Chapter 2 - THE SIGNATURE IN CAROLINE’S OFFICE
“Ask your fiancée who actually requested the first false hearing report, Luca. Because it wasn't me.”
Those words from Vanessa's father changed the room.
Until that moment, I had believed I was watching a wealthy man defend himself after being caught trying to steal a child's inheritance.
But Mr. Bellini wasn't looking at the papers.
He was looking at Vanessa.
And Vanessa looked frightened in a way I hadn't seen before.
Not angry.
Not embarrassed.
Frightened.
“Don't,” she whispered.
Her father straightened his jacket.
“You wanted everyone to believe I planned this. Perhaps you should tell Luca whose idea it was.”
Luca Moretti remained standing beside Oliver's chair.
His tattooed hands rested against the white tablecloth.
“Oliver,” he said gently, “you told me you saw someone practicing my signature.”
Oliver nodded.
“Can you tell me who?”
The boy glanced at Vanessa.
Then at the older man.
“I saw Vanessa.”
Vanessa closed her eyes.
Oliver continued quietly.
“She had a yellow paper under one of your letters. She kept writing your name.”
My stomach tightened.
Caroline Moretti's old office had remained almost untouched since her death three years earlier.
Oliver sometimes sat there after school because it still smelled faintly of his mother's lavender hand cream.
He kept his drawings in the bottom desk drawer.
And the blue notebook containing his hearing exercises had originally belonged to Caroline.
The thought of Vanessa using that room to practice forging Luca's signature made my skin crawl.
Luca looked at his fiancée.
“Is that true?”
Vanessa opened her mouth.
Nothing came out.
“Vanessa.”
“Yes,” she said finally. “I practiced your signature.”
Several guests murmured.
“But I wasn't the person who submitted that application.”
Richard Hayes looked down at his folder.
Luca noticed.
“Richard?”
The attorney hesitated.
“Mr. Moretti, the application came through the corporate administration office. I was told your signature had already been verified.”
“By whom?”
Richard looked uncomfortable.
“Your executive office.”
For the first time that evening, Luca appeared genuinely confused.
“My executive office?”
“Yes, sir.”
Luca slowly turned toward the far end of the table.
“Marco.”
His younger brother had been sitting silently since the first mention of Caroline's trust.
Marco Moretti was thirty-four, broad-shouldered, with the same dark eyes as Luca.
He had helped manage the family's legitimate businesses for nearly a decade.
Oliver adored him.
And Luca trusted him with almost everything.
Marco set down his water glass.
“What?”
“Who handles the verification of documents when I'm traveling?”
Marco frowned.
“Your office manager. Sometimes me. Depends on the document.”
“Did you see this application?”
“No.”
The answer came quickly.
Perhaps too quickly.
Vanessa suddenly laughed.
It was a terrible sound.
“Of course. Now everyone gets to pretend they knew nothing.”
Luca faced her.
“Explain.”
Vanessa wiped beneath her eyes.
“You want an explanation? Fine. Your company was about to lose its financing. My father offered a merger. Your advisers discovered Caroline's trust could interfere with the voting structure.”
Luca's jaw tightened.
“Caroline's trust isn't a business inconvenience.”
“That's easy to say when you haven't seen what the lenders were preparing to do.”
Mr. Bellini shifted in his chair.
“Vanessa, enough.”
“No, Father. You wanted me to tell the truth.”
She pointed at him.
“Then we're telling all of it.”
Richard cleared his throat.
“The Moretti and Whitmore financing arrangements are more complicated than tonight's presentation suggested.”
Luca stared at him.
“What financing arrangements?”
Richard looked toward Marco.
Marco slowly pushed back his chair.
“Luca, maybe we should discuss this privately.”
“No.”
Luca's voice remained quiet.
“You've had all evening to speak privately. Start talking.”
Marco rubbed his forehead.
“Some commercial loans are coming due. We were restructuring them through Whitmore.”
“And?”
“The lenders wanted additional security.”
“Whose security?”
Marco didn't answer.
Luca looked down at the document in his hand.
Then at his brother.
“You used Oliver's shares?”
“I didn't transfer anything.”
“That wasn't my question.”
Marco stood.
“I was trying to keep the company from collapsing.”
Something about his expression bothered me.
