Chapter 2 – A PHOTOGRAPH IN THE DARK

Luca stepped away from Marcus Bellini, his eyes dropping to the blue slip of paper shaking in my hand.

“Let me see that,” Luca said.

He didn’t snatch it. He took it gently from my trembling fingers.

He stared at the name. Thomas Carter.

“Emily,” Luca asked, his voice low, “your father passed away before the accident?”

“A week before,” I choked out. “The police said it was a heart attack. He was a mechanic. He didn’t have any money. He definitely didn’t have money to buy a first-class ticket out of Chicago.”

Vanessa let out a sharp, mocking laugh, though her eyes were frantic.

“Oh, this is brilliant,” she sneered. “The little maid is trying to play detective. My father probably picked that up off the street. Or maybe her drunk father owed my family money.”

“Don’t you ever speak about my father like that,” I said, stepping toward her.

I had spent eleven months keeping my head down, serving champagne, and scrubbing floors. But seeing my dad’s name on that ticket erased every ounce of fear I had of this woman.

Vanessa raised her hand to slap me.

Luca caught her wrist mid-air.

“Touch her,” Luca said, his voice entirely devoid of warmth, “and you won’t have a hand left to wear an engagement ring.”

Vanessa gasped, pulling her arm back as if she’d been burned.

At the end of the table, Michael was staring at the silver watch Luca had confiscated from Marcus.

“Why did you have my watch?” Michael asked, his voice hollow. “I thought I lost it at the hospital.”

Marcus straightened his tie, looking around the room at the fifty silent guests.

“This is a private family matter,” Marcus said stiffly. “I will not be interrogated in front of caterers and maids.”

“You will answer me right now,” Luca commanded.

“I took it as collateral,” Marcus shot back, a cruel smile forming on his lips. “Your dear brother here owes me. You think he lost his memory, Luca? Ask him about the debts he racked up before he drove his car off that bridge.”

Michael shook his head violently. “I don’t know what you’re talking about!”

“Don’t you?” Marcus stepped closer. “You were terrified of Luca finding out you were skimming from the family business. You were running, Michael. That’s why you crashed.”

A murmur rippled through the guests.

Luca looked at his brother.

Michael looked absolutely terrified, clutching his head as if trying to force the memories to return.

“No,” Michael whispered. “No, I wouldn’t betray Luca. I wouldn’t.”

Nicholas tugged on my apron again.

He looked overwhelmed, his small hands shaking.

“Emily,” he whispered. “I want to go upstairs. Please.”

Luca heard him. He turned to me, his expression softening instantly.

“Take him up, Emily. Lock his bedroom door. Don’t let anyone but me inside.”

“Yes, sir,” I said.

I took Nicholas by the hand and hurried him out of the dining room, away from the screaming and the heavy, suffocating tension.

We climbed the grand staircase.

Once inside his room, I locked the heavy oak door and turned on his small bedside lamp.

“Are you okay, sweetheart?” I asked, kneeling to his eye level.

He nodded slowly, reaching up to adjust his hearing aids.

“I don’t like Grandpa Bellini,” he said softly. “He smells like old cigars and lies.”

I managed a weak smile. “I don’t like him much either.”

Nicholas walked over to his small desk and opened his sketchpad.

Whenever he was stressed, he drew. It was how he processed the world when his ears couldn’t.

“Emily?” he said.

“Yes, Nick?”

“When Grandpa Bellini was in here on Wednesday… he dropped something.”

My heart skipped a beat. “What did he drop?”

Nicholas turned the pages of his sketchpad.

Tucked between two pages of crayon drawings was a glossy, slightly faded photograph.

Nicholas handed it to me.

“He was looking at it when he thought I was asleep,” Nicholas explained. “He got mad and crumpled the edge, then it fell under my bed. I found it later.”

I held the photograph under the lamplight.

It was taken inside a hospital room.

A young man was lying in the bed, wrapped in bandages, his face bruised and swollen. It was Michael, clearly taken right after the accident.

But it was the woman standing next to the bed that made the breath leave my lungs.

It was Vanessa.

She wasn’t wearing a designer gown.

She was wearing a nurse’s uniform.

And she was leaning over Michael, holding a syringe near his IV line.

I stared at the picture in horror.

Vanessa had always claimed she met Luca at a charity gala only one year ago. She swore she had never met Michael before she started dating Luca.

Someone pounded heavily on the bedroom door.

“Emily! Open the door!”

It was Michael’s voice, sounding frantic.

I unlocked the door, and Michael pushed his way inside, his face pale and covered in sweat.

“I remember something,” Michael gasped, looking at me with wide, terrified eyes. “When I was in the water… someone pulled me out. But they didn’t do it to save me.”

I slowly held out the photograph.

Michael’s eyes fell on the image of Vanessa in the nurse’s uniform.

He staggered back, pressing his hand against his chest as the forgotten memory finally snapped into place.

“She didn’t meet Luca a year ago,” Michael whispered. “She was the one who kept me sedated.”

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