Chapter 8 - MY MOTHER'S SECOND SECRET
We found my mother forty minutes later.
She was not running.
She was sitting in a diner three miles from the old estate.
Alone.
A cup of coffee stood untouched in front of her.
When I entered, she did not look surprised.
She looked exhausted.
I sat across from her.
Anthony stood near the door.
Grace and Carlo waited outside.
“Where are the pages?”
My mother looked at me.
“I don’t have them.”
“Your scarf was there.”
“I was there.”
“When?”
“Last night.”
“Why?”
“To find them before Victor did.”
“You knew about room seventeen?”
“Yes.”
“How long?”
“Since before your father died.”
I leaned back.
Another secret.
Another piece of my own family history hidden from me.
“You spent my entire childhood telling me family survives because we tell each other the truth.”
She looked at me sadly.
“I was wrong.”
“Where are the pages?”
“Gone.”
“Who took them?”
“I believe Cecilia.”
Anthony entered.
“You believe my wife?”
Elena looked at him.
“I saw her car near the property three nights ago.”
His face hardened.
“Why didn’t you call me?”
“Because every time Cecilia’s name comes up, you protect her.”
“That’s my wife.”
“And Isabelle was his.”
Silence.
My mother reached into her purse.
She removed an envelope.
“Those pages were not the only thing in the archive.”
Inside was a photograph.
My father.
Victor Hale.
And a third man.
The third man was much younger.
But unmistakable.
Carlo.
I stared at it.
The date on the back was twenty-two years earlier.
Carlo would have been twenty-five.
“You said you met my family eleven years ago.”
Carlo stood in the doorway.
His face told me the answer before he spoke.
“I lied.”
Anthony stepped toward him.
“You worked for Dad?”
“Yes.”
“For how long?”
“Three years.”
“Doing what?”
“Security.”
I stood.
“You have one chance.”
Carlo nodded.
“Your father hired me after somebody started stealing from one of his companies.”
“Victor?”
“We suspected him.”
“Then why was Victor never removed?”
“Because your father could never prove it.”
I stared at Carlo.
“You knew Victor was dangerous before Isabelle ever met him.”
“Yes.”
“And you allowed him to remain my attorney?”
“I believed Salvatore had contained him.”
I laughed once.
Coldly.
“You believed wrong.”
Carlo lowered his head.
“Yes.”
Elena touched the photograph.
“Salvatore planned to remove Victor.”
“When?”
“The week he had his stroke.”
Everything suddenly connected.
My father’s illness.
The rushed estate transition.
Victor taking control of paperwork.
Me stepping into leadership while trying to hold together a family and several businesses.
Victor had become indispensable because he had designed the confusion himself.
“What did Dad know?”
“He suspected Victor had been moving money for years.”
“Did Anthony know?”
“No.”
My brother looked genuinely stunned.
“Then why did Dad leave me those instructions?”
Elena turned to him.
“He didn’t.”
Anthony froze.
“What?”
“The document you showed us was not Salvatore’s handwriting.”
Anthony shook his head.
“It looked exactly like his.”
“Victor could imitate it.”
She looked at me.
“I watched your father write for forty years.”
“That letter was not his.”
Anthony sat down.
His face went pale.
All this time, he had believed he was protecting the Romano family because our father had ordered him to.
Victor had manufactured loyalty.
Then weaponized it.
I looked at Anthony.
“Cecilia gave you the letter?”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“After Dad died.”
And there it was.
Cecilia and Victor.
Maybe together from the beginning.
Anthony whispered.
“She knew.”
My mother nodded.
“I think she did.”
He stared at the table.
For the first time, he looked less like my brother and more like a man discovering his entire marriage might have been built on deception.
My phone rang.
Grace.
I answered.
“Dominic, come outside.”
Something in her voice made me move immediately.
She stood beside Carlo’s SUV holding her phone.
“What?”
“Your mansion cameras came back online.”
“Good.”
“No.”
She turned the screen toward me.
A camera showed the library.
Empty.
Then Cecilia entered.
She walked directly toward Isabelle’s photograph.
Removed it from the desk.
And pressed something underneath the frame.
A compartment opened.
She reached inside.
Pulled out a small flash drive.
My heart stopped.
Isabelle had hidden something in plain sight for fourteen months.
Cecilia slipped it into her pocket.
Then she looked directly at the security camera.
May you like
And smiled.
A moment later, every camera went black again.
