She Caught Her Fiancé Kissing Her Own Sister, Fled With Mafia Secrets Hidden Beneath Her Pastries

They returned to the Bellandi estate shortly before midnight.

Lucia had not released the envelope since leaving Termini. Her fingers ached from gripping it, and her shoulders had tightened until every movement hurt.

Matteo noticed but said nothing until they entered the library.

“Sit down,” he instructed.

“I can stand.”

“You can. But you have been standing for fourteen hours, and you nearly fell asleep in the car.”

“I was thinking.”

“Apparently, thinking requires a considerable amount of effort.”

Lucia gave him a tired look.

“Are you always this charming after a near-death experience?”

“Only when I am trying to distract someone from having a panic attack.”

She opened her mouth to argue.

Then she realized he was right.

Her breathing had become shallow, and a faint tremor had begun in her hands. The realization made her angry, as though her body had betrayed her in the same way Enzo had.

Matteo pulled out a chair.

“Sit, Lucia.”

This time, she did.

He placed a glass of water before her and stepped away while she drank.

The small kindness unsettled her more than she wanted to admit. She was accustomed to people either demanding her attention or requiring something from her. Matteo seemed able to recognize distress without immediately trying to turn it into a negotiation.

That did not make him trustworthy.

It made him difficult to understand.

Dario entered the library a few minutes later, carrying a tablet and a stack of printed reports.

“We checked the compromised security code,” he said. “The transaction was authorized through an old administrative terminal. The current system recorded the code but not the person who entered it.”

Matteo glanced toward Alessandro.

“Could someone have accessed the terminal remotely?”

“Yes, if they knew the old credentials,” Alessandro replied. “The administrative office retained a separate connection for archived files. It was supposed to be disabled after the system was updated.”

“Was it?”

Alessandro hesitated.

“No.”

Matteo's expression became colder.

“Why?”

“Because disabling it would have required the complete migration of several older financial records. The process was delayed.”

“By whom?”

Alessandro lowered his eyes to the documents.

“By me.”

The room became quiet.

Lucia watched the accountant carefully. He appeared tired, but beneath the exhaustion was a tension that had not been there the previous evening.

“Did you authorize the transaction?” Matteo asked.

“No.”

“Did you know someone had used your access system?”

“No.”

“Then you will have no objection to an independent audit.”

Alessandro swallowed.

“Of course not.”

Matteo said nothing more. He turned toward Lucia and placed the digital recorder on the table.

“Let's see what your father left us.”

Dario connected the recorder to a small audio interface. The device crackled before a man's familiar voice emerged from the speakers.

Lucia stopped breathing.

“Test one. Giuseppe Vissi. October seventeenth.”

Her father's voice sounded tired but clear. There was a faint hum in the background, perhaps from a refrigerator or an old machine.

“I'm recording this because I no longer believe paper is safe. If anyone finds this, I need them to understand that the shipping discrepancies are not simple theft. Someone has constructed a network that makes legitimate companies appear responsible for illegal transactions.”

A pause followed.

“I spoke to Paolo. He believes the money is being used to control officials who have accepted payments. The payments themselves are only the beginning. Once a person takes the money, the network creates evidence that makes it appear they knowingly participated in every part of the operation. Then those people can be threatened into doing whatever is asked of them.”

Lucia covered her mouth.

Matteo leaned forward.

The recording continued.

“Paolo wants to bring everything to the authorities, but we do not know which officials have already been compromised. Vittorio Serra says he can arrange protection. I do not trust him.”

Another pause.

“I may be wrong. I hope I am wrong. But the records show that payments are being approved by people who claim they have no knowledge of the transactions. Someone inside the Bellandi organization is helping the Rosatis conceal the trail.”

Matteo's face hardened.

Then Giuseppe said something that made the entire room go still.

“If Matteo hears this, tell him his father knew more than he admitted.”

The recorder emitted a brief burst of static.

Lucia turned toward Matteo.

He did not look at her.

His eyes remained fixed on the table.

The voice continued.

“Your father was told about the illegal shipments. He wanted them stopped, but he was afraid that exposing the truth would destroy the family business. He believed he could negotiate a quiet end to the arrangement. Paolo disagreed. He wanted everything documented.”

A soft sigh came through the speakers.

“Matteo, I am sorry. Your father asked me to keep Paolo's discoveries away from you because he feared you would start a war with the wrong people. I agreed to help for a time. I thought I could protect both of you by keeping the evidence separate.”

The recording went silent for several seconds.

Then Giuseppe spoke again.

