Chapter 5
The purchase had been made through the gala budget.
That changed everything.
The museum’s accounting manager found the charge within an hour.
It had been listed as:
SPECIALTY COSTUME SUPPORT — $1,840.
The approval belonged to Diane.
Julian stared at the screen.
“She bought it?”
Cesare did not answer immediately.
The vendor supplied display costumes, mannequins, and reproduction clothing for museum exhibits.
The order contained two custom padded pregnancy forms.
Two.
Not one.
Vanessa had been wearing one.
The second had been hanging inside the cloakroom.
The purchase was made five months earlier.
Nine days before Vanessa told Julian she was pregnant.
Diane arrived at Cesare’s home that evening after he asked her to come.
She walked into the library already angry.
“You searched museum accounts because of me?”
“I reviewed an expense you approved.”
“You embarrassed me in front of my staff.”
Cesare placed the purchase record on the table.
Diane looked at it.
For the first time, she did not answer immediately.
Julian stood near the fireplace.
“You bought them.”
Diane slowly removed her gloves.
“Vanessa asked for help.”
“With what?”
Diane looked toward Cesare.
Then back at Julian.
“She told me she thought she might lose you.”
“So you helped her fake a pregnancy?”
“She said it would only be temporary.”
Julian laughed.
“Five months?”
“I kept telling her to end it.”
Vanessa was not there to contradict her.
That bothered Cesare.
He asked one question.
“Why two?”
Diane frowned.
“What?”
“Why did you order two stomach pieces?”
“I don’t remember.”
Cesare leaned back.
A woman who remembered seating plans from gala dinners ten years earlier suddenly could not remember why she purchased two custom pregnancy prosthetics.
Julian started pacing.
“What was supposed to happen when the baby was due?”
Diane said nothing.
“How did you think this ended?”
“I assumed Vanessa would tell you.”
“When?”
Again, no answer.
Cesare watched his sister.
Diane was not protecting Vanessa because she approved of the lie.
She was protecting something about the lie’s structure.
There had always needed to be an ending.
A fake pregnancy could not continue forever.
Someone had planned for that.
Cesare pushed the invoice toward Diane.
“You have until tomorrow to decide whether you want to tell me why there were two.”
Diane stood.
“You don’t command me.”
Cesare looked toward the door.
“No.”
His voice remained calm.
“But you will no longer command anything inside my museum.”
Diane froze.
For twenty-three years, she had helped run the Lombardi Foundation’s events.
May you like
Cesare had never removed her from anything.
Until now.
