Chapter 2 - An hour later, I parked outside a small café in the Arts District, tucked between a bookstore and a plant shop. The sign above the door read MORNING GLORY, though the windows were dark and the chairs were turned upside down on the tables.
Luca opened the door before I knocked.
He was not wearing the black suit from the day before. Instead, he had on a pale blue shirt with the sleeves rolled to his forearms. Without the formal clothes and the three waiting SUVs, he looked less like the intimidating head of a powerful family and more like a tired man who had forgotten to go home.
“You came,” he said.
“You asked me to.”
His mouth tilted slightly. “You keep saying that.”
“Because it keeps being true.”
He stepped aside.
The café smelled like cinnamon, coffee, and something buttery baking in the kitchen. A woman in her late thirties came through a doorway carrying two mugs.
She had Luca’s dark eyes but none of his reserve.
“You must be Claire,” she said.
I glanced at Luca.
“Giulia Moretti,” she continued. “I’ve heard a lot about you.”
“From Vanessa?”
“From Luca.”
The warmth in his sister’s voice made me suspicious. “What did he say?”
“That you were the only person in Las Vegas who could make him lose an argument.”
“I’ve known him for less than a day.”
“Then you’re very efficient.”
Luca gave his sister a warning look.
Giulia ignored him and placed a mug in front of me. “Coffee. There’s sugar on the table. If my brother starts speaking like a legal document, interrupt him.”
“I don’t speak like a legal document,” Luca said.
“You absolutely do.”
She kissed his cheek, nodded toward me, and disappeared into the kitchen.
I wrapped my hands around the mug. “She’s nice.”
“She is.”
“She doesn’t seem frightened of you.”
“She’s my sister.”
“That didn’t answer the question.”
“It answered it for her.”
For the first time, the corner of his mouth lifted.
Then he walked toward a small office at the back of the café. I followed.
The room held two filing cabinets, a desk, and several framed photographs. In one, Luca stood beside an older woman who looked like Giulia. In another, he was much younger, his arm around a boy with a gap-toothed smile.
I paused.
“Your family?”
“My cousins.”
“You look happy.”
“I was seventeen.”
“That doesn’t answer the question.”
He studied the photograph. “I was less aware of how complicated happiness could be.”
The answer was unexpectedly honest.
He opened a filing cabinet and removed a blue folder.
My stomach tightened.
It was plain, with no label on the cover.
“You had it,” I said.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because Vanessa asked me to keep it.”
“When?”
“Three weeks ago.”
I looked at him. “Three weeks ago?”
“She brought it to me after an argument.”
“With you?”
“With Ryan.”
That was not what I expected.
Luca placed the folder on the desk but did not open it.
“What was the argument about?”
“Money.”
The word seemed too ordinary for the tension gathering in the room.
“What kind of money?”
“Vanessa believed Ryan was borrowing from one of my business accounts.”
I stared at him. “Why would Ryan have access to your business accounts?”
“He didn’t. Not directly.”
“Then what does that mean?”
Luca leaned against the desk. “I own several commercial properties in Las Vegas. One of them houses the marketing firm where you work.”
I knew the building. Everyone in my office did. Our company had moved there two years earlier after the old lease expired.
“Your firm pays rent to one of my property companies,” he continued. “Ryan worked on some of the account paperwork.”
“He was an operations manager.”
“I know.”
“Are you saying he stole from you?”
“I’m saying there were irregularities.”
The room seemed to narrow around us.
“What kind of irregularities?”
“Payments redirected to a consulting company. The company was registered under a name I didn’t recognize.”
“Was Ryan involved?”
“I don’t know.”
“But Vanessa thought he was.”
“Vanessa thought he was being pressured by someone.”
“Who?”
Luca’s eyes stayed on mine. “She never said.”
I felt a familiar wave of disbelief rise in me. “Why didn’t you tell me this yesterday?”
“Because you had just learned that your husband left you with my wife. You were at the hospital with your father. I didn’t think details about commercial accounts would help.”
“You thought proposing a relationship would help?”
“I said it was a bad idea.”
“You said it was revenge.”
“I said that too.”
Despite everything, a breath of laughter escaped me.
It faded quickly.
“Open the folder.”
Luca did.
Inside were copies of invoices, bank statements, and emails printed on company letterhead. I recognized Ryan’s signature on several documents. Not his actual signature, but the electronic approval stamp he used at work.
I picked up one of the pages.
“This isn’t my department.”
“No.”
“But I’ve seen this vendor.”
“Where?”
“At work. They handled some of our digital campaigns.”
“What was the company called?”
I scanned the document. “Brightwell Strategies.”
“Does that mean anything to you?”
