Chapter 9 - Rose's Greatest Lie
I had been told my father died before I was old enough to remember him.
Grandma Rose never contradicted my mother's story.
My mother died when I was nineteen, leaving behind a box of birthday cards and no answers.
Now Eleanor was claiming my father's life had been connected to a fire that happened years before I was born.
"Make that make sense," I said.
Eleanor gestured for me to sit.
I remained standing.
"Your father was the intended witness," she explained. "Not the intended victim of the fire itself. He was a boy then. Enzo's men burned the warehouse to destroy records about his family, and the boy escaped with a document. Years later, when he tried to tell the truth, Enzo came after him."
"His name?"
"Thomas Carter."
My father's name.
The room seemed to contract around it.
Eleanor explained that Thomas had worked for Rose when he was young and had discovered payments linking Enzo to the fire and to later arms shipments.
Rose had married his uncle and treated Thomas like a son long before he met my mother.
The family relationships were messy, but the underlying truth was simple.
My father had not been lost to a random highway accident.
He had been silenced because he knew too much.
"What proof do you have?" I asked.
Eleanor opened a cabinet and removed a cassette recorder and an envelope.
Inside were photographs of Thomas at the bakery, a carbon copy of a shipping invoice, and a letter dated six months before his supposed death.
The letter was addressed to me, though I had not yet been born.
He had written that if I ever inherited his questions, I should choose the truth but never confuse it with revenge.
My hands shook as I read.
Matteo stood quietly beside me without trying to touch me.
Eleanor pressed play on the recorder.
Rose's younger voice filled the room.
"If you're hearing this, I couldn't keep the children out of it. Enzo Vescari used the fire to erase debts and witnesses. Lucia tried to stop him. I hid Eleanor because the police captain was taking Enzo's money. Thomas found the account books, and Enzo's men came for him."
Rose's voice broke for a moment.
"Emily deserves the life we never had. I won't give her a grave full of secrets instead of a childhood."
The recording ended.
I felt anger at my grandmother, grief for her, and gratitude all at once.
She had denied me the truth.
She had also denied an enemy the chance to find a little girl through her father's investigation.
"Who killed him?" I asked.
Eleanor lowered her gaze.
"I don't know. But I heard the name of the man who authorized it."
"Enzo?"
She shook her head.
"Dominic. He was already running his father's business."
Matteo stepped away from the wall.
"My uncle murdered her father?"
"I said he authorized the job. We never recovered the evidence."
I forced myself to breathe.
A witness statement was not a conviction.
But it was a direction, and now I had a reason to investigate that I could barely hold steady.
Dana's phone buzzed on the table.
She read the message and swore.
Someone had filed emergency guardianship papers claiming Isabella was unstable and Sofia needed immediate placement with Dominic Vescari.
There was a hearing scheduled the next morning.
Matteo's uncle was no longer merely trying to frighten the girl silent.
May you like
He was trying to take legal control of her.
