Chapter 3 - The Five-Thousand-Dollar Receipt Led Adrien to the Real Betrayal, and He Learned Why Elena's Parents Had Sold HerAdrien investigated my family.
I didn't know.
For two weeks.
Then he showed me the file.
My parents' names.
Walter Crane's payment.
The $5,000.
I stared.
“You knew?”
“Yes.”
“You searched my family.”
“Yes.”
“You had no right.”
“No.”
He didn't defend himself.
That made me angrier.
“You bought me.”
“No.”
“Then what?”
“I bought the debt.”
I stared.
He explained.
Walter Crane had arranged the transaction.
But the money had not gone directly to my parents.
It had been used to cover a medical debt owed to a company connected to Moretti Holdings.
Someone had engineered my parents' desperation.
Someone had wanted me inside the Moretti house.
The question was why.
Adrien showed me another document.
My father's signature.
A confidentiality agreement.
He had promised to deliver me.
I felt sick.
“Why?”
Adrien looked at the paper.
“I don't know.”
“Then find out.”
He nodded.
For the first time, I saw anger in his eyes.
Not toward me.
Toward the people who had sold me.
The investigation uncovered a hidden family connection.
My father had once worked for the Moretti organization.
He had handled accounts.
He had stolen from them.
He had disappeared.
But before he disappeared, he copied something.
A ledger.
A ledger that could destroy several powerful people.
And somehow, that ledger had been passed to me without my knowledge.
Adrien looked at me.
“Do you remember your father's study?”
“Yes.”
“Anything hidden?”
I remembered a wooden box.
My mother had told me never to touch it.
I had forgotten about it.
We found it in storage.
Inside was a key.
And a photograph.
Adrien recognized the man beside my father.
His uncle.
Antonio Moretti.
Adrien went pale.
“My uncle.”
The same man who had been advising him for years.
The same man who had proposed hiring me.
The same man who had arranged the $5,000 payment.
I whispered:
“He sold me.”
May you like
Adrien nodded.
“Again.”
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