Chapter 3
Gabriel Cole had not died.
That was the first truth Vanessa finally admitted.
The second was worse.
She had known.
Dante stood in the council room with the doors closed.
Vanessa sat opposite him.
Nico remained by the wall.
“What happened five years ago?”
Vanessa stared at her wedding ring.
“Gabriel disappeared.”
“You told me he was killed.”
“That’s what everyone believed.”
“But you saw him.”
“Six months later.”
“Where?”
“A motel outside Baltimore.”
“How?”
“He contacted me.”
“And Ethan?”
“Two then.”
“Gabriel saw him?”
“Yes.”
Dante felt anger rise.
He controlled it.
“What did Gabriel want?”
Vanessa looked at him.
“Revenge.”
There it was.
Not money.
Not escape.
Revenge.
“Against me.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“He said you destroyed his family.”
Dante almost laughed.
“I barely knew Gabriel.”
“He knew you.”
“Through who?”
“Your uncle Rafael.”
The name changed the room.
Rafael Moretti was Dante’s father’s younger brother.
Seventy-one.
Retired from daily business.
Respected by everyone.
The man who held Dante’s shoulder at Sofia’s funeral.
“What did Rafael tell him?”
“That your father ordered Gabriel’s father killed.”
Dante frowned.
Gabriel’s father, Marcus Cole, had died in a warehouse fight almost thirty years earlier.
Dante had been twenty-two.
“He died during the North Yard war.”
“That is what you were told.”
Another old grave opening.
Vanessa continued:
“Gabriel believed your father arranged it because Marcus refused to move product for the Morettis.”
“Possible.”
“You admit it?”
“I admit my father did things I learned about too late.”
Vanessa stared.
Dante continued:
“But my father has been dead eleven years.”
“Gabriel blamed you for keeping the empire.”
“Convenient.”
“Yes.”
The answer surprised him.
Vanessa looked toward the closed doors.
“At first I believed Gabriel.”
“At first.”
“Then I married you.”
“For him?”
“Yes.”
Nico looked at her.
Dante said nothing.
Vanessa continued:
“Gabriel told me to get close.”
“Learn schedules.”
“Family habits.”
“Old rooms.”
“He wanted something Sofia hid.”
“The blue door.”
“Yes.”
“What?”
“I don’t know.”
“Lie.”
“I swear.”
Dante watched her.
She was terrified.
But not only of him.
“Why Lily?”
“Gabriel said Sofia taught Lily a song.”
Dante went still.
Sofia had sung constantly around their daughter.
Old Italian lullabies.
Children’s songs.
Nonsense melodies she invented.
“She was an infant.”
“Gabriel said children remember rhythm before language.”
Dante looked at the brass key.
“So you conditioned her to clean near the door.”
Vanessa’s face tightened.
“I needed her close enough to recognize something.”
“You dressed her in rags.”
“That was today.”
“Why?”
Vanessa’s voice broke.
“Margaret was coming.”
Dante frowned.
“My aunt Margaret?”
“Your father’s sister.”
Margaret Moretti was eighty.
Rarely left her house.
“What does she have to do with this?”
“Gabriel said if Lily looked like a Moretti princess, Margaret would watch her.”
“So you humiliated my daughter.”
“To keep attention off her.”
Dante stared.
Vanessa rushed:
“I know how it sounds.”
“No.”
His voice became cold.
“You know how it was.”
She stopped.
There was no honorable version of making a child feel lesser.
Protection did not erase cruelty.
Dante asked:
“Why Ethan?”
Vanessa lowered her eyes.
“Gabriel wanted him close to you.”
“As what?”
“A replacement.”
Dante felt something dark.
“For Lily.”
“Yes.”
“He wanted me to treat Ethan like an heir.”
“Yes.”
“And Lily?”
“Small.”
“Invisible.”
“Outside the main family.”
“That is why you told him she was his servant.”
Vanessa began crying.
“I never wanted him to repeat it.”
Dante almost laughed.
Of course.
Cruelty was acceptable until witnesses heard it.
“What did Gabriel promise you?”
“That when this was over, Ethan would be safe.”
“From who?”
Vanessa looked toward the wall.
“Rafael.”
Dante’s eyes narrowed.
There.
Not simple revenge.
Gabriel blamed Dante.
Yet feared Rafael.
“Why Rafael?”
May you like
Vanessa swallowed.
“Gabriel says Rafael killed Sofia.”
