Chapter 1 – THE WOMAN IN THE BLUE COAT

The silence in the ballroom felt heavy enough to break the floorboards.

Rosa’s hand was still hovering over her mouth.

Luca stared at the phone sitting on the white tablecloth.

“Sophie,” he said.

His voice was terrifyingly calm.

“Where is Mia’s house?”

“Dad, please.”

“Where?”

Sophie gave the address.

Luca hung up.

He didn’t look at the sixty guests.

He didn’t look at his mother.

He looked at Adriana.

“You’re going to sit in my office,” he said.

Adriana shook her head.

“Luca, let me explain—”

“Sit. In. My. Office.”

He turned and walked toward the hallway.

The guests immediately started whispering.

Rosa looked at me.

Her hands were shaking.

“Emma,” she whispered. “Get my coat.”

I ran to the coat check room.

My heart was pounding against my ribs.

I grabbed Rosa’s heavy wool coat, but as I pulled it off the hanger, the coat next to it fell to the floor.

It was Adriana’s blue cashmere coat.

A small, velvet pouch spilled out of the pocket.

I shouldn’t have looked.

I was the housemaid.

I was already on the verge of being fired.

But the pouch had fallen open.

And inside was a silver locket.

Not just any locket.

I recognized it immediately.

It was the exact same locket hanging in the massive portrait of Luca’s late wife, Elena, in the main staircase.

The one Luca said was buried with her.

I picked it up.

It was heavy. Cold.

I pressed the small latch on the side.

It clicked open.

Inside, there wasn’t a picture of Luca.

There was a picture of Adriana.

And she was holding a newborn baby.

On the opposite side, an inscription was engraved in the silver:

To my sister. Thank you for my life.

I stopped breathing.

“What are you doing?”

I spun around.

Adriana was standing in the doorway.

Her eyes dropped to my hands.

She didn’t yell.

She didn’t demand I hand it over.

She just closed the door behind her and locked it.

“You have no idea what you’re looking at, Emma.”

I stepped back.

“This is Elena’s locket.”

Adriana walked slowly toward me.

“It was never Elena’s.”

I stared at her.

“It’s in her portrait.”

“Because she wanted people to think it was hers.”

Adriana held out her hand.

“Give it to me.”

“Sophie said she met her mother.”

“Sophie met a woman who is sick and desperate.”

“Then why are you taking her there every Thursday?”

Adriana’s hand trembled.

Not with anger.

With terror.

“Because if Luca finds out who that woman really is, he will lose his daughter forever.”

She took a step closer.

“And Rosa will lose her son.”

She reached for the locket.

“I am the only thing keeping this family together. Now give it to me.”

I looked at the engraving again.

To my sister.

Elena didn’t have a sister.

I looked up at Adriana.

“Who is the baby in this picture?”

Adriana stared at me.

“Answer me.”

She finally whispered:

“It’s Sophie.”

My stomach dropped.

Before I could speak, the doorknob turned violently.

Someone pushed against the locked door.

“Adriana.”

It was Luca.

And he wasn’t alone.

“Open the door,” a woman’s voice said.

I froze.

I knew that voice.

It was the voice from the home videos Luca watched on his wife’s birthday.

Adriana closed her eyes and let out a broken sob.

“God forgive me.”

The door burst open.

And there stood Luca.

Next to a woman who had supposedly been dead for eight years.

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