He didn't look like a man surprised by an accusation.
He looked like someone who had dreaded this conversation for months.
Oliver tugged my apron.
“Miss Emily?”
I crouched.
“Yes, sweetheart?”
“Is Uncle Marco in trouble?”
I glanced at Luca.
“Your dad is figuring things out.”
Oliver looked at the hearing aid resting in his palm.
Then he slipped it back into his ear.
“I want to hear.”
Those four words almost broke my heart.
For six months, people had talked around that little boy as though his difficulties hearing meant he couldn't understand what was happening.
Now he was determined not to miss another word.
Luca noticed.
He knelt.
“Buddy, you're not in trouble. And you're not going anywhere.”
“Not Germany?”
“Not Germany.”
“Promise?”
Luca took his son's hand.
“I promise.”
Oliver leaned against him.
For a moment, the entire room disappeared behind the simple sight of a father holding his child.
Then Richard spoke.
“There is another complication.”
Luca didn't release Oliver.
“What?”
“The proposed trustee appointment was prepared using documents from Caroline's original trust file.”
Luca looked up sharply.
“Those records are kept in my private archive.”
“Apparently, copies existed elsewhere.”
“Where?”
Richard hesitated.
“Your late wife's office.”
I felt Oliver stiffen beside me.
Vanessa looked down.
Luca slowly stood.
“Who entered Caroline's office?”
Vanessa said nothing.
Marco stared at the floor.
Then Oliver whispered something.
“Miss Emily?”
I leaned closer.
“What's wrong?”
“Mommy's blue notebook.”
“What about it?”
Oliver's eyes were wet.
“There's a picture inside.”
“A picture?”
He nodded.
“Mommy drew a little rocket on the last page.”
I remembered that drawing.
Caroline had drawn a rocket beside a handwritten message.
For Captain Rocket, whenever the world gets too noisy.
Oliver had shown it to me months earlier.
He loved that notebook more than any toy he owned.
“Vanessa didn't just take it,” he whispered.
“She tore the back part out.”
I looked at him.
“What back part?”
“The blue pocket.”
My heart gave a strange jump.
I remembered seeing a small fabric pocket stitched into the inside cover.
I'd assumed it was for storing appointment cards.
Oliver looked toward his uncle.
“Uncle Marco said Mommy put important things there.”
Across the table, Marco's face changed.
Luca saw it immediately.
“Marco?”
His brother swallowed.
“What?”
“How did you know about that pocket?”
Marco looked at Oliver.
Then at me.
Finally, he answered.
“Because Caroline asked me to help her hide something before she died.”
The room fell silent.
Luca stared at his brother.
“Hide what?”
Marco didn't answer.
Luca stepped closer.
“Marco. What did my wife ask you to hide?”
His brother's eyes filled with something that looked painfully close to shame.
“A letter.”
“To whom?”
Marco looked at Oliver.
Then back at Luca.
“To you.”
Luca stopped moving.
“Where is it?”
Marco hesitated.
“That's what I've been trying to find.”
Vanessa suddenly gripped the back of her chair.
“Stop talking, Marco.”
But Marco ignored her.
“Caroline told me that if anyone ever tried to use Oliver's inheritance, I had to give you that letter.”
Luca looked as though someone had struck him.
“You've known about a letter from my wife for three years?”
Marco lowered his head.
“Yes.”
“Why didn't you tell me?”
Before Marco could answer, Oliver reached into his jacket again.
He removed a small blue piece of fabric.
It had been torn from the notebook's inside cover.
“I kept this,” he whispered.
Luca took it carefully.
Sewn into the fabric was a tiny silver key.
And attached to the key was a folded strip of paper.
The handwriting was Caroline's.
Luca unfolded it.
I watched the color disappear from his face as he read aloud.
“Luca, if someone tells you Oliver must leave this house to protect the family, don't believe them.”
He stopped.
His hands began trembling.
Then he read the final sentence.
“Because the first person who tried to take his inheritance was someone you already trusted with your life.”
Marco whispered, “Luca, there's something I need to explain.”
But Luca wasn't looking at his brother anymore.
He was staring at the back of the paper.
There was one final line.
May you like
And it contained a name.
“Ask Marco what happened the night Caroline signed the second trust.”