I frowned. “Not really.”
He slid another page across the desk.
This one was an email from Ryan to someone named M. Hale.
Claire won’t question the numbers if the revisions come through me. She trusts my judgment.
My skin prickled.
The date was six months earlier.
I read the sentence twice.
“What is this?” I whispered.
Luca did not answer.
I turned the page.
There were more emails.
Ryan discussing budget changes.
Ryan asking whether certain invoices could be split into smaller amounts.
Ryan assuring someone that I would approve the updated campaign projections because I had “too much on my plate” to examine every line.
My hands began to tremble.
“He used my name,” I said.
“Not exactly.”
“He used my trust.”
“Yes.”
I pushed the papers away. “Why would he do this?”
“We don’t know.”
“You said Vanessa thought he was being pressured.”
“She found the folder in his desk.”
“And then she brought it to you?”
“She was afraid he would destroy it.”
I looked up. “Afraid of Ryan?”
“Afraid of what would happen if the information became public.”
“To your business?”
“To everyone involved.”
I stood and moved toward the window. Outside, the street was empty except for a delivery truck parked by the bookstore.
My mind searched through the past six months, looking for signs I had missed.
Ryan asking me to approve a budget while I was on a client call.
Ryan telling me that accounting was being unreasonable.
Ryan becoming defensive whenever I mentioned the company’s new vendor.
At the time, I had thought he was under pressure.
I had defended him.
“How much money?” I asked.
“Not enough to ruin the company.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“Approximately two hundred thousand dollars.”
I turned around.
“He stole two hundred thousand dollars?”
“We don’t know that he kept it.”
“Where did it go?”
“That is what we were trying to determine.”
“We?”
“Vanessa and I.”
I stared at him. “You were investigating my husband with your wife?”
“She came to me.”
“You could have told me.”
“I considered it.”
“But you didn’t.”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because I didn’t know whether you were involved.”
The accusation was quiet, but it struck like a slap.
“You thought I was involved?”
“I thought you might have signed something without understanding it.”
“That is not the same thing.”
“It is when the documents carry your approval.”
I laughed once, without humor. “You think I’m capable of helping my husband steal from you?”
“I think people sometimes protect the person they love without asking enough questions.”
The words were not cruel. That made them worse.
Because he was right.
I had protected Ryan from questions. From criticism. From consequences. I had explained his absences, defended his moods, and told myself that marriage required patience.
“What did Vanessa find?” I asked.
Luca looked down at the folder.
“She found a second set of documents.”
“Where?”
“In Ryan’s home office.”
My pulse quickened. “Our home office?”
“Yes.”
“Did you go through my house?”
“Vanessa did.”
“When?”
“Last weekend.”
I remembered that weekend. Vanessa had come over while I was at the hospital with my father. She had said she needed to borrow a dress for a charity dinner.
I had given her a key years ago.
“You let her into my apartment.”
“I did not know she planned to search it.”
“You gave her access.”
“She was my wife.”
The words carried no defensiveness. Only regret.
I looked at the folder again. “What second set of documents?”
Luca removed a sealed envelope from the back pocket.
“This was inside the folder.”
The envelope was cream-colored and addressed in handwritten ink.
Claire Bennett
My heart began to pound.
“Why didn’t you give it to me yesterday?”
“Because I hadn’t opened it.”
“Why not?”
“It was addressed to you.”
I took the envelope.
The handwriting was not Ryan’s.
I knew it immediately.
The letters were narrow and slightly slanted, with a distinctive loop beneath the capital C.
Vanessa’s handwriting.
I looked at Luca. “Did she tell you what was inside?”
“No.”
“Then why did she call me?”
“I don’t know.”
I slid one finger beneath the seal.
“Claire,” Luca said.
I stopped.
“What?”
“If you don’t want to read it here, you don’t have to.”
“I do.”
“It may change what you think you know.”
“That happened yesterday.”
“It may change what you think about Vanessa.”
I looked at the envelope.
“Is that supposed to make me forgive her?”
“No.”
“What is it supposed to do?”
“Give you the truth before you make a decision.”
I opened it.
Inside was a single sheet of paper.
My eyes moved over the first line.
Claire,
If you are reading this, then Ryan has done what he promised he would never do.
I stopped breathing.
Below it, Vanessa had written:
He did not leave me because he loved me. He left because he believes you are the only person who can expose him.
I read the sentence again.
Then I looked at Luca.
“What did he do?” I asked.
Luca’s expression had gone still.
“I don’t know.”
I lowered my eyes to the page.
May you like
At the bottom, beneath Vanessa’s signature, was one final line:
Ask your father what happened to the Bennett Family Foundation account before Ryan married you.
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