Chapter 5
My father rarely spoke about Lorenzo.
They were brothers.
They were also enemies by the end.
The official story was that Lorenzo became reckless, opened unauthorized routes, and died before the conflict could become permanent.
Afterward my father cleaned up what remained.
I inherited the organization years later.
That was the version.
Rafe gave me another.
“My father served Lorenzo,” he said.
I looked at him.
“You never mentioned that.”
“You never asked.”
Dangerous answer.
He knew it.
“I should have told you.”
Better.
Rafe explained Lorenzo believed the Rienzi organization should not be controlled by one bloodline branch. He wanted a permanent council composed of Rienzi, Ashworth, Mercer, and Bell families.
My father refused.
Lorenzo began building alliances privately.
Edmund Ashworth was one.
“How does Genevieve fit?”
Rafe looked at her.
“She was a child.”
Genevieve answered herself.
“My father promised Uncle Lorenzo that one day Ashworth blood would enter the Rienzi household.”
I almost laughed.
“So this was arranged when we were children.”
“No.”
“Then what?”
Genevieve’s voice sharpened.
“You chose me.”
True.
That was the cruel elegance of it.
No forced marriage.
No obvious manipulation.
Our paths simply crossed at precisely the right events.
Her invitations increased.
Mutual contacts appeared.
Business meetings became dinners.
Dinners became private.
I thought chance had become attraction.
Maybe attraction was real.
The surrounding architecture was not.
“Did your father engineer our first meeting?”
She looked away.
I remembered it.
A charity auction.
I had almost skipped.
Rafe convinced me to attend.
I looked at him.
He went still.
“You?”
“No.”
Too fast.
I stepped closer.
“Who asked you to push me into that room?”
Rafe’s jaw tightened.
“My father.”
His father had been dead three years.
Another inherited instruction.
The entire relationship suddenly felt crowded with ghosts.
Genevieve looked almost relieved.
“See? This was bigger than me.”
Wrong defense.
“You still chose what happened after you learned.”
Her relief vanished.
I asked:
“When did you know?”
She whispered:
“Before our second date.”
Eighteen months.
She had looked into my face for eighteen months knowing our relationship began as a pathway into my organization.
Then she made the mistake of trying to justify it.
“I fell in love with you.”
I believed her.
May you like
That made the betrayal worse, not smaller.
Because love had not stopped her from completing the plan.
