Chapter 7 - Whose Son?
Mrs. Moretti did not speak until we were back inside the SUV.
The burning cottage disappeared behind us, orange light shrinking between the trees as firefighters arrived from the nearby town.
Leo slept with his head against Vanessa's chest.
She refused to let anyone else hold him.
Luca sat across from his mother with the photograph in his hand.
He had turned it over so many times that the corners were beginning to bend.
ASK YOUR MOTHER WHOSE SON.
Finally, he said, “Tell me.”
Mrs. Moretti looked out the window.
“Not while the child is here.”
Vanessa's arms tightened around Leo.
“He's asleep.”
“Children hear more than adults think.”
No one argued.
We drove to a Moretti-owned safe residence twenty minutes away, a large stone house hidden behind iron gates and bare winter trees.
Marco secured the property.
Leo was carried upstairs and put into bed with two guards outside his room.
Only then did we gather in the library.
Mrs. Moretti placed the photograph on a table.
For a long moment, she simply looked at it.
“I was twenty-four,” she said.
Luca stood across from her.
“And the baby?”
She closed her eyes.
“You.”
The word seemed to empty the room of air.
Luca did not move.
Vanessa looked at him.
I watched his face become unreadable.
“Why is Matteo in the photograph?” he asked.
Mrs. Moretti folded her hands.
“Because Matteo spent years believing you were his son.”
Vanessa whispered, “Oh my God.”
Luca stared at his mother.
“Was he right?”
“No.”
“You answered too quickly.”
Pain crossed her face.
“Because I have answered that question to myself every day for almost forty years.”
Luca's expression sharpened.
“Explain.”
Mrs. Moretti looked smaller beneath the library lamps.
“I knew Matteo before I knew your father.”
Nobody interrupted.
“We were young. Stupid. He was charming then. Restless, but charming. I believed I loved him.”
Vanessa lowered her eyes.
Mrs. Moretti continued.
“Then I learned there was another woman. Isabella.”
Vanessa looked up.
“My mother?”
“Yes.”
Mrs. Moretti's voice softened.
“She didn't know about me either.”
The old woman gave a sad smile.
“Matteo was talented at making women believe they were the only person in the room.”
Luca crossed his arms.
“And then you married my father.”
“A year later.”
“Was I conceived before the wedding?”
“No. But Matteo refused to believe that.”
She reached into her purse and removed a tiny brass key.
“This is why I hid in the sewing room.”
I frowned.
Mrs. Moretti looked at me.
“You thought I chose it because no one used it anymore.”
“I did.”
“I chose it because of the floorboard beneath the cutting table.”
Luca's eyes narrowed.
“What is under it?”
“The only paper I never trusted a bank, lawyer, or safe with.”
Marco dispatched a guard to retrieve it from the mansion.
While we waited, Luca walked to the window.
I wanted to go to him.
I didn't.
This was not my secret to comfort away.
Vanessa sat beside her mother-in-law-who-never-became-her-mother-in-law and stared at the floor.
“Did my mother know?”
Mrs. Moretti nodded.
“Eventually.”
“That Matteo thought Luca was his?”
“Yes.”
“Is that why he hated Antonio?”
“It was one reason.”
Vanessa laughed bitterly.
“So my entire life he told me Antonio stole everything from him. His money. His company. My mother. And apparently he believed Antonio stole his son too.”
Mrs. Moretti looked at her.
“Matteo did not lose those things. He destroyed them.”
Vanessa's eyes filled.
“You should have told me.”
“I should have told many people many things.”
That was the closest thing to confession I had ever heard from a Moretti.
An hour later, the guard arrived carrying a small metal box.
Mrs. Moretti unlocked it.
Inside were letters tied with ribbon, a hospital bracelet, and a sealed envelope yellowed with age.
She gave the envelope to Luca.
He opened it.
A laboratory report slid out.
PATERNITY PROBABILITY: 99.87%.
Tested father: Antonio Lorenzo Moretti.
Luca sat down.
For the first time all night, he looked exhausted.
Mrs. Moretti moved toward him, then stopped.
It was such a small hesitation, but I understood it.
She did not know whether her son wanted comfort from the mother who had hidden this from him.
Luca noticed too.
For several seconds, neither spoke.
Then he held out his hand.
Mrs. Moretti took it.
"I was angry with your father for demanding the test," she said. "I thought if he loved me, he should trust me. He told me trust and certainty were not the same thing when a child would someday inherit everything he had built."
Luca gave a tired laugh.
"That sounds like him."
"It does."
She squeezed his hand.
"When the result came back, Antonio never mentioned Matteo's claim again. Not once. But I did something worse. I kept the shame of the question alive in myself. I hid the report because I was afraid you would someday learn I had loved Matteo before your father and think differently of me."
Luca looked at her.
