Chapter 1
“You never feared the dress. You feared what she sewed inside.”
The USB sat in my palm while Marcella stared at it like it had already destroyed her wedding.
Vivia was behind me, one small hand wrapped around my trouser leg. The old dress hung unevenly where the inner seam had torn, and the champagne glasses Marcella knocked from the table were still rolling across the marble.
Marcella whispered, “Nico, burn it.”
That was the wrong thing to say.
Rafe moved between us before she could lunge again. The wedding guests had stopped pretending not to listen. Men who had spent half their lives around Bellandi violence suddenly found the floor fascinating.
I crouched and picked up the folded note.
I knew the handwriting.
Elena.
My wife had been dead for two years.
For one second, I forgot how to breathe.
Vivia touched my sleeve.
“Mommy wrote it?”
“Yes.”
My voice barely worked.
I opened the note.
Nico—
If Vivia is wearing this dress, then Marcella never found what I hid.
Do not let her tell you I was confused.
Do not let her tell you the crash was my fault.
Open the file marked FIRST.
Marcella stepped backward.
I looked up.
Her face gave me the truth before the USB ever could.
“Elena’s crash.”
Marcella shook her head immediately.
“No.”
“You haven’t heard the question yet.”
“Nico—”
I stood.
“What did you do?”
Her eyes filled.
Not guilt.
Fear.
Rafe brought me a secured laptop from the club office adjoining the ballroom. I inserted the USB myself.
Five folders appeared.
FIRST.
MARCELLA.
THE WEDDING.
VIVIA.
IF I DON’T COME HOME.
My hand stopped over the keyboard.
The wedding.
Not our wedding.
Marcella’s.
Today.
Elena had hidden this drive two years before Marcella ever announced she was getting married.
I looked at my sister.
“You knew this day was coming when Elena was still alive.”
Marcella’s lips parted.
No words came.
I opened the first file.
Elena appeared on-screen.
Alive.
May you like
And the first thing my dead wife said was:
“If Nico is seeing this at Marcella’s wedding, then she finally did exactly what she promised me she would do.”
