Chapter 6 - THE PRICE OF ABANDONING ME
“Vincent didn't leave you because he discovered he loved me,” Lena said. “He left because Lucille convinced him you were a threat.”
The words echoed around the boardroom.
Lucille's face hardened.
“Lena, this is not the place.”
“Then where is the place?” Lena demanded.
Her voice shook.
“For three years, you've told me what to say, what to wear, whom to trust, and which family members were dangerous.”
Leo folded his arms.
“Start with the wedding.”
Lena stared at him.
Then she looked at me.
“Vincent was told Seraphina might be Marco's daughter.”
The room seemed to tilt.
I gripped the chair.
“Before our wedding?”
Lena nodded.
“Lucille told him the trust would investigate whether Seraphina had a financial claim.”
I looked at Lucille.
“Did you know I was Daniela's child?”
The older woman's expression remained controlled.
“Yes.”
I couldn't speak.
She'd known.
When she'd sent me the charity invitation.
When she'd watched Vincent court me.
When she'd attended my bridal shower and complimented my dress.
She'd known.
“Why?” I whispered.
Lucille looked toward Leo.
“Because your brother left behind unresolved obligations.”
Leo's expression darkened.
“Don't hide behind Marco.”
She turned to him.
“You always believed you were the only one protecting this family.”
“Answer her.”
Lucille exhaled.
“Your father placed a conditional allocation in the trust for any acknowledged or legally established descendants of Marco. If Seraphina's parentage was confirmed, the existing distribution would change.”
I stared at her.
“Then why encourage Vincent to date me?”
“Because I believed a marriage might settle the dispute privately.”
Leo frowned.
“That makes no sense.”
Lucille's eyes moved toward the windows.
“No,” she admitted. “It doesn't. Not without the rest.”
For the first time, Lucille seemed uncertain.
She explained that Marco had concealed several investments under subsidiary companies.
Some were legitimate.
Others were connected to questionable transactions that had threatened the Sorentini Foundation.
After his death, a portion of the family trust had been frozen.
Vincent could receive income from it but couldn't control the underlying assets until a scheduled review.
Lucille believed that if Vincent married Seraphina, the two potential claims could be resolved through a family settlement.
“Then why stop the wedding?” I asked.
Lucille looked at Lena.
“Because new information arrived.”
Lena placed the medical report on the table.
I leaned forward.
There was my name.
My birth date.
And a summary claiming that records connected to Daniela Rossi had been altered.
“Who gave you that?” Leo asked.
Lucille hesitated.
“An outside investigator.”
“Name?”
“Andrew Vale.”
Leo's jaw tightened.
I knew that name.
Andrew Vale had been Marco's business adviser.
He'd also served briefly as a trustee after Marco died.
“Vale lost his professional license,” Leo said.
“Yes,” Lucille answered.
“And you trusted him?”
“I trusted the records he brought.”
Leo looked disgusted.
“That's not the same thing.”
The photograph on the table showed Vincent holding the medical report outside the church.
But there was another detail.
I moved closer.
His left hand was clenched around something silver.
A pocket watch.
I recognized it immediately.
Marco's watch.
I'd seen Vincent carry it when we were engaged.
He'd told me his father gave it to him before he died.
“Why does that matter?” Lena asked when I pointed it out.
“Because Vincent never carried that watch in public after his father's funeral.”
Leo studied the photograph.
Then he looked at Lucille.
“Did Vale give it to him?”
She nodded slowly.
“He claimed he'd found it among Marco's private belongings.”
Leo's expression changed.
“My brother's pocket watch was missing from the estate inventory.”
I remembered the way Vincent used to open it when he was nervous.
The small click.
The silver chain.
The photograph of his parents tucked beneath the cover.
“What was inside it?” I asked.
Leo frowned.
“His father's portrait. Nothing else.”
But Lena shook her head.
“There was something else.”
Everyone turned.
“Vincent showed me once,” she said.
“A little piece of paper folded behind the photograph.”
“What did it say?” Leo asked.
“I never saw the words. He wouldn't let me touch it.”
Lucille stood abruptly.
“This meeting is over.”
Leo didn't move.
“No.”
She faced him.
“Your wife is recovering from a terrible loss. This is cruel.”
“My wife deserves answers.”
“Answers that could destroy the family?”
Leo looked toward me.
“Then the family should have told the truth sooner.”
We left the meeting without resolving the trust dispute.
Leo's attorneys requested an independent review, and the board agreed to preserve all relevant records.
But I barely heard the discussion.
I kept thinking about the pocket watch.
After dinner that evening, I sat in Gabriel's nursery.
I didn't turn on the overhead light.
Only the little lamp beside the rocking chair.
Leo appeared with a cup of tea.
“Have you eaten?”
“A little.”
He set the cup beside me.
“Detective Ellis is tracing the watch through the evidence inventory.”
I nodded.
Then I asked the question I'd been avoiding.
“Did you marry me because of Marco?”
Leo looked startled.
“Sera—”
“You recognized my necklace.”
“I told you that.”
“But you knew Daniela. You knew Marco had hidden things. And you were the person who found me outside that church.”
He sat beside me.
“I found you because I saw your wedding collapse. I couldn't leave you there.”
“Why did you keep coming back?”
“Because you made me laugh.”
I looked at him.
He smiled sadly.
“You remember the diner?”
Of course I did.
Three weeks after the abandoned wedding, he'd found me working on a fundraiser at the public library.
He'd offered to take me to lunch.
I'd refused anything expensive.
So he'd taken me to a diner on Lexington Avenue.
He'd ordered black coffee.
I'd spilled strawberry milkshake on his silk tie.
He'd laughed until the waitress laughed too.
“I didn't fall in love with an inheritance,” he said. “I fell in love with the woman who argued with me about whether a five-dollar milkshake was too expensive.”
Tears filled my eyes.
“I don't know how to trust anyone right now.”
He took my hand.
“Then I'll keep showing you. As long as it takes.”
The following morning, Detective Ellis returned with news.
The police had recovered Marco's pocket watch from Vincent's belongings.
It was scratched.
The chain was broken.
And the inside photograph had been removed.
Beneath it was a folded paper.
Not a financial document.
Not a bank account number.
A short handwritten statement.
If anything happens to me, ask Lucille about the child Daniela carried.
Beneath those words was a date.
Two days before Marco's death.
I looked at Leo.
“Marco knew about me.”
Leo stared at the paper.
“Yes.”
Detective Ellis continued.
“There is something else.”
She placed another photograph on the table.
It showed Marco's handwritten statement beneath ultraviolet examination.
A second line had been erased.
Investigators had partially recovered it.
Do not allow Andrew Vale to control—
The remaining words were unreadable.
Leo stood.
“Vale was the one who brought Lucille the report.”
Detective Ellis nodded.
“And we've confirmed something more troubling.”
She looked directly at me.
“Andrew Vale has been managing Vincent's private finances for the past three years.”
I swallowed.
“Since the wedding?”
“Since the day after.”
Then she placed a bank statement on the table.
One large payment was circled in red.
It was dated the morning Vincent abandoned me.
And the sender wasn't Marco's estate.
May you like
It was a charitable fund established in my birth mother's name.
THE DANIELA ROSSI CHILDREN'S TRUST.
