Chapter 4 – THE GHOST OF THE WOMAN HE ONCE LOVED

The name dropped like a physical blow in the silent dining room.

Elena.

Luca staggered backward, his shoulders hitting the heavy mahogany wall paneling. The invincible, untouchable mafia boss looked as though a knife had just been plunged directly into his chest.

I knew the name Elena. Every member of the household staff knew that name.

Elena was Luca’s first love. They had been engaged seven years ago. She was a beautiful, kind-hearted kindergarten teacher who had wanted nothing to do with the mafia lifestyle, but loved Luca enough to try.

And six years ago, a month before their wedding, Elena had been killed in a tragic hit-and-run accident on a rainy Chicago street.

The driver was never found. Luca had mourned her every single day since.

“Elena,” Luca whispered, the word breaking in his throat. He stared at Matteo, his dark eyes wide with a horrific realization. “Elena died before the wedding. She was never pregnant.”

Matteo was trembling violently against the locked dining room door. He shook his head, tears spilling over his cheeks.

“She didn’t die, Luca,” Matteo sobbed, sliding down the door until his knees hit the marble floor. “The accident was staged. I paid the paramedics to falsify the death certificate.”

The silence that followed was suffocating.

Rosa sank back into her chair, clutching her chest, weeping for the girl she had treated like a daughter.

“You staged her death?” Luca’s voice was barely a breath. “Why?”

“Because she was going to tell you the truth!” Matteo cried, burying his face in his hands. “One night, when you were in New York for business… I went to her apartment. I was drunk. I was so jealous of you, Luca. You had the empire, you had the father who loved you more than his adopted son, and you had her. I forced myself on her.”

I felt a wave of profound nausea wash over me. I looked at Vanessa, expecting her to show some sign of disgust, but the fiancée simply stood there, checking her manicured nails, completely indifferent to the monster she was allied with.

“When Elena found out she was pregnant,” Matteo continued, his voice echoing in the vast room, “she threatened to expose me to the Commission. She knew you would kill me. So I orchestrated the hit-and-run to make her disappear.”

“Where is she?” Luca roared, lunging forward. He grabbed Matteo by the throat, hauling him up off the floor and pinning him against the heavy oak doors. “Where is the woman I loved?!”

“I don’t know!” Matteo gasped, clawing at Luca’s hands. “I swear to God! After the fake accident, I kept her locked in a safehouse on the South Side until the baby was born. But Sofia found out. Sofia found the safehouse six years ago. She broke in, took the baby, and helped Elena escape!”

Everything suddenly made agonizing sense.

Sofia hadn’t run away because she was a coward. She had run away to protect Elena’s newborn son from the monster who had fathered him. She had taken the boy and raised him in secret, while Elena went into hiding to survive.

And yesterday, when Sofia finally thought it was safe to return to Chicago to tell Luca the truth, Vanessa and Matteo had intercepted her.

Luca threw Matteo to the ground in disgust. He stood over his adopted brother, his chest heaving, his fists clenched so tightly his knuckles were white.

“You stole my life,” Luca whispered, tears finally falling from his dark eyes. “You stole the woman I loved, you stole six years with my nephew, and you let me mourn at an empty grave.”

Matteo curled into a ball on the floor, sobbing uncontrollably.

Luca slowly turned around. He looked at Vanessa.

“And you knew,” Luca said, his voice dropping into a deadly, terrifying calm. “You knew about Elena. You knew about the boy.”

Vanessa smirked, picking up her evening bag. “Of course I knew. Information is power, darling. When my family discovered Matteo’s dirty little secret two years ago, it was the perfect leverage. We blackmailed him into helping me isolate you. It was a flawless plan, until your meddling sister showed up.”

Vanessa checked her watch again. “It is now nine-forty-five, Luca. This emotional family reunion is touching, but my men at the rail yard are getting impatient. Sign the trust papers, or Elena’s child burns.”

Luca stared at the woman in the red silk gown.

“I will never sign my empire over to you,” Luca said coldly.

Vanessa’s eyes hardened. “Then the boy dies.”

“No, he won’t,” a quiet voice interrupted.

Everyone turned.

It was me.

I was shaking so badly I could barely stand, but I stepped away from Rosa and walked toward the center of the room. I reached into the pocket of my apron once more.

“Mrs. Bellini,” I said, my voice surprisingly steady. “When I was cleaning the guest room yesterday, I didn’t just see you hide the silver rosary in your purse.”

Vanessa’s smirk faltered. “What are you talking about, you little rat?”

I pulled out a heavy, dark green winter coat. It was a child’s coat. I had found it shoved underneath the guest bed yesterday, completely forgotten in the chaos of the kidnapping.

“This is Leo’s coat,” I said.

I reached into the small front pocket of the coat and pulled out a bright yellow piece of paper. It wasn’t a receipt. It was a prescription bag from a pharmacy.

“Leo has asthma,” I read aloud from the label. “He needs his inhaler every four hours. But his inhaler was left in this coat.”

Vanessa frowned. “So what? The brat will wheeze a little before the fire starts. It doesn’t change anything.”

“It changes everything,” I said, looking directly at Luca.

“Mr. Moretti,” I said, handing him the pharmacy bag. “Look at the date and the location on the prescription.”

Luca took the bag. His eyes scanned the yellow paper.

His breath hitched.

“This prescription was filled this morning,” Luca whispered, staring at the paper in absolute shock. “At a pharmacy three blocks from here.”

I nodded, my heart pounding as I looked at Vanessa’s horrified face.

“Sofia and the boy aren’t in a boxcar at the rail yard,” I said.

“Because someone went to the pharmacy for them this morning. Someone they trust.”

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