Chapter 4 – THE MANILA ENVELOPE

Vanessa’s cold smile shattered into genuine panic. She lunged across the marble floor, her manicured hands clawing for the envelope.

“Give that to me!” she screamed.

Matteo’s heavy hand closed around Vanessa’s wrist, stopping her mid-air. He shoved her backward into a chair and snatched the envelope from Sophie.

“What is this, Mrs. Parker?” Matteo asked, looking at his elderly housekeeper.

Mrs. Parker stepped out of the shadows of the hallway, her hands neatly folded in front of her gray uniform.

“It’s the shipping yard deeds, sir,” Mrs. Parker said, her voice steady. “Miss Whitmore forged your signature this afternoon. I saw her practicing your handwriting in the study. She intended to mail the finalized documents to the Moretti family’s attorney in New York.”

Matteo ripped the envelope open. A stack of legal documents slid into his hands. His signature was perfectly replicated at the bottom of each page, transferring his entire legitimate empire to his greatest enemies.

“You weren’t just trying to marry me,” Matteo whispered, staring at Vanessa. “You were gutting me from the inside out to pay off the men who killed my wife.”

Vanessa was hyperventilating now, shrinking into the velvet chair. “Matteo, please. They forced me! I owed them money for the hit! They said if I didn’t get them your shipping yards, they would kill me!”

Arthur Whitmore turned his back on his daughter in utter disgust. “You made your bed, Vanessa.”

Matteo dropped the papers onto the ruined birthday cake. He pulled out his phone and dialed his head of security.

“Lock down the gates,” Matteo ordered. “Nobody leaves. Call the police.”

“No!” Vanessa shrieked. “Matteo, wait! If you send me to prison, you’ll never know the rest of it!”

Matteo paused, his thumb hovering over the end-call button. “The rest of what?”

Vanessa looked desperately at Sophie, who was still shielding Rosie.

“The maid,” Vanessa panted, pointing a trembling finger at Sophie. “Ask her what her mother was carrying the night she was hit by that car.”

Sophie stiffened.

Matteo slowly put the phone in his pocket. He turned to Sophie. “What is she talking about?”

Sophie shook her head, tears welling in her eyes again. “I don’t know! My mother didn’t have anything! The police gave me her clothes and her purse. There was nothing else!”

Vanessa laughed hysterically. “She’s lying! The Morettis told me exactly what happened that night. Elena didn’t just crash. She ran. She got out of her car at the rail station and tried to hand something off to a stranger before the hitmen caught up with her.”

Vanessa leaned forward, her eyes wild.

“Your wife gave something to her mother, Matteo. And whatever it was, the Morettis have been tearing this city apart trying to find it for two years.”

Matteo stepped closer to Sophie. “Sophie… think. Did your mother give you anything before she died?”

Sophie closed her eyes, her mind flashing back to the cold hospital room, the sterile smell of bleach, and her mother’s bloody, bruised hand pressing something into her palm just before the heart monitor flatlined.

Sophie’s eyes snapped open.

“The rosary,” she whispered.

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