"I do think differently of you."
She flinched.
He continued.
"I think you're a person who was twenty-four once. Apparently our family forgot mothers existed before they became mothers."
Her eyes filled.
He looked down at the paternity report.
"I'm angry you hid this."
"You should be."
"I'm angry you knew enough about Matteo to be afraid of Vanessa and still didn't tell me why."
"You should be angry about that too."
Luca nodded.
Then he lifted his eyes.
"But I am not ashamed of you."
Mrs. Moretti covered his hand with both of hers.
The moment was quiet, almost ordinary, and because of that it felt more intimate than any grand reconciliation could have.
For years, this family had treated secrets like armor. Tonight, piece by piece, the armor was coming off.
And underneath it were simply people who had been afraid.
Mrs. Moretti touched his shoulder.
“Your father insisted on the test when you were three months old. Matteo had sent him photographs and letters. Antonio was furious with me for keeping my old relationship secret.”
Luca looked at the report.
“Why didn't you destroy this?”
“Because your father wanted me to.”
He frowned.
She smiled sadly.
“And by then I had learned that destroying uncomfortable truths only makes them more powerful.”
Luca looked at her.
That sentence belonged to the entire Moretti family.
Maybe to every person in the room.
Vanessa rubbed both hands over her face.
“So Matteo sent the photograph tonight to make Luca turn against you.”
“Yes.”
“He wanted us divided.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
Marco answered from the doorway.
“Because he's coming back.”
Everyone turned.
Marco held a tablet.
“We traced movement from three Vesper accounts in the last hour. Large transfers. Vehicles were rented under shell-company names. Two known associates entered Illinois this afternoon.”
Luca stood.
“How many?”
“At least six men.”
“Target?”
“We don't know.”
Mrs. Moretti looked at the photograph.
“I do.”
Luca turned.
“The mansion.”
Marco frowned.
“Why attack an empty house?”
“It isn't empty.”
She looked at Luca.
“Your father's archive is there.”
Luca's face changed.
“I moved the archive three years ago.”
“Most of it.”
He stared at her.
“What did you keep?”
“A ledger Antonio wrote by hand. Names, dates, payments. He started it after he realized Matteo had corrupted Vesper.”
Marco swore.
“Where?”
Mrs. Moretti looked at me.
“The servants' wing.”
I blinked.
“What?”
“In the old linen room. Behind the wall panel.”
Luca stared at his mother.
“You hid evidence against Matteo in the servants' wing?”
“Your father said powerful men never look where they believe unimportant people belong.”
The sentence cut through me.
My father had died because Matteo thought he was disposable.
Vanessa had dismissed me because I was a maid.
And Antonio Moretti, for all his sins, had hidden the most dangerous book in Chicago behind shelves of folded towels because he understood arrogance better than locks.
Luca picked up his coat.
“We go back.”
Marco shook his head.
“Boss, if Matteo is headed there, we should let law enforcement intercept him.”
Luca looked at the memory card.
“Not until we have the ledger.”
I stood.
“So we retrieve it before he does.”
Luca immediately frowned.
“You are staying here.”
“No.”
“Sophie.”
“I know the servants' wing better than anyone in this room.”
“So does Matteo if he has plans of the house.”
“He won't know which panels stick, which doors look locked but aren't, or which laundry chute connects to the lower corridor.”
Marco looked at Luca.
“She has a point.”
Luca gave him a look that could have frozen boiling water.
Marco lifted both hands.
“I didn't say I liked it.”
I stepped closer to Luca.
“My father died trying to get evidence out. If his name is anywhere in that ledger, I'm going.”
Luca lowered his voice.
“This is not about proving courage.”
“I know.”
“Then why do you keep walking toward danger?”
I thought about it.
“Because I spent six years walking away from questions I didn't know I was allowed to ask.”
His expression softened.
“I can't do that anymore.”
He stared at me for a long time.
Then he said, “You stay beside me.”
Again.
This time, I answered, “Only if you stay beside me.”
Something almost warm passed through his eyes.
“Deal.”
Vanessa stood too.
“I'm coming.”
Luca shook his head.
“You stay with Leo.”
She looked upstairs.
For once, she didn't argue.
“Bring me one thing.”
“What?”
“The truth about my mother.”
Luca nodded.
We left at 2:18 in the morning.
The snow had stopped.
Chicago glittered in the distance beneath a black winter sky.
As our convoy turned toward the Moretti estate, Marco's phone rang.
He answered.
His face tightened.
“Say again.”
Then he looked at Luca.
“The mansion's perimeter alarm just went offline.”
Luca's hand moved toward his jacket.
Marco continued.
“And someone opened the front gates from inside.”
Luca looked at me.
I understood immediately.
May you like
Matteo did not need to break into the Moretti mansion.
Someone inside had invited him in.