“If you are listening to this, I failed.”

Lucia's eyes filled with tears.

Her father had been afraid. He had carried an entire conspiracy in his head while continuing to bake bread and smile at customers. He had watched his daughter fall in love with a man whose family name appeared in the same documents that frightened him.

Why had he never told her?

Because he had believed silence would keep her safe.

The realization hurt more than she expected.

Matteo reached toward the recorder, but the voice continued.

“There is one more thing. The star is not the name of a company. It is a record of every person who received money, every person who authorized it, and every person who was threatened into continuing the arrangement.”

A faint noise sounded in the background.

Giuseppe lowered his voice.

“Someone has been asking about Lucia. They know she is engaged to Enzo Rosati. They believe marriage will give them access to Dolce Stella and the documents hidden there.”

Lucia felt as though the floor had disappeared beneath her.

“They plan to make her the owner of the entire operation on paper. When the money is traced, her name will appear beside every transfer. Enzo will claim he trusted his future wife to handle the accounts.”

Matteo's hand closed into a fist.

The recording continued.

“If they come for the ledger, do not hand it over. If they come for Lucia, do not let them make her believe she has no one.”

There was a final rustle.

Then the recording ended.

Nobody moved.

Lucia stared at the small device.

Her father had known.

He had known Enzo was dangerous. He had known her wedding could become a trap. He had known someone wanted to use her bakery.

Yet he had died without telling her the truth.

She wiped her cheeks angrily.

“Why didn't he tell me?”

No one answered immediately.

Finally, Matteo said, “Because he believed that if you knew nothing, you could be kept out of it.”

“That's what everyone says.”

“I know.”

“Enzo wanted to use me. My father hid everything. Your family concealed the truth. Everyone decided what was best for me without asking what I wanted.”

Her voice broke.

“I am so tired of being protected by lies.”

Matteo looked at her for a long moment.

Then he said, “You have every right to be.”

She was surprised by the absence of defensiveness in his voice.

He could have told her that Giuseppe had been right, that her father's decision had saved her from greater danger, or that Enzo's betrayal was unrelated to the choices other people had made.

Instead, Matteo let her anger exist.

It was the first time that day someone had done so without trying to explain it away.

Alessandro began examining the recorded file.

“There is a second segment.”

He adjusted the settings, and another recording began.

Giuseppe's voice returned, quieter this time.

“The person inside the organization has access to the administrative accounts and the shipping records. I have not been able to identify him with certainty. I suspect he is close to the family, someone trusted enough to move between the business and the private estate without attracting attention.”

A chair creaked in the background.

“Carlo says he suspects the legal department. I suspect the accounting department. We may both be right, because the system requires cooperation between the two.”

Alessandro stopped moving.

Lucia noticed.

“What's wrong?”

“Nothing,” he replied too quickly.

Matteo turned toward him.

“Continue.”

The recording ended with Giuseppe reading a short list of initials. Most were unclear, but the last two sounded unmistakable.

“A.F.”

Alessandro's face became pale.

Lucia stared at him.

“Your initials.”

“Yes.”

“Does your name appear elsewhere in the documents?”

Alessandro removed his glasses and rubbed the bridge of his nose.

“My name appears on legitimate financial reports. I was the accountant responsible for certain shipping records before the department was reorganized.”

“Were you involved in Paolo's final shipment?”

“I supervised the accounts.”

“Then why didn't you tell us?”

“Because I believed the irregularities had been corrected.”

Matteo stepped away from the table.

“Who told you that?”

Alessandro said nothing.

Dario moved closer to the door.

“Matteo,” he warned quietly.

The accountant finally looked up.

“Vittorio Serra.”

The name hung in the air.

Alessandro explained that Serra had approached him after the first discrepancies appeared, claiming that several shipments had been entered under incorrect reference numbers. He had promised that the records would be corrected before the next audit.

At first, Alessandro had believed him.

Then his daughter had received a threatening letter.

It contained a photograph of her leaving school and the name of the street where she lived with her mother.

Serra had told him that nobody needed to get hurt if Alessandro cooperated.

He had been asked to delay the system migration, retain the old access terminal, and approve several transactions that appeared legitimate on paper.

He had not known the full extent of the operation, he insisted. He had never intended for Paolo to disappear, and he had never known about Giuseppe's death.

But he had known enough to be afraid.

“So you helped them,” Matteo said.

“I made a terrible mistake.”

“You helped them move money through my company.”

“I thought I was protecting my daughter.”

“You were protecting her by threatening someone else's family with the consequences.”

