have a legal claim.
Isabella folded her arms.
“Your brother's interest could delay the Riverside sale. Maybe indefinitely.”
Rosa shook her head.
“I don't know anything about that.”
“You expect us to believe this is a coincidence?”
Gabriel stepped toward Isabella.
“How did you know about the child?”
“I didn't.”
“Then why did you tell Matteo this would happen?”
Her expression tightened.
“I knew he was seeing Rosa. I warned him mixing family matters with employees would end badly.”
“Did you know she was pregnant?”
Isabella looked away.
That was answer enough.
Gabriel felt a cold anger building.
His fiancée had watched him mourn a brother he believed had betrayed him.
She had watched Rosa work beneath the same roof.
She had seen Lily grow old enough to walk.
And she had never spoken.
“Get out of this room,” he said.
“Gabriel—”
“Now.”
Isabella left.
The silence afterward felt enormous.
Gabriel sat across from Rosa.
“I can't undo what happened. But I want to make this right.”
Rosa looked at the folded letter.
“You said that wasn't yours.”
“I said I never wrote it.”
“But that's your signature.”
Gabriel studied the document again.
An awful memory stirred.
A thick stack of papers.
Isabella standing beside his desk.
Her voice telling him the household needed to be reorganized after Matteo's death.
His own hand signing page after page.
He looked at the date.
November 18.
Then he remembered exactly what he had signed that morning.
And his stomach dropped.
“Rosa,” he said quietly, “I think I did sign the order.”
She stared at him.
“But I didn't know it was about you.”
Rosa's eyes filled.
She reached into her apron and placed a second sheet of paper on the table.
It was the page that had accompanied the original letter.
At the top, in black ink, was a handwritten instruction.
If she mentions Matteo's child, remove her before Gabriel finds out.
Underneath were two initials.
I.R.
May you like
And beneath them, in Gabriel's own handwriting, were three words he did not remember writing.
Approved. No exceptions.
