Chapter 8 - VICTOR’S CONFESSION
Victor Bellini’s confession was twelve pages long.
He had written it by hand.
Vanessa found him unconscious beside it after an overdose of prescription medication.
Doctors saved him.
For the next six hours, he remained sedated at Northwestern Memorial under police guard.
I sat beside Dad in another room.
The bullet had passed through his shoulder without hitting an artery.
“Lucky,” the surgeon said.
Dad called it expensive.
“You got shot,” I said. “You don’t get to complain about the bill yet.”
“Tomorrow?”
“Maybe.”
Luca stood outside the room most of the night.
He never came in unless I asked.
I noticed that.
At four in the morning, I stepped into the hallway.
“You should sleep.”
“So should you.”
“I’m not worth several billion dollars.”
“Neither am I at four in the morning.”
I smiled.
Then I handed him Mom’s letter.
“You should read it.”
He hesitated.
“It was written to you.”
“She wrote about you.”
He read.
Halfway through, he sat.
When he finished, he stared at the page for a long time.
“I barely remembered her.”
“She remembered you.”
“I gave her copies of invoices.”
“You tried to help.”
“I was seventeen and angry at Matteo. I wasn’t brave.”
“Motives don’t erase outcomes.”
He looked at me.
“That sounds like something Teresa would say.”
“She’s corrupting me.”
“She corrupts everyone with carbohydrates.”
For a moment, everything felt simple.
Then Marco arrived carrying Victor’s confession.
“Police copied it. Vanessa gave us permission to read.”
Luca opened to the first page.
Victor admitted ordering someone to scare my mother.
Not kill her.
He had hired a man to steal Luca’s abandoned car and force Emily off the road.
The man lost control.
Emily’s vehicle struck a concrete barrier.
She died at the scene.
Victor covered it up.
Matteo helped.
“So Matteo didn’t order it,” I said.
“No,” Marco replied. “But he helped bury it.”
“Antonio blamed Matteo.”
“He knew Matteo was involved. Maybe not how.”
I felt no relief.
Only exhaustion.
Victor had killed my mother through cowardice and greed.
Matteo had protected him.
Luca’s father had hidden evidence.
My father had hidden Matteo’s survival.
Every man in the story had chosen secrecy and called it protection.
I was tired of being protected.
“Where’s the ledger?” I asked.
Marco shook his head.
“Still with Matteo.”
“And the trust certificate?”
“Missing.”
“Can Matteo use it?”
“No. But he can destroy it.”
“Would that cancel the trust?”
“No. Copies exist.”
Luca closed the confession.
“Then what does he want now?”
Marco’s expression was grim.
“Revenge.”
By noon, we had an answer.
Moretti Holdings stock dropped eighteen percent after anonymous documents were sent to reporters.
The red ledger.
Or parts of it.
Headlines connected Moretti companies to decades-old bribery, illegal property transfers, and shell corporations.
Luca’s board called an emergency meeting.
He wanted me nowhere near it.
I went anyway.
The boardroom occupied the forty-second floor of a glass tower overlooking Chicago.
Twelve directors sat around a table.
I wore the only business clothes I owned: black pants and a navy blouse I usually saved for funerals.
Vanessa arrived wearing sunglasses.
Her father was still hospitalized.
Nobody welcomed her.
Luca opened the meeting.
Before he could speak, an older director named Harold Crane interrupted.
“Given the allegations, I move for temporary suspension of Mr. Moretti’s executive authority.”
Marco leaned toward me.
“There it is.”
“What?”
“The coup.”
Harold continued.
“Until ownership questions are resolved, the board requires stable leadership.”
“Meaning you?” Luca asked.
Harold smiled.
“Meaning someone without your family liabilities.”
I looked around.
Several directors avoided Luca’s eyes.
Bought.
Or frightened.
Maybe both.
Luca said, “My ownership remains controlling.”
“Does it?”
Harold slid a document across the table.
A court filing challenging the Reed trust.
Filed that morning.
By Vanessa Bellini.
Every head turned.
Vanessa stared.
“I didn’t file that.”
Harold shrugged.
“Your signature says otherwise.”
She grabbed it.
Her face changed.
“Forged.”
I almost laughed.
“Welcome to the club.”
Harold continued.
“Until the court determines whether Ms. Reed’s interest is valid, her shares cannot vote.”
“Convenient,” I said.
He looked at me as though noticing housekeeping had entered his boardroom.
“And you are?”
“Thirty-one percent.”
Silence.
Luca hid a smile.
Harold did not.
“You are an alleged beneficiary.”
“I’m also the woman whose identity your people keep stealing.”
“My people?”
I looked at his cuff links.
Silver initials.
H.C.
Then I remembered the scratched-out face in the photograph from Caruso’s basement.
I pulled the photo from my bag.
Mrs. Caruso had given it to me that morning.
