Chapter 12
Luca Bellandi did not return dramatically.
I brought him.
He lived two states away under another surname and owned a modest vineyard.
No guards.
No army.
No apparent interest in my chair.
That almost made me angrier at the dead men who had used his name.
He entered the library and looked at me for a long time.
“You look like Dad.”
“So do you.”
Not quite true.
But enough.
Then he saw Elena.
His face changed.
“I heard you died.”
“So did Salvatore.”
Luca looked at Adrian.
Understanding came quickly.
“You.”
Adrian said nothing.
I asked Luca the question that mattered.
“Did Matteo approach you?”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“Four months after Elena’s funeral.”
My jaw tightened.
“What did he offer?”
“The Bellandi name back.”
“And?”
“I refused.”
The old captains looked surprised.
Luca laughed.
“You all thought exile makes a man spend his life staring at a chair.”
Samuel lowered his eyes.
Luca continued.
“Matteo said Salvatore was unstable. That grief had made him dangerous.”
I almost smiled.
Classic.
When someone refuses control, call their emotion instability.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
Luca looked at me.
“You were the man who benefited from my exile.”
Fair.
“You thought I knew.”
“Yes.”
Another family wound built from assumptions.
Elena watched both of us.
Then said:
“Matteo counted on that.”
I looked at her.
She was right.
Every branch of this conspiracy depended on isolation.
Me from Elena.
Luca from me.
Captains from truth.
Servants from authority.
Everyone knew fragments.
Nobody compared them.
Adrian finally spoke.
“Luca being innocent changes nothing.”
I looked at him.
“No.”
Then at my brother.
“It changes one thing.”
“What?”
I turned back to Adrian.
“You spent three years using secrets because you believed nobody would ever put the whole family in one room.”
May you like
His face tightened.
And now that room existed.