Alessandro's shoulders sagged.

“I know.”

For a moment, Lucia saw him not as a villain or an innocent man, but as a person who had chosen the wrong compromise and spent years trying to avoid its consequences.

She understood the temptation.

Every morning, she had stayed silent about small things she disliked because she believed they were easier to tolerate than conflict. She had excused Enzo's controlling behavior because she imagined it came from love. She had let Valentina's casual insults pass because she wanted to keep the family together.

Small compromises could become enormous when repeated long enough.

“Where is your daughter now?” Lucia asked.

“With her mother, outside Rome. They believe they are safe.”

Matteo turned toward Dario.

“Arrange protection for both of them. Independent security. No one from the old network.”

Alessandro looked at him in disbelief.

“You would do that?”

“I am doing it because your daughter did not choose your mistakes.”

Then Matteo looked at the accountant.

“But you will give a complete statement. Every account, every order, every conversation with Serra. You will cooperate with the investigation, and you will not conceal anything else.”

Alessandro nodded.

“I will.”

“Good. Because if you lie again, I will consider it a choice, not a mistake.”

Alessandro lowered his head.

After he left the room, Lucia approached Matteo.

“You could have had him arrested.”

“I could have.”

“Why didn't you?”

“Because we need the full network, and because his daughter deserves to remain safe whether her father helps us or not.”

He looked at the closed door.

“I have spent years believing that fear gives me the right to decide what happens to people. It does not. It only explains why they obey.”

Lucia studied him.

“Who taught you that?”

“My father.”

“Did he teach you anything else?”

Matteo's expression shifted.

“Never depend on anyone you cannot afford to lose.”

“That sounds lonely.”

“It was intended to make me strong.”

“Did it?”

He considered the question.

“It made me difficult to kill.”

“That isn't the same thing.”

“No,” he admitted. “It isn't.”

For several seconds, the library seemed to hold a silence that belonged to neither of them alone.

Matteo walked to the window.

“When Paolo disappeared, I searched every port, every warehouse, every private clinic I could reach. I paid people who had no business taking my money and threatened people who had no part in his disappearance. I destroyed relationships before they could become vulnerabilities.”

He paused.

“I told myself that if I found the person responsible, everything would return to the way it was.”

“Did it?”

“No.”

Lucia approached the window, leaving a careful distance between them.

“When my father died, I tried to keep Dolce Stella exactly as he had left it. I kept his recipes, his tools, and his old chair in the office. I thought if I changed too much, I would lose what remained of him.”

Matteo glanced at her.

“Did that work?”

“No. It only made me afraid of changing things that needed to change.”

Their eyes met.

For the first time, neither seemed eager to look away.

A knock interrupted the moment.

Dario entered carrying a new report.

“We have confirmation that Vittorio Serra visited the Bellandi estate yesterday afternoon.”

Matteo frowned.

“Why wasn't I informed?”

“His appointment was entered through the legal department. He met with Alessandro for forty minutes.”

Lucia felt a cold sensation spread through her body.

“Yesterday afternoon,” she repeated. “Before I found the papers.”

Dario nodded.

“And before the locker was opened.”

Matteo took the report.

“Is there a record of what they discussed?”

“No. But the visitor log shows Serra requested access to the archived financial system.”

Alessandro had been telling the truth.

He had also been meeting the man who had threatened his daughter while Matteo's family remained unaware.

Lucia looked toward the stairs.

“How much of this house does Serra control?”

Matteo folded the report.

“Less than he thinks.”

“And how much of the city?”

His silence answered her.

That night, Matteo arranged for Lucia to stay in a bedroom closer to the main corridor. More security personnel were positioned outside, but he allowed her to choose whether the door would remain open.

She chose to close it.

Not because she feared Matteo.

Because she wanted one place where she could decide who entered.

Before she went to sleep, she placed her father's recipe notebook on the bedside table and opened it to the warning.

THE STAR MUST NOT FALL INTO ROSATI HANDS.

For the first time, she understood that the star might refer not only to a ledger but to the people whose lives had been trapped inside the conspiracy.

Her father had spent his final weeks trying to protect strangers, his family, and a boy who believed he could expose corruption without being destroyed by it.

She wished he had trusted her enough to share the burden.

But wishing could not change the past.

Lucia closed the notebook.

Tomorrow, she would find out what the star really contained. She would learn why Enzo had chosen her, why Valentina had helped him, and why someone had spent years building a criminal operation around her father's honest little bakery.

And if Matteo Bellandi intended to help her uncover the truth, she would make certain he understood one thing.