Chapter 8 - Two Mothers Came Home

Anna Vieri did not want to return to the Romano estate.

So we met her in a small government office the next afternoon.

Marcella arrived first.

She wore no red gown.

No diamonds.

No wedding ring.

Only a gray sweater and a face that looked younger without certainty.

When Anna entered, Marcella stood.

Neither woman spoke.

They had the same eyes.

That was enough.

Anna was fifty-one.

Her hair was almost completely silver.

The scar above her eyebrow was still visible.

Marcella touched her own scar.

Anna began crying.

“I’m sorry.”

Marcella looked at her.

“Did you leave me?”

Anna shook her head.

“I tried to take you.”

“Then why didn’t you?”

“Elena had papers. Lawyers. Men who followed me everywhere.”

Anna sat down.

“She told me that if I fought her, I would disappear and you would grow up believing I abandoned you.”

Marcella gave a broken laugh.

“That happened anyway.”

“Yes.”

Anna did not defend herself.

“I was a coward for too long.”

Clara looked at her from across the room.

“So was I.”

The two women had met once before.

Twenty-nine years ago.

Anna had come to Clara after discovering the false accounts.

Clara had already begun suspecting Elena in Giovanni’s death.

They planned to expose her together.

Then Giovanni died.

Then Dr. Varga disappeared.

Then Clara was forced into hiding.

Then Anna lost Marcella.

Elena did not destroy one family.

She kept them separated long enough that each believed the others had chosen silence.

Alessio sat beside the window.

“What happened to my father?”

Anna looked at him.

“I saw Luca the day he died.”

Clara stood.

“You did?”

Anna nodded.

“He came to Lyon looking for Varga.”

“What happened?” Alessio asked.

“Elena called him using a recording of Clara’s voice.”

Clara stared.

“A recording?”

“Old answering-machine tapes. Family messages. Enough pieces to imitate a short warning.”

Alessio looked sick.

“She made him believe I had been taken.”

Anna nodded.

“Luca left the clinic. He met two men in a parking garage.”

“Did you see them?”

“One.”

Anna opened her bag.

She removed an old photograph.

A man standing beside Elena at a charity event.

“He worked for her companies for years.”

The investigators already knew his name.

He was still alive.

Still employed by a Marconi subsidiary.

By evening, he was in custody.

By midnight, he had asked for a lawyer.

The next morning, he began talking.

Not because of loyalty.

Because the archive contained payment records with his signature.

He admitted that Luca Romano had been lured from the clinic.

He admitted the car accident was staged afterward.

He admitted Elena had ordered the cover-up.

And he admitted something nobody expected.

Elena had not ordered Giovanni’s death alone.

There had been a second person.

Alessio’s face hardened when he heard that.

“Who?”

The investigator placed a copied ledger page on the table.

A second set of initials appeared beside Elena’s.

L.R.

Alessio stared at them.

“My father?”

Clara shook her head immediately.

“No.”

The investigator pointed to the date.

The initials had been written before Luca Romano joined Giovanni’s company.

Thomas looked closer.

Then his face changed.

“I know those initials.”

Alessio turned.

Thomas whispered:

“Lorenzo Romano.”

Alessio’s great-uncle.

Giovanni’s younger brother.

A man who had died ten years ago with a reputation for loyalty.

Clara sat down slowly.

“Lorenzo helped Elena poison Giovanni.”

Thomas nodded.

“And after Giovanni died, Lorenzo became chairman for six months.”

Alessio looked at the ledger.

“Until my father removed him.”

The entire story shifted again.

This had never been only Marconi against Romano.

The betrayal had started inside both families.

And the final proof was still missing.

The investigator turned another page.

One entry was circled.

PRIVATE SAFE — ROMANO CEMETERY.

Thomas closed his eyes.

Alessio looked at him.

“You know where it is.”

The gardener nodded.

“Yes.”

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Then he looked toward the garden outside.

“It’s under the empty grave.”