Chapter 8 - THE PRICE OF THE TRUTH
The municipal building was built of pale brick and surrounded by an ordinary parking lot full of minivans and pickup trucks. If someone had told me a week earlier that the biggest secret in the Moretti family would be explained in a room beside a public library, I would have laughed.
I wasn't present for Nico's interview. I didn't need to be. Rachel invited me to her office afterward because Nico's statement included a detail about the cellar that only I could confirm.
She began by telling me the practical facts. Nico Moretti was alive. He had been living under an assumed surname, moving between seasonal jobs, and avoiding contact with his family. He had cooperated with police and agreed to provide documents. Investigators were examining his role in the events surrounding both the warehouse death and the twins' removal from the hospital.
"Is Luca okay?" I asked.
"He's shaken," Rachel said. "But he's staying with Lily, and he knows we'll handle the evidence."
"What did Nico say about the girls?"
Rachel sat back. "He says Victor Bellini convinced Adrian Price that Luca was too unstable and the business too dangerous for children. They used a fraudulent emergency custody scheme immediately after Abigail's delivery. Nico was told to drive one infant to a safe foster placement. When he discovered the second baby was being sent elsewhere, he protested. Victor threatened to expose Nico's involvement in the warehouse case unless he complied."
"So he went along with it?"
"He did. He says he told himself he'd come back when the children were safe. Years passed. He tried to keep track of them, but the Bellinis controlled the addresses."
"Lily spent years thinking her parents rejected her. Ellie was told Vanessa was her mother." Anger flared in my chest. "How could he call that keeping them safe?"
"He may have believed he was avoiding one danger while helping create another. That's for investigators and, eventually, a court to sort out."
I leaned forward. "What about the cellar?"
"Nico says it was used to conceal the children's visits during trust-account inspections. Vanessa occasionally brought one of them to the mansion when Luca traveled. There was supposed to be a separate stairwell, but the door was sealed during renovations."
I remembered the tiny room, the fake window, the growth marks drawn on the frame. "It wasn't a home. It was a hiding place."
"Yes," Rachel said. "And it's part of the investigation."
On my way out of Rachel's office, I passed a framed photograph of three women standing in front of a shelter for families. A handwritten note beneath it thanked the legal team for helping parents keep their housing after an unfair eviction. I stopped to read it.
Rachel found me there. "That was our first pro bono project," she said. "Different kind of case, same lesson. People make worse decisions when they believe they have no safe choice."
"Vanessa made sure I believed I had no safe choice," I said.
"Yes. Which is why your options matter now."
I told her that I had called an admissions counselor, though I hadn't yet applied. She smiled without turning it into a speech about bravery.
"Applications are just questions you ask the future," she said. "Sometimes the answer surprises you."
I carried that sentence out onto the sidewalk, where the wind lifted the hem of my coat and buses hissed beside the curb. It was such an ordinary day that I wanted to stop and memorize it. The city hadn't changed. I had.
For the first time, the future felt less like a wall I had to keep from falling and more like a door I might be allowed to open.
That night I sat with my father at his kitchen table while he sorted old medical bills. The numbers were still frightening, but at least they were numbers. We could make a plan for numbers. I told him I'd contacted a community college to ask about part-time classes in child development.
He looked up and grinned. "Your mother would be dancing around this kitchen."
"She'd ask if the tuition was reasonable first."
"Then she'd dance."
We laughed. The sound felt like opening a window.
At the mansion, the situation remained tense. The Bellini Foundation released a statement accusing Luca of attempting to seize children who were not his. Vanessa's attorney argued that the girls had been placed with caregivers because of credible concerns about Moretti family violence. Those concerns could not simply be dismissed; Luca had admitted his past entanglement with violent crime. But the public statement omitted the alleged falsified birth records, the conflicting guardianship documents, and years of deception.
Rachel responded through formal channels, refusing to trade accusations in the press. A court appointed independent representation for both girls and ordered preservation of the relevant hospital, school, and trust records. Arrangements for contact with their parents would be guided by the children's needs, not by a public relations battle.
Luca called me the following evening.
"Lily asked whether you could visit," he said. "I told her I would ask, not assume."
"That's good."
"Would you like to come for dinner? As a guest. If you'd rather not, I understand."
I hesitated. The mansion had been the scene of my assault. Walking through its front doors made my stomach tighten, even when I knew Vanessa was gone.
"Could we meet somewhere else?" I asked.
"Of course."
We arranged to meet at a small family restaurant with a private corner booth, accompanied by Mara and a trusted child-welfare support worker familiar with Lily's situation. Lily arrived wearing a green cardigan and carrying Button in a backpack.
"I picked the restaurant," she announced.
"Good choice," I said. "It smells like pizza."
"That's why."
Luca held out my chair, then stopped as though suddenly uncertain whether he should. I sat down myself and smiled to let him know he hadn't committed an international offense.
Over dinner, Lily described a science experiment involving bean sprouts, told Mara that cucumbers were an insult to sandwiches, and asked me whether all grown-ups eventually liked coffee.
"No," I told her. "Some of us never surrender."
Luca raised his cup. "Some of us live on it."
She shook her head in disappointment.
Between the garlic bread and dessert, she asked about Ellie. The support worker gently explained that her sister was safe and had been found, but needed time before they could visit. Lily thought about it.
"Does Ellie know I didn't forget her?" she asked.
"The people caring for her know that's important to you," the worker said. "They'll help you share that when she's ready."
Lily pressed Button to her chest. "I made her a star cookie. But it got stale."
"Then maybe we'll make another," I said.
She accepted that answer. Children can be astonishingly patient when adults finally tell them what they know and what they don't.
After dinner, Mara took Lily to wash her hands. Luca and I were alone across the booth for less than a minute.
"I heard you're applying for classes," he said.
"My father talks too much."
"He sounds proud."
"I'm terrified."
"Good," he said, then corrected himself. "Not good that you're frightened. I mean, doing something you want can be frightening. I hope you don't mistake the fear for a reason not to try."
I looked at him. "That's surprisingly decent advice from a man who couldn't figure out a board game."
He laughed. "I still think the rules were rigged."
For a moment we were just two people in a restaurant, enjoying a conversation. Then his phone vibrated. He glanced at the screen and the warmth vanished from his face.
"It's Rachel," he said.
He answered. I watched him listen, then close his eyes.
"When?" he asked. "Are both girls safe?"
He hung up and looked at me.
"The hospital found an original surgical log," he said. "Abigail delivered twins. The log was hidden in an off-site archive under the wrong patient number. Independent identity testing is underway under the court's supervision."
I exhaled slowly. It was the confirmation we had been moving toward, but hearing it aloud felt like stepping off a ledge and discovering solid ground beneath.
"That's good, isn't it?" I asked.
"It's a start." He rubbed a hand over his face. "There's more. Victor Bellini requested an emergency hearing to seek control over Ellie's placement. He submitted a statement from Nico saying I was involved in hiding the girls."
"But Nico just cooperated with police."
"The statement is dated six years ago."
"Could it be forged?"
"We don't know."
Across the restaurant, Lily was choosing a chocolate dessert. Luca watched her with a tenderness so fierce it hurt to see.
"I'm not going to let a courtroom become another place where she's told she isn't wanted," he said.
"Then don't," I replied. "Show up. Tell the truth. Even the parts that make you look bad."
He nodded, but the phone rang again before he could answer. This time it was Daniel.
"Boss," he said, "the detective found Vanessa's car. It was abandoned near the airport. Her passport wasn't in it."
"Do they think she left the country?"
"Not yet. But they found something in the trunk: a package addressed to Emma Reed."
My stomach dropped.
May you like
Luca looked at me across the table.
"It's not another threat," Daniel said. "It's a recording device. Vanessa left a message. She says she knows the one person who can prove what happened to the twins, and she'll speak only to Emma."