The scratched man wore the same distinctive square cuff links.
I placed it on the table.
“Were you friends with Antonio Moretti?”
Harold’s face changed.
Only slightly.
Enough.
Luca saw it.
“Where did you get that?”
“Teresa’s basement.”
Harold stood.
“This meeting is over.”
“No,” Luca said. “Sit down.”
Harold walked toward the door.
Marco blocked it.
“You cannot detain a board member.”
Marco smiled.
“I’m standing.”
Luca picked up the photograph.
“You were there.”
Harold’s jaw tightened.
“Everyone was there in those days.”
“Why scratch your face out?”
“I didn’t.”
“Who did?”
Harold looked toward the windows.
Then his phone rang.
He checked the screen.
Fear crossed his face.
He answered.
“What?”
We heard Matteo.
“Hello, Harold.”
Harold went white.
Matteo’s voice was on speaker somehow.
“I told you not to challenge the trust.”
Harold stammered, “You said—”
“I said remove Luca. I didn’t say expose Vanessa.”
Luca leaned back.
“So Harold works for you.”
Matteo laughed.
“Worked.”
Harold ran.
Marco grabbed him.
A gun fell from Harold’s jacket.
Security rushed in.
Then alarms sounded throughout the building.
Fire alarm.
People stood.
Smoke began pouring beneath the boardroom door.
Marco shouted, “Move!”
We evacuated down the emergency stairs.
Thirty-eight floors.
Halfway down, the lights failed.
Someone grabbed me from behind.
A hand covered my mouth.
I kicked.
Bit.
Fought.
A voice whispered into my ear.
“Your mother fought too.”
Matteo.
I drove my heel backward.
He cursed.
Then another body slammed into him.
Luca.
They crashed against the stairwell wall.
I saw Matteo’s face.
Saw the gun.
“Luca!”
The gun fired.
Luca jerked.
My heart stopped.
He looked down.
Blood spread across his white shirt.
Matteo smiled.
Then disappeared through a maintenance door.
I caught Luca before he fell.
“No. No, no, no.”
His hand pressed against his side.
“Emma.”
“Don’t talk.”
“You’re bossy.”
“Shut up.”
He smiled weakly.
Below us, Marco shouted for medics.
I held pressure against the wound.
Blood soaked my hands.
Luca looked at me.
“Did you mean it?”
“What?”
“When you quit.”
I stared at him.
“You’re asking about my employment status?”
“I need to know whether HR should process paperwork.”
I started crying.
“You are insane.”
“Probably.”
“You’re not dying.”
“I wasn’t planning to.”
“Good.”
His fingers closed around mine.
Then his eyes rolled shut.
“Luca?”
No answer.
“Luca!”
May you like
And somewhere above us, through smoke and alarms, Matteo Moretti began to laugh.
The hospital would not let me see Luca immediately after surgery, so I sat with the letter from Mom folded in my pocket until the paper became soft at the edges. Vanessa sat across from me and finally told me why she had wanted Teresa’s restaurant gone so badly. It was not only the property value. Victor had spent years teaching her that sentiment was weakness, and Caruso’s represented everything he despised about Luca: loyalty that could not be purchased, memory that could not be redeveloped, people who knew the Morettis before money polished their name. Vanessa had believed becoming Luca’s wife meant proving she could be harder than his past. “I thought love meant making myself useful to power,” she said. “Turns out that makes you useful to terrible people.” I did not forgive her then. But I understood her better. Marco returned with evidence from the stairwell. Matteo had entered using a contractor badge issued by Harold Crane’s office. The fire had been set with smoke canisters, not an actual building fire. The entire evacuation was engineered to separate Luca from security. Harold claimed Matteo threatened his family, but phone records showed months of voluntary contact. He had been promised executive control after Luca’s removal. The betrayal hit Luca hard when he woke. He asked about me before asking about the company, which Vanessa noticed and I pretended not to. When I finally entered his room, he looked pale and furious at the tubes attached to him. “You got shot,” I said. “Apparently.” “Again, terrible dating qualification.” His eyes warmed. “So you heard that.” I sat beside him and told him about Harold, Victor’s confession, and the missing ledger. He listened without interrupting. Then he said something I did not expect: “If the company survives, I’m opening the books.” Not just the records Matteo leaked. Everything. Independent investigators. Restitution. Criminal referrals where necessary. “It could destroy Moretti Holdings,” I said. “Maybe parts deserve to be destroyed.” That was the moment I stopped seeing him as Antonio’s heir. He was choosing what to inherit and what to end. Outside the room, Marco received a call from Teresa. Someone had broken into Caruso’s again, but this time nothing was damaged. A single brick had been removed from the basement wall. Behind it, Teresa found a metal plate stamped with the same number as the bank key: 317. Matteo had been searching the wrong hiding place all along, and now we finally knew where Antonio’s last secret was waiting